Jokic, Millsap starting to become an item

BOULDER — It took four days of training camp, but the Denver Nuggets’ frontcourt duo of Paul Millsap and Nikola Jokic has started to hit their stride.

“Today was Paul Millsap’s best practice by far,” coach Michael Malone said as the Nuggets closed down training camp in Boulder and got ready to board an afternoon flight to Oakland for their preseason opener Saturday. “He asserted himself, he was confident. We made sure we were getting him the ball where he’s most effective and he made plays for himself and those around him. So it was great to see Paul start to feel a little more confident and comfortable within the offense.”

That Nuggets’ attack — the fifth-most efficient offense in the league last year and best in the NBA after Dec. 15 — experienced some growing pains over the first couple days of camp. But that’s to be expected when inserting a four-time All-Star like Millsap into a well-oiled machine like Denver’s offense.

But after six energetic and competitive practices, just one of which Malone called “mediocre to poor,” that pairing, which the Nuggets will call on to lead their offense this season, is meshing together nicely.

“Today was their best day. They’ve had moments in the first five practices where they look very good but they also have moments where you can tell it’s a new pairing,” Malone said. “They’re getting used to each other. Today though, I thought they had some great exchanges playing off of each other, playing with each other and hopefully off of today you can only build off that.”

Of course, there will be growing pains. The Nuggets’ offense last season revolved around Jokic after he was re-established in Denver’s starting lineup following a Dec. 12 loss in Dallas that ended a disappointing six-game road trip, and while things will still center on Jokic and his ability to initiate the Nuggets’ attack from the three-point line, high post, or block, Millsap will be a focal point as well.

The 32-year-old who rose to NBA prominence during his four-year run in Atlanta as the Hawks’ best player, has never played with another big like Jokic. Al Horford, who played alongside Millsap for most of his time in The A, was cut from the same cloth as Denver’s 6-foot-10 Serbian, but he never passed like Jokic or was never nearly as big of a focal point as Jokic was for the Nuggets.

As a result, the two bigs have found themselves on top of one another at times when Denver has scrimmaged this week.

“Just spacing,” Millsap said about what the two need to work on. “And it’s mostly me, just picking my spots and learning plays. Twelve years in and it’s always tough coming into a new program and a new system and learning plays. Once I learn the plays, it will run like clockwork.”

“It’s always a learning process when you come in and you got a guy like Jokic who’s got the ball in his hands a lot so you gotta get a feel for him, he’s gotta get a feel for me,” Millsap continued. “And then guys around us gotta get a feel for me so it’s a work in progress. It’s not going to happen overnight we know that. We feel like we made major strides from last night to this point.”

Then again, Jokic has never played with another power forward like Millsap. Last season Kenneth Faried and Wilson Chandler jumped in and out of  the starting lineup as Denver’s power forwards and while they both played well for the Nuggets — Faried’s gravity from the short corner was a needed wrinkle to Denver’s attack, as was Chandler’s scoring from the perimeter — Millsap is a true playmaking four and has a skill-set that alone can carry and has carried an offense before.

The two bigs in a sense can take pressure off of one another.

“The great thing now is that we have somebody who can share in that load. We can play through Paul Millsap in the post, we can play through Paul Millsap no the elbow or in the high post,” Malone said.

“When you’re so used to being the guy who has the ball like Nikola is and when you’re so used to being the guy who has the ball like Paul somewhat is, now you got to kind of play off each other,” Malone continued. “So if Paul is up top, sometimes we’re going to need Nikola to be low and vice versa. So I think it will be a relatively headache free transition for those guys but it’s not just walk in the gym and they got it. Repetition is the best teacher and I think the more we practice, the more we play, the more we script, I think they’ll get there.”

Denver’s preseason opener on Saturday in Golden State will obviously be a good test for the Nuggets. While Malone hasn’t decided on who he’ll start at point guard between Emmanuel Mudiay, and Jamal Murray, the latter of whom had his best practice of the week on Friday, the rest of Denver’s starting five is set.

Gary Harris, Chandler, Millsap, and Jokic will get their feet wet together against premier competition for at least a quarter or two in front of a boisterous Warriors crowd.

“This is West Coast offense at its fullest,” Millsap said.

The duo has improved as the week’s gone on and as Malone referenced at practice Friday, this isn’t the end of training camp for the Nuggets, but just the beginning. With a high usage piece like Millsap in the fold, it will likely take most of the preseason for those two and the rest of Denver’s offense to feel as comfortable as they did at points last year.

“Now, he knows my spots and I know his spots. We’re going to be good, or we’re going to be bad, I don’t know,” Jokic said with a laugh.