Jusuf Nurkic cleared for full contact practice, Emmanuel Mudiay questionable vs. Utah

The Denver Nuggets received some much-welcomed news on the injury front today as center Jusuf Nurkic was cleared by doctors to participate in full contact practices without any limitations, as reported by Chris Dempsey.

#Nuggets C Jusuf Nurkic (knee) has been cleared to begin contact practice. He'll be worked into drills slowly, on minutes restrictions.

— Chris Dempsey (@chrisadempsey) December 17, 2015

Once he is able to go thru a full practice, he'll likely be available to play. Still at least a couple weeks for all of this. #Nuggets

— Chris Dempsey (@chrisadempsey) December 17, 2015

Nurkic is recovering from surgery which he had in May to repair a slightly torn patellar tendon in his left knee. He suffered the injury during the second-half of last season, but played through the injury on the way to a successful rookie season where he averaged 6.9 points and 6.2 rebounds in 62 games. Nurkic was also an NBA All-Rookie Second team selection.

The original diagnosis was the Nurkic would be sidelined 3-4 months, but the Nuggets have been vague on his progress and a firm timetable on his return date. Throughout the summer, preseason and first quarter of the regular season, the Nuggets front office has been firm with the stance that Nurkic is “ahead of schedule,” and coach Michael Malone put an “end of November” timetable on the Bosnian’s return, a date which came and went without much chatter.

Up until this point, Nurkic was only participating in non-contact portions or practice, and routinely put on shooting exhibitions during drills and prior to Nuggets games — mostly because that’s the only sort of activities that his rehab permitted him to do.

https://vine.co/v/im2j1E2lM3J

Because of him limited ability to do much physical activity, Nurkic still needs a couple of weeks to get back into basketball shape, which remains a tall task for the 7-foot 280 pound 21-year-old.

“He hasn’t done anything,” Malone said. “So we’ll probably limit him to 15 [minutes] of practice, then maybe half an hour, then maybe 45 minutes, then an hour. Once he can get through a full practice, then he’ll be ready to play. Whether that’s two weeks, three weeks, who knows? Obviously keep our fingers crossed that the sooner the better. But until that happens, we’ve got guys in Kenneth [Faried] and Joffrey [Lauvergne] and Darrell Arthur and Nikola [Jokic] who are playing at a high level right now. So, we’ll continue to hold it down until he is back.”

The Nuggets didn’t circle a date or game that they want Nurkic to return by, but if we look ahead a target date to return could come in early January.

Mudiay questionable at Utah

Rookie Emmanuel Mudiay was upgraded to questionable versus Utah tomorrow night in Salt Lake City after missing the last two game with a right ankle sprain.

In his absence, veteran point guard Jameer Nelson has filled the void in a big way posting an impressive 13.3 points and 6.0 assists in 32.6 minutes over the better part of three games.

In fact, Nelson had already been trending up throughout the Nuggets last string of games where they’ve won five of their last six. He’s routinely been on the floor in the latter stages of the fourth quarter to close games over Mudiay, as the rookie has struggled this season; especially offensively where he’s scoring 10.7 points per game, but shooting just 31.1 percent from the field. Mudiay is also dead last among point guard in ESPN’s Real Plus Minus and second to last of all qualified players.