The idea first dawned on Michael Malone, his staff, and Denver’s front office when the Nuggets dealt for JaVale McGee at the trade deadline.
What would it look like if McGee and Nikola Jokic shared the floor? Could the two 7-footers with a combined 14 feet of height and nearly 15 feet of length be of use against certain opponents? What advantages could those two playing together create?
The Nuggets finally discovered answers to some of those questions Thursday when Malone started McGee and Jokic together in Denver’s 114-103 win over the Timberwolves. The results were encouraging.
“I knew they’d be able to play together,” Malone said. “I didn’t expect them to have the night they had the first time doing so.”
The Nuggets were outscored by two points in the 24 minutes that Jokic and McGee played alongside one another but outrebounded the Timberwolves 35-17 with the two centers on the floor. Denver also collected 13 offensive rebounds in the 24 minutes that the two tallest players in its rotation played together. Jokic finished with 14 total rebounds, six of which came on the offensive glass. McGee corralled 13 total rebounds. Five of those came off of Nuggets’ missed shots. As a team, Denver out-rebounded Minnesota 53-43 and outscored the Timberwolves 60-30 in the paint.
The Timberwolves felt the Nuggets’ length on the first possession of the game. Denver ran a set play off the opening tip where after McGee gave Denver possession, he dashed towards the rim and got separation from his defender thanks to a timely backscreen from Facu Campazzo. Jokic lofted a pass his way, and although McGee missed the lay-in his length kept the ball alive. Jokic corralled it and scored the Nuggets’ first basket of the night.
“I feel like us both in at the same time is a great tandem, especially on the rebounding aspect,” McGee said. “I feel like we’re just tapping it to each other trying to get offensive rebounds and defensive rebounds. It’s an amazing feeling.”
Don’t expect the Jokic-McGee frontcourt to stick in Denver’s starting lineup long-term. The Nuggets default starting five will still likely include Jokic, Aaron Gordon, Michael Porter Jr., Facu Campazzo and probably Austin Rivers for the time being. But the tall-ball pairing is something Malone has in his back pocket to deploy against certain matchups.
The Timberwolves fit the bill. Minnesota started former Nuggets big man Jarred Vanderbilt at the four next to Karl-Anthony Towns. But after Denver grabbed four offensive rebounds over the first 4 1/2 minutes of the first quarter, Minnesota was forced to go to its own Twin Towers look featuring fellow seven-footer Naz Reid alongside Towns. Reid and Towns went on to play 22 minutes together Thursday.
So would the Lakers, who will surely play lots of two-big lineups featuring combinations of Anthony Davis, Andre Drummond and Marc Gasol against the Nuggets in a potential future postseason meeting.
“The playoffs are all about matchups,” Malone said.
“It’s a confidence builder knowing you can go to a really big lineup.”
After McGee drew two shot-blockers on this attempted sky-hook early in the first quarter, the easiest offensive rebound of Jokic’s life fell right into his lap.
This one was just unfair. Jokic, McGee and 6-foot-9 Gordon all hit the offensive glass for this Rivers three-point attempt. Minnesota didn’t stand a chance to clear the rebound.
I loved how aggressively McGee went after this board. He put his body right into Towns when Jokic shot and used his length to chase the ball down. I also bet that Jokic was more comfortable shooting this fall-away jumper knowing that McGee was going to be in position to rebound if he missed.
Tall-ball lineups aren’t foreign in Denver. Last year, the Nuggets deployed Jokic alongside Mason Plumlee for 87 minutes over 48 regular-season games. Denver outscored its opponent by an average of 16.1 points per 100 possessions in those minutes. It was the Nuggets’ most efficient two-man lineup combination that logged at least 50 minutes last season.
The Nuggets can use McGee like they used Plumlee and have him at times guard the tougher interior matchup if he’s playing with Jokic. But McGee’s a much more imposing shot-blocker and rim protector than Plumlee was.
Jokic and McGee teamed up to suffocate Towns on this drive right before halftime.
How McGee rumbles down the paint on the offensive end of the floor reminds you of Kenneth Faried, who Jokic was teammates with for three seasons from 2015-18. The Nuggets recorded a positive +- in all three of those seasons when Jokic and Faried were on the court together. In 2016-17, Denver registered a 12.9 Net Rating (122.2 Offensive Rating) in the 479 minutes Jokic and Faried logged alongside one another.
“To be honest, I think I could play with anybody,” said Jokic. “We were playing good. (McGee) was rebounding for us really well. He was blocking a couple shots. He was a really good rim protector today.”
The Nuggets’ lineup malleability throughout the Jokic era is mostly a testament to the league’s MVP and how he’s able to maximize the skill-set of whomever he’s playing around. He’s that savvy unselfish and just that straight-up smart. He’s going to make whatever big or small he’s logging minutes next to more dangerous and look even better than they should.
For a team that has had to throw patchwork lineups together on the fly over the last month, the Nuggets proved Thursday that they still have the personnel and lineup versatility to adapt to certain situations. But Jamal Murray isn’t coming back this season. Will Barton and PJ Dozier won’t be back prior to the playoffs and if either plays again this season is still up in the air (Barton is the closer of the two to a return.) Monte Morris (injury management) wasn’t active Thursday after he made his return from a 12-game absence due to a hamstring strain earlier this week, but the Flint, Michigan native will play Friday in front of family and friends in Detroit. Denver will still be careful with his minutes going forward though.
Continued creativity will have to paramount within the Nuggets’ rotation. The Jokic-McGee tandem likely won’t be relied upon on a full-time basis, but Thursday wasn’t the last time that we’ll see the two centers share the floor over the next several weeks.
Offensively, spacing and shooting is a question mark in a Jokic-McGee-Gordon-Rivers-Campazzo fivesome, which the Nuggets started in Minnesota. But if Jokic and McGee are able to offensive rebound like they were Thursday, Denver will be OK. Defensively, their length can create problems all over the floor and particularly in the paint.
Maybe most of all, McGee can help Jokic conserve a bit of energy on defense. It’s energy he’ll certainly need on the offensive end of the floor if the Nuggets plan on making a deep playoff run.
“I think this can definitely be a lineup in the future, especially against teams that play two bigs,” said McGee. “I feel like it definitely gives Jok some time off of his legs on the defensive end when he has to guard the best, especially when it’s a big that’s a scorer. When he has to do that, I can guard him and he doesn’t have to worry about anything. He can just do what he does on offense.”
