Mr. Connelly,

Welcome, and thank you for coming. In light of the fact that this offseason may be the most important to the Nuggets since drafting Carmelo I would like to present you with some information. The above statement may seem dramatic but I have no doubt you’ll agree within a couple minutes.

First of all let me congratulate you on the Jokic acquisition. Incredible. You have my lifelong admiration for finding and drafting Jokic. Outside of a couple NBA superstars he is my current favorite player to watch and I have no doubt he will remain so for the next ten years. As you are no doubt aware, his advanced statistics are otherworldly and should only improve. I am also very complimentary of Juancho, Beasley, Harris and Murray. Great pickups for their draft position.

Let me get right to it. The Nuggets are about to face a question of timing. I have no doubt you already have a vision for this team and I personally really like where things are going. The emphasis I would like to make regarding timing is about when the Nuggets are looking to compete for a championship. Right now it seems the current thought process is something along the following lines. Draft as best as possible. Develop the current players and work hard not to lose an asset for nothing. Get players on as favorable of contracts as possible. Compete for the second and third round of the playoffs. Nail the right trade at some point. Maintain cap flexibility. Attract a star free agent as that second or third star on the team. Compete for a championship. While sooner would be better we are probably four to five years from competing for a championship if everything goes perfectly and, lets be honest, if there is a fair amount of luck thrown in.

Here’s the problem, about 25 other GM’s are doing exactly the same thing. They are trying to rebuild while competing. As you are well aware the obstacles the Nuggets face are significant. The salary cap, small market and not being a free agent destination are the most intimidating of those obstacles. Now, I know what you are thinking, I’m going to start talking about tanking. No, that is not where this is going.

This offseason is incredibly important because you have several options available to you. You could dump hundreds of millions into older stars and hope for magic. You could resign Gallo, draft well and hope the guys progress better than expected and Gallo continues his miraculous run of health. Both of those situations are almost certain mediocrity. Not only are they certain mediocrity, they doom the Nuggets to mediocrity for years. Imagine something different, something no one else is doing.

May I present to you the Jokic Plan. The bones of this plan are that with Jokic we have an exceptional player that will almost certainly be a superstar. Jokic should give us about 10 years of high level play until he begins to regress. The first six of those years will be spent developing players, the next four competing for a championship. I realize six years sounds like a long time but only with incredible lottery luck and a gift trade would we be able to beat that timeline anyway on the current plan.

The development is the key to this plan. Your drafting acumen is well known and should only increase the stable of young players the Nuggets possess. Having a bunch of young guys with potential isn’t exactly revolutionary. The problem is putting young players in the right situation to progress and succeed. Presti in OKC has done well at continually refreshing his team with young players with potential. The problem has been developing them. In OKC this year Oladipo, Adams and Domantas to name a few all stagnated or regressed. Part of that was almost certainly the fact that Westbrook only passed to gain an assist and if they didn’t perform as expected they received a glare that Medusa would have envied. It was a perfect example of the rebuilding/competing conundrum. Jokic of course provides the key. Jokic would be the anti Westbrook. Jokic would inflate, not destroy the value of young players. Here’s what the plan would look like.

The Nuggets continue their insightful drafting looking for high reward players.
The Nuggets look to add players who are undrafted or playing overseas. A couple examples of such guys currently playing in the NBA are Jonathan Simmons, Robert Covington, Joe Ingles, Tyler Johnson, and Wesley Matthews.
The Nuggets become a team primarily interested in developing players. Jokic on the floor with guys who are willing to play the right way will help them get better rapidly. The back door cuts, ball movement, screens and the expectation of taking open shots completely frees guys up to play.
Malone can return to being a defensive minded coach. His quote at the beginning of the year was telling. "These guys just won’t do it." Well, if they just won’t do it they can come out and others be sent in to play in their place. Jokic will bring enough offense for us to survive.
The Nuggets focus on drafting high IQ players. This of course implies that there is such a thing as a low IQ player. That would be players such as Serge Ibaka, Tony Snell, and Kenneth Faried. Guys with above average athleticism and ability but an inability to leverage that into the potential they have. Draymond Green, Chris Paul, Iggy and Kevin Love are examples of high IQ players. They maximize their physical abilities and fit within the system they are in.
The Nuggets approach the season with a squad mindset. Guys would know they are being judged on a per minute basis and work their ass off to perform in those minutes. They would also be able to build some familiarity with the guys they play with consistently for those minutes, even if it is only fifteen per game.
Veterans like Gallo, Chandler, Faried and Nelson would be viewed as assets to be flipped for draft picks or young guys. They would be treated accordingly. I know Gallo says he loves it here but a monster contract for injury plagued Gallo could significantly hamper Denver for the next five years.
A bevy of long, defensive minded, loping athletes who rush teams in waves every night at altitude would turn Denver into the worst part of every road trip.
The fans would love it. Effort every night. The chance to argue the most recent prospects, either undrafted or not. Online forums discussing the stats and trade value of every player. We would love it. I can’t tell you the pods, articles and general arguments that would break out. Any young unheralded player that gets on a hot streak would be deified Jeremy Lin style. Not only would we love it, every other educated fan in the nation would love it. They would all be discussing various Nuggets players and wondering how those players would fill holes on their team. The Nuggets might possibly become the most discussed team in the league.
Sign players to long contracts, four or five years, with team options for years two and three. That way if the player turns out to be good we can take the team option and then when we trade the player their new team knows they are getting an under market player for the next three or so years. If it doesn’t work we can simply drop the player.
Make trades to grab guys who had a bad year. For example look at Victor Oladipo. Underperformed this year in OKC offensively even though at 25 he should be close to peaking. RPM still puts him as a top four defensive guard in the league but this year his offense took a step back. Oladipo in a fast, share the ball, free flowing, offense would immediately become the guy everyone thought he was going to be. He would then be sold high to a team looking for their two guard of the future in exchange for some intriguing potential.



The above is the general plan. The following are reasons this plan would succeed

Jokic makes everyone better. Guys would gain confidence and have better stats playing with Jokic.
The Warriors and Cavs are super teams that still have a couple years left. Barring catastrophic injury they will be dominating the NBA landscape for at least the next three years.
No one else is employing this plan. There are about twenty five teams in the league who are trying to win now and another five will tank every year, usually after the All-Star break when it’s apparent they aren’t going to do much.
It frees up Malone to coach based on individual performance, not the pressure of trying to win every single game and therefore being over-reliant on veterans.
Players will give energy and effort not just to the game but to workouts, practice, video sessions and the innumerable things that bring excellence. In other words the culture of the organization would become ultra professional.
After we draft well and make some trades we will have some legitimate assets. With enough interest surrounding Denver eventually a veteran free agent or two will choose Denver. With one young All-Star, two young borderline stars and excellent role players, adding two star veterans should be enough to really compete for a couple years.


Tim, this is a solid plan. As a die-hard, multiple jersey’s, Carmelo-hating, Jokic is going to be better than Magic Johnson fan, let me say we are with you. We as in the fans who have been waiting twenty years for a chance. We as in the fans who every year come to the season with a tiny sliver of hope but have it cruelly crushed when we realize that once again we are trying to rebuild while competing and we end up doing neither well. Give us hope Tim. As fans we are generally knowledgeable and are becoming better educated all the time. We know LeBron or Durant isn’t walking in that door. We know that we need to do something different from what 25 other NBA teams are doing. Give us hope Tim. Don’t make us debate how life changing Kyle Lowry or Millsap is gonna be for our franchise. They are good but they aren’t bringing a championship to Denver in their year or so of All-Star play left. Give us hope. Let the league know our players are for sale. Let the players know. They are all playing for the next contract and interest in them is good news. Give us hope Tim, give us something the league hasn’t seen. Something no one else is doing. The sheer audacity of it will capture attention. Give us hope Tim, we deserve it for patiently staying with the Nuggets for so long. Don’t insult our intelligence by saying this year will be different. Give us hope, give us a plan we can buy in on. Give us the gift of possibility.


In conclusion Mr. Connelly, here is my gift to you. This plan is all yours. You never need to even reference me. The hope is enough for me. The last time we had hope we were rooting for Carmelo and Kenyon Martin to carry us past the Lakers. Looking back it seems ridiculous we were even willing to believe those guys could be complete NBA players for a whole series, but at the time we really thought so. That was the most hope this franchise has had since Dikembe beat the Sonics. That’s pathetic. Give us hope Tim, real hope. Hope based on facts, not just luck. Hope for that trophy. Hope in the power of Jokic. Hope for a championship.

Best regards,

NugzD