@MarkKnudson41
Strike One: The Denver Nuggets trailed the lowly Washington Wizards by two points and the clock was winding down. With less than two seconds on shot clock – about nine seconds remained in the game – the Wizards missed a short shot and Denver’s Nikola Jokic tipped the rebound out to Jamal Murray. For some crazy reason, four of the five Wizards on the court were all below the foul line, leaving Denver with a big numbers advantage as they headed the other direction in an attempt to send the game into overtime.
It looked like some Mile High Magic might arrive in the nick of time.
Then it didn’t.
Instead, this one sequence, this single epic fail, may have summed up the Nuggets struggles during this bizarre NBA season. The question is, will it end up being a signature moment in a season of discontent?
When he reached mid court with 4.7 seconds left on the clock, Murray had Michael Porter Jr and Facu Campazzo with him for a three-on-one fast break opportunity. Easy pickins, right? Go hard to the hoop against a lone backpedaling Washington defender…or fire a pass to a wide open Porter for an uncontested dunk…or…
Do what Murray inexplicably did: He stopped, picked up his dribble well behind the three point line, allowing a couple more players from both teams to enter the play – in other words, fast break opportunity gone – then double clutched before throwing a not so great pass to Campazzo who predictably bricked a three pointer. Game over. Nuggets lose.
Incredible.
Let’s start with Murray, who – as one astute observer on social media noted, is “about as consistent and Denver’s springtime weather.” He put up 50 a few games ago, remember? He had 34 that night against Washington. His confidence should be sky high at that moment…yet he hesitates, picks up his dribble – when at the very least if he continues to the rim, he’s going to the free throw line to tie up the game – and then passes the ball to the wrong guy for the wrong shot.
The right guy should have been MPJ, but he too made a bone head play. Instead of making himself a big target near the paint for a game tying dunk, he floated back to what’s become his too-comfortable zone, the three point line. There was no one between Porter and the bucket. An eight year old youth player knows that when there’s no one between you and the rim, you go to the basket. Duh.
Porter’s roller coaster young career has shown us several things. First, he is physically capable of doing things no one else on the Nuggets roster can do. No one. With his size and length, MPJ can slash to the rim as well as anyone in the league. And he can finish. When he chooses too.
But he’s also soft. He has shied away from the physical part of the game more often than not. He gets his fair share of rebounds, but not all that often when he’s in any sort of scrum in the paint. And he’s faaaaar more comfortable shooting the three – even fading away while doing so – than he is attacking the rim.
Maybe it’s a maturation thing with both Murray and MPJ. Murray is a shoot-first point guard who is trying to learn to distribute better. But he’s a scorer first and foremost. But his confidence appears to waiver…a lot. He’s yet to have a double-figure assists game this season and is averaging less than five assists per game. Had Campazzo had the ball in his hands instead of Murray, it’s likely Denver would have tied – or perhaps won the Washington game on a three by Murray at the horn. We’ll never know.
Porter has to grow up and figure out who he wants to be. There is soooo much talent and potential there. This roller coaster stuff with him should be a thing of the past by now. When will that happen? MPJ’s “plus-minus” stat against the Wizards was…0. Zero. Even. The next game against Oklahoma City, he had a plus-minus of +29.
Nuggets coach Michael Malone said the team will learn from the epic fail against Washington. Let’s hope so. Because if they don’t learn and change things, this season isn’t going to end anywhere close to the way they want it to.
Strike Two: It’s head scratching to watch. A big name NFL player is released or rumored to be on the trading block, and immediately everyone who follows the Denver Broncos instantly decides that the player should and will want to land in predominantly orange.
The latest cases are now of course Houston Texans standout quarterback DeShaun Watson and Seattle’s Russell Wilson. Both players have made it clear they’d welcome a trade, while their current teams have – to this point at least – declined to make them available. So the entire thing is really and exercise in futility at this point. But you never know.
What we do know is that if and when either the Seahawks or the Texans make their star QB’s available, there will be multiple suitors…and the players themselves will have a say in the matter. Broncos Country is just assuming that one or both would want to come to Denver. Like that’s some sort of foregone conclusion.
It’s not. Not even close.
Time for a reality check.
Yes, there was a time not that long ago when Denver was a prime destination for NFL free agents and the like. Pat Bowlen was among the best owners in all of sports, not just the NFL. John Elway was able to recruit and eventually sign Peyton Manning…then DeMarcus Ware. Aqib Talib came to Denver to play for Bowlen, Elway and head coach John Fox. So did T.J. Ward and Darian Stewart. Denver was an “It” place to play. And then they won Super Bowl 50 to boot.
Then things changed on a dime. Not just Manning’s retirement. Fox had already been replaced by Gary Kubiak…but then Kubs retired (kind of.) Most importantly, Bowlen’s failing health took him out of the mix, and those left to run the operation simply didn’t/don’t have Mr. B’s acumen.
Very quickly, Denver lost it’s “It” status and became just another mediocre NFL franchise. That’s were things remain today. Mediocre.
No, Denver is not an elite franchise anymore. Denver isn’t “the place to play” anymore and Broncos Country doesn’t have any real reason to assume that DeShaun Watson or Russell Wilson or any other elite available NFL players will want to come here to play for an organization in disarray just because it’s “our” Broncos.
It really is that simple.
Swallow hard: Denver does not have more to offer to or for Wilson or Watson that the New York Jets do. This is not an upper echelon franchise at the moment. This is a franchise that’s about to be sold, has a new front office and is pretty much still in rebuilding mode. If Watson is unhappy with the Texans after last season – they went 4-12 – then why would he want to come to Denver and join a team that was 5-11? Wilson wants to play for a winner. The Raiders have been mentioned as a possibility.
Ya, that hurts. It hurts because it’s true.
If Denver is ever going to rejoin the upper crust of the NFL, they will have to settle the ownership mess, hope that new General Manager George Paton is the right man for the gig, and draft and develop their own stud quarterback.
There are no givens and there are no shortcuts.
Strike Three: It wasn’t any secret that when Steve Addazio was hired to replace Mike Bobo as the head football coach at CSU, things on the offensive side of the ball were about to change. Dramatically.
Bobo likes to throw the ball. A lot. Under Jim McElwain and Bobo, CSU became a haven for future NFL wide receivers. Rashard Higgins. Michael Gallup. Bisi Johnson. Preston Williams…with Warren Jackson set to join that group very soon. When they came to Fort Collins, they knew they were going to get theirs. And they did.
When Bobo was fired and Addazio hired, it meant “Wide-out U” was about to become “Ground and Pound U.”
Now here we are.
Ram followers got a taste of what’s to come in the very limited four-game 2020 “season.” It started when Addazio replaced incumbent starting QB and NFL prospect Patrick O’Brien with transfer Todd Centeio before the first game against San Jose State. Centeio was an unknown to most at the time, a player with good feet and “escapability.” He can run – he led the team in rushing that night with 80 yards on the ground. But as a passer…umm…not so much.
In that season opening loss to the Bulldogs, Centeio completed just 10 of 23 passes for 141 yards…and most of those were early in the game. He was eventually replaced by O’Brien, who started the remaining three games.
For the season, Centeio completed just 39% of his throws and posted a quarterback rating of 69.0. Not good.
With O’Brien leaving the program, Addazio announced at the start of spring practice that Centeio will be the team’s starting QB in 2021.
This of course feeds into the perception that the days of the Rams posting big passing numbers are behind us. Expect Addazio to put his stamp on his second squad, and feature a lot more run than pass. Heralded wide receiver transfer Nate Craig Meyers saw the handwriting on the wall and announced he’s leaving Fort Collins, too.
It’s certainly not bad news to hear that Addazio wants to control the ball more, leave his defense on the field less, and be able to compete better in the trenches. After all, his background is as an offensive line coach (a job he was rumored to be in line for with Urban Meyer and the NFL’s Jacksonville Jags a few weeks back.) That can be a winning formula in football. But…
The best teams in College Football have mostly gone the direction of the “RPO” offense – Run-Pass Option – which requires their quarterbacks to be true dual threats. Drop back passers don’t pose that threat…but neither do QB’s who only pose a threat with their feet. Nothing Addazio does at the position now – aside from helping make marked improvement in Centeio’s passing skills – will be fooling anyone next fall. If his plan really is to simply line up and run the ball at the opposition – with his running backs and his QB – it could be a very long season.