At around 6 p.m. ET Tuesday evening, the Nuggets arrived at what could be their residence for the next 90 days, 1000 West Buena Vista Drive.
The Gran Destino Tower sits on Walt Disney World’s Coronado Springs Resort and will be Denver’s home base for the next 10 weeks if the Nuggets reach the Western Conference semifinals like they did a season ago. A conference finals appearance means Denver will be in Orlando until the end of September. If the Nuggets reach the Finals, Denver won’t leave Disney World grounds until mid-October.
“There’s no playbook. There’s no one that I can call up who’s gone through what we’re going to go through,” Michael Malone said last week. “We’re going to learn as we go.”
The Nuggets’ unprecedented quest for an NBA Championship shifted into another gear Tuesday when the team touched down in Orlando for the NBA’s restart.
Here’s what the Nuggets’ first 24 hours inside the NBA bubble were like.
Once the Nuggets entered the Gran Destino Tower Tuesday evening, they were immediately administered coronavirus tests. Each player and staffer was then sequestered to their rooms for a mandatory 36-48 hour quarantine.
Of course, not every member of the Nuggets’ 36-person traveling party is currently in Orlando. Nuggets general manager Calvin Booth estimated Wednesday that 3/4 of the team’s full traveling party was on the Tuesday afternoon flight to Florida and that the ones who weren’t will be arriving soon.
“We anticipate those guys will be trickling in here in the next few days as those guys come up negative and we can get them on flights down here,” Booth said.
The biggest name not currently with the team is Nikola Jokic. Back on June 23, reports surfaced that Jokic had tested positive for coronavirus while in Serbia and although the All-NBA big man was asymptomatic and has since tested negative for the virus, travel issues have kept him from joining the team in Orlando, per a team source.
“We’re trying to work out the logistics right now. He’s not en route as far as I know,” Booth said. “I think he’s waiting just to get a proper flight and get out here. I think he’s feeling good about his situation and ready to go.”
Once Jokic arrives at Disney World, he’ll be subject to his own quarantine like his teammates and Nuggets staffers are currently undergoing. He’ll miss at least the Nuggets’ first practice which is scheduled for Thursday at 5 p.m. ET.
Denver will also practice Friday from 2-5 p.m. ET and then Saturday from 7-10 p.m. ET. The Nuggets will scrimmage the Wizards on July 22, the Pelicans on July 25, and the Magic on July 27 before playing their first of eight seeding games Aug. 1 against the Heat (1 p.m. ET, ESPN/ALT).
Booth said the Nuggets aren’t concerned about Jokic’s availability for the restart.
“No, I don’t think we’re concerned at all,” Booth said. “I think he’s excited about joining the bubble. I think everybody realizes the opportunity that we have and they want to try and take advantage of it. It’s just a matter of getting him in the bubble safely and making sure he’s healthy.”
The members of Denver’s traveling party who are currently at Disney World have been treated to three meals a day while inside the bubble. Breakfast, lunch and dinner get dropped at their hotel room doors around 8 a.m., 12 p.m. and 6 p.m. respectively throughout the day.
On Tuesday night after arriving at the hotel, the Nuggets’ dinner consisted of grilled chicken, white fish, pasta with bolognese sauce, roasted summer vegetables, fresh garden greens, arugula, watermelon, pickled red onion, goat cheese, and mozzarella caprese salad. The meal went viral on social media after Nuggets guard Troy Daniels posted (a portion) of the dinner that he received to his Instagram story, but a source told DNVR that the main courses from Tuesday’s dinner arrived shortly after Daniels’ picture was posted.
For breakfast Wednesday morning, some eat french toast sticks, quiche, potatoes and fruit. Chicken and fish with salad and pasta highlighted Wednesday’s lunch menu while dinner later that night included a surf and turf option of steak and shrimp with rice, salad and fresh fruit.
Until the 36-48-hour quarantine is up, players and staffers must stay isolated in their rooms until they return two negative coronavirus tests 24 apart. In other words, they’ve had loads of down time. Many players brought their personal video game consoles to Orlando and if I was Disney, I’d boost my WiFi speed.
Wednesday night also featured another round of coronavirus testing, which the team will get the results from on Thursday. After players and staffer return two negative tests 24 hours apart, they’ll be able to practice Thursday and officially enter the NBA bubble, Oura ring and all.
Once plays and staffers are out of their hotel room quarantine, meals will look a lot different. Disney restaurants may actually be open to players and teams will be able to have meals prepared for the whole roster. The NBA is also creating an off-campus kitchen and partnering with restaurants including Morton’s and Del Frisco’s to provide delivery service to the bubble.
But before then, the Nuggets have their first organized team activity since the NBA season was suspended on March 11. Denver is slated to hold its first practice in around four months on Disney’s Coronado fiesta court Thursday evening.
