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Malone mulls starting lineup changes ahead of Thursday's matchup with Wizards

Harrison Wind

December 8, 2016

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In the midst of a six-game road trip, the Denver Nuggets, who are losers of six of their last eight, are contemplating their second significant lineup change of the regular season.

The first significant change, which came after Denver’s 125-110 home loss to the Golden State Warriors back on November 10, saw Michael Malone move away from the twin towers frontcourt of Nikola Jokic and Jusuf Nurkic to a more traditional look that featured Nurkic alongside Kenneth Faried who started 64 games at the four for the Nuggets last season.

After yet another disappointing first quarter against Brooklyn Wednesday night that saw the Nuggets fall behind 11-0 and 36-23 after 12 minutes, Malone is contemplating another switch to try and jumpstart Denver at the beginning of games.

“We’ll look at starting groups and combinations, who plays better together,” Malone said after the loss Wednesday night. “But anything we can do to alleviate the big leads that we’re giving up early, we have to look at. We owe it to ourselves.”

Following a first quarter in Philadelphia Monday night that saw Denver turn the ball over nine times and trail 27-18 before pulling out a 106-98 victory, the Nuggets committed six turnovers in the first 12 minutes of their loss to the Nets including three on their first four possessions of the game.

Those changes could start with Faried, who was benched after only playing four minutes in the first half as Malone elected to sub in Darrell Arthur at power forward to start the third quarter. Faried ironically returned in the fourth, with Malone in the locker room after he argued a foul call and was immediately tossed from the game, and helped the Nuggets overcome a 29-point second-half deficit. It wouldn’t be a shock to see Arthur at the start of Thursday night’s game in Washington.

Jokic is another candidate to return to the starting lineup. The 21-year-old put together back-to-back double-doubles against the Suns and Heat last week before a wrist injury forced him to miss Denver’s last three games. Jokic returned against the Nets and played well, scoring 14 points and grabbing 11 rebounds in 21 minutes off the bench. Jokic was also a +18 plus-minus and was a key cog in the Nuggets’ second-half comeback.

Nurkic has also especially struggled as of late. The Nuggets are a -38 plus-minus in 54 minutes over their last three games with him on the floor.

Elsewhere, does Malone think about sitting second-year point guard Emmanuel Mudiay down and reducing his role for a few games in favor of Jameer Nelson?

Over his last ten games, Mudiay is averaging 9.2 points on just 30.7 percent shooting from the field. He is keeping his turnovers down, committing just 14 over that span, but Mudiay’s assists and playmaking has suffered as he’s become more conservative on offense. Mudiay has just 37 assists in his last ten games and his one assist Wednesday night against Brooklyn, a botched fast break that nearly resulted in a turnover, was Mudiay’s first dime in his last three games.

Conversely, Nelson has been a steady contributor off the bench for Denver this season. Over the Nuggets’ last three games, Denver is a +44 plus-minus in 86 minutes with Nelson on the floor as compared to a -36 plus-minus in 61 minutes with Mudiay. Mudiay has already been losing fourth-quarter minutes to Nelson over the past few games, does that trend carry over to Thursday night’s first quarter? Last season, the game “slowed down” from Mudiay after he sat out 14 games in December and January with an ankle injury. Maybe a reduced role will have a similar effect.

Finally, does Malone consider inserting Wilson Chandler, the Nuggets’ Most Valuable Player this season and leading Sixth Man of the Year candidate into the starting lineup?

Denver could play Chandler and Gallinari next to each other to start games, but Chandler has grown accustomed to his role off the bench and the Nuggets need him to anchor the second unit. Malone could start Chander, stagger him with Gallinari like the Warriors do with Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson at times and play him primarily with the bench group.

With Gallinari’s struggles as of late – he’s scoring just 11.4 points per game on 38.6 percent shooting since returning from a sore right thigh that sidelined him for four games – Chandler would give the starting group an added boost offensively, but that change doesn’t appear as imminent as others.

It’s evident something likely needs to change in the Nuggets starting lineup. Mudiay has a really hard time finding lanes with two bigs that play primarily in the paint, in Faried and Nurkic, and defensively, that group hasn’t shown enough intensity, focus, and discipline on that end of the floor to be effective at the start of games.

Playing through Nurkic can be a potent offensive strategy at times, but surrounding him with two non-shooters in Faried and Mudiay compounds spacing, lets the defense collapse and makes things hard on the Bosnian.

Malone has shown he’s not afraid to make a change and tinker with his lineup and rotation when he deems it necessary – which could be looked at as a strength or weakness – but when looking at what players play best with one another, and what combination have worked for the Nuggets this season, Malone should come to the conclusion that his starting group needs a shuffle.