Each weekday, our DNVR Nuggets crew will be tackling one question about the Nuggets season in a round table format. Members, leave the questions that you’d like to see our writers answer in the comments section below and Harrison, Adam and Brendan will address them on an upcoming episode of the DNVR Nuggets Podcast.
Brendan Vogt: all the stuff I took for granted
As it turns out, all of the standing and waiting, the uninteresting matchups, the collective overreacting to the ups and downs of an 82-season that fills the life of a beat writer — it’s all worth it. Without it? I don’t know what to do with myself.
I would trade so much to witness a deflating loss to a sub-.500 team with you all, and attempt to talk you off the ledge in a podcast, only to second-guess my optimism and embrace the devil’s advocate as I lay my head on the pillow. I would trade so much to gather for a pre or post-game scrum with Michael Malone, despite being able to script virtually the entire availability in my head, if only to crack some overused jokes with my colleagues. I would trade so much for a free meal in Pepsi Center, even if the meal is, well — what I paid for.
I miss that the good, the bad, and the tedious all comprised a routine. A routine I have grown so used to, and in fact, quite like. For people like us, the NBA season isn’t something we can enter and exit as we please. It’s not a small part of our months, our weeks, or even our days. It is a lifestyle that consumes us, and I miss it already.
Adam Mares: The community
It’s only been two weeks but I have managed to find more than enough entertainment in watching old Nuggets games, catching up on tv shows, and just being surrounded by my family. The one thing I haven’t been able to replicate and I know that I won’t be able to replicate is being so close to the community of Nuggets fans around the globe. Walking up to my seat at Pepsi Center and high-fiving all of the DNVR fans, hanging out at the perch, drinking beers alongside Nuggets fans at the DNVR bar, and sharing in the day to day minutiae of the NBA regular season grind on social media.
The games are fun, and eventually the absence of the game itself will become stronger and stronger but the thing that I already miss is just being around the community, both in real life and online.
Harrison Wind: The unpredictability of every game
Arriving at the arena for a January game against the Cavaliers doesn’t come with the same level of excitement as a matchup against LeBron James, Anthony Davis and the Lakers does, but it still carries the same level of uncertainty. In the NBA, you never know what’s going to happen every night, and for me, it’s the most captivating part of covering the league.
Who could have predicted that Nikola Jokic would have recorded the fastest triple-double in league history on a chilly Milwaukee night just over two years ago? Or this season, that a shorthanded, seven-man rotation captained by Jokic would lead the Nuggets to the best win of the Michael Malone era in Utah. Who saw Michael Porter Jr.’s career-high 25 points coming in Indiana two nights after he played only 11 minutes against Houston? What about Jamal Murray scoring 14 of his 26 points in the fourth quarter to lead the Nuggets to a come-from-behind victory against the Spurs after a halftime phone call with his father, Roger, put him in the proper mindset to play through an injury.
There’s a lot of uncertainty around the league where we stand today. Will the season resume? What will it look like if/when it does? But the randomness and unpredictability of what the story was going to be on any given night always kept you on your toes and eager about arriving at the arena for every game. That’s what I’m missing most about the NBA right now.
