November 9, 2023 • 20 mins
We're breaking down recent games and dissecting the team's performance, from their blowout loss against the Timberwolves to their impressive plays against the Mavericks and Bulls. Michael Porter Jr.'s defensive prowess is up for discussion, as we gush over his potential All-Star status. We lament the unfortunate injury Jamal Murray sustained during the condensed season schedule and underline the necessity of his full recovery.
Ever wondered what makes Jokic tick? We share a hilarious anecdote that perfectly encapsulates his character, while also admiring his conditioning efforts. Our confidence in the Nuggets' repeat this season is unwavering, and we're stoked about the young guns - Christian Braun, Peyton Watson, and Julian Strother - on the bench. We also throw the spotlight on the All City, All NBA Podcast hosted by Adam Mares and Tim Legler, as a delightful bonus. Stick around for updates and previews of upcoming interviews, as we wrap up the previous week's activities and anticipate the weeks ahead. From Jokic's witty remarks to the Nuggets' season roundup, this episode is a fun one!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Brian (00:03):
Hey everyone, welcome back to Fandom from afar.
It's been another week alreadyand I appreciate all the
feedback that I got from thefirst week in review.
I had fun doing it, so we'regoing to do it again.
So this will be the review forweek two for our Denver Nuggets
NBA season.
First we'll go over the gamesthat happened since last time
recorded.
There were four of them.
(00:24):
Pretty fun week overall.
Nuggets went three and one.
That one was to the MinnesotaTimberwolves.
They lost one, 10 to 89, andtruthfully it wasn't even that
close.
The Timberwolves just dominated.
It was one of those nights.
The Nuggets on the road, I'mguessing in Minnesota in
November it's pretty cold, Idon't know what was going on,
(00:45):
but they just did not have itthat night and it's just one of
those games.
I tried to tell myself thatlast year but it was very
frustrating because the Nuggetshad quite a few of just one of
those games.
But now that we gotchampionship rings then it's a
little bit easier to take thesegames.
(01:06):
So it was just a blowoutdominated, nothing really to say
.
But I'm really interested inthe next matchup whenever these
teams play again.
I think the Nuggets obviouslythey got pride on the line.
They don't want to have a teamout there that just has
dominated them and is really abad matchup for them overall.
(01:27):
But I think the Nuggets skilllevel they should be able to
handle the T-wolves no problem.
Obviously they did in theplayoffs last year, but it'll be
interesting.
I think the Nuggets will comeout a little more motivated next
time those teams play.
So it should be almost like aplayoff atmosphere.
So I'm excited to see that OnMonday night Minnesota actually
(01:50):
took down Boston.
So the two top teams are whatpeople consider the top teams in
the league.
Minnesota has beaten them bothand at the time of this
recording they've given themtheir only losses that they have
on the season.
So if I'm a Timberwolves andthat's pretty exciting so I'll
have to reach out to my buddyRyan, who was on the podcast
(02:11):
earlier on and see how he'sfeeling about those Timberwolves
.
The next game was against theMavericks and this was a fun one
.
This was the first game of thein season tournament, so they
had the crazy court and the newjerseys and it was fun.
The Mavericks actually came inundefeated as well.
So it was a good test for bothteams and Nuggets kind of took
(02:33):
care of business.
They really looked like thebetter team.
They had just an answer foranything the Mavericks wanted to
do, including Luca, which Lucahas been having an amazing
season, but it was really fun tosee the Nuggets have multiple
options that can guard himpretty well, the most surprising
being MPJ.
(02:54):
He was kind of shutting himdown a little bit.
Luca was trying to drive orpost up and kind of do some
isolation on him and MPJ wasn'thaving any of it.
He's using his height Like MPJis a legit 6'10", 6'11" and he's
using his height to kind ofgive guys space, because he
knows he's not as quick as mostguys but he's bothering people.
(03:15):
He's playing some defense andit's really fun to see, because
of course Michael Porter canshoot as good as anyone in the
league and if he's adding somedefense to it as our fourth,
fifth, like third option onoffense, that's pretty deadly.
So it was really fun to see MPJ.
I think he's finally gettinghealthy.
He had the ankle issue in thepreseason and so it's fun to see
(03:40):
him kind of putting it alltogether now and it kind of
coincides with Jamal's injury,so it's perfect timing.
But it's also just veryexciting for the big picture to
see MPJ playing defense like heis.
And then also he had 24-9 inthe Dallas game and if he's
putting that in every night,that's just huge for the Nuggets
(04:02):
Next game second night of aback-to-back we had the Bulls
come in and it was close for thefirst half, but it was one of
those things where the Nuggetswere kind of playing with their
food a little bit.
They didn't try very hard in thefirst half and then the third
quarter just came out and theyreally it was beautiful to watch
(04:23):
, but they they kind of put thebulls away in the third quarter.
Michael Porter Jr Again 27points in this game too.
Like I said, he's just he'sreally just kind of putting it
all together.
It'll be really interesting tosee if the nuggets continue to
have such a great record thatChances are they're gonna end up
with two all-stars.
Like they can't just say it'sall yokich, especially when you
(04:45):
have such Great performances byteammates.
So if Jamal's out for anextended period of time, then
it'll be interesting to see ifMPJ can become an all-star this
year the way he's playing.
Like I would not.
I would not doubt it.
So unfortunately, like I said,jamal is hurt and he tried to
play a little bit in thisChicago game but ended up having
(05:07):
to leave with hamstring injuryand already before that he had a
thumb injury and a wrist injury, and he, more so than anyone
else, has kind of showed thedownside of having all these
games so early in the season.
The, at the time of thisrecording, the nuggets are seven
and one, which is the mostgames played in the NBA, and
(05:29):
they've all been prettycondensed into a short period of
time.
And so I think Him, more sothan anyone, has really kind of
gotten beat up by all thesegames.
And it's really unfortunatebecause obviously all the fans
really wanted him just to kindof continue on from what he was
doing in the playoffs and makingall-star team, and I was even
predicting he was gonna make anall-NBA team.
(05:50):
But Right now, with with himbeing out, I really don't want
them to rush him back.
I would rather him take histime, get fully healthy and then
come back and and then we'llmake our run.
Like I really wouldn't evenmind if he took a couple weeks
off just to make sure it wasn'tone of those lingering things
where he tries to come back andthen tweaks it again and then
(06:12):
he's just out for more time.
So Get healthy, jamal, butwe'll we'll hold down the fort
while you're going.
And Then the last game wasMonday night against the
Pelicans and Zion.
They were missing CJ McCallumand we were missing Jamal.
So both teams are a littleshort-handed, but it was a good
game.
(06:32):
The Pelicans were actually upby 20 in the first half and it
was looking like, oh no, this isgonna be another Effort, like
we saw against the Timberwolves.
But then the third quarter cameand, oh my goodness, the
Nuggets just really kind ofshowed what they could do and
they ended up winning the gameby 18.
(06:54):
So talk about a 38 pointturnaround in a pretty short
period of time.
And of course, Jokic was a bigpart of that.
He had an amazing game.
He really controlled everything.
He had 35, 14 and 12, but thatdoesn't even really Showed just
how much he dominated the game.
He's amazing, he's really takenit to another level and and I
(07:17):
already thought he was the bestplayer in the world.
But it's just so fun.
Every night he has new ways ofkind of Controlling the game and
just having fun out there.
Like on the Pelicans game hehad a couple passes that the
guys ended up blowing shots thatwould have been just all-time
highlights with like behind theback from the post past to
(07:37):
Reggie Jackson that blew thelayup and then he had one where
he went between his legs to KCPfor a three who just happened to
miss.
But he's just tried new stuffjust because he can and it's
kind of fun.
Now a big story.
The second half to was becauseof Jamal's injury, reggie got
moved to the starting lineup andthen Colin Gillespie was
(07:58):
Playing a little bit, but Julianstraw there got a lot more time
than he normally does and ifyou listen to my podcast Last
week, I was really hoping thathe would get to play more and he
did not disappoint.
He Came out and was playingsome good, good, solid minutes,
nothing special.
But then once he made his firstshot, it was on like he he was
(08:19):
making everything and they werefrom deep and he was Staring at
the crowd kind of doing the themean mug, all pumped up and
everything.
It was so fun.
And then his Conferenceafterwards he said that that was
the loudest crowd he's everplayed in front of and it kept
pumping him up.
And so if that, hopefullythat's just the beginning of
what we see from Julian movingforward and hopefully that'll
(08:40):
earn him some good minutes now.
I did mention that the the benchwas playing with Kong,
gillespie and and straw there,but Christian Brown, peyton
Watson, zeke, like they're,they're all.
They're continuing what wetalked about last week and
they're just playing so well andI no longer cringe when Yoke it
goes out, because that was just.
(09:02):
We would bleed points last yearwhen the bench had to come in.
But this year we just have sucha good fit that they play hard.
They're shutting people down ondefense, but they're actually
scoring a little bit too, andnow, adding strother into this,
it could get really exciting andhopefully Create a little bit
more opportunity for thestarters to rest.
We don't want anyone else kindof getting worn down like we saw
(09:26):
with with Jamal.
So the bench has been reallyexciting and Strother most
recently was just Insane.
It was great.
Now the next segment is calledmy favorite Yoke-ism of the week
.
Now I might have to change thattitle after listening to the
(09:47):
podcast Last week.
It was going great until Itried to say that title and then
all of a sudden it sounded likeI had Mouthful of marbles and I
just didn't have a tongue thatworked or something like that.
I don't know why my braincannot say yoke-ism, but so far,
so good today.
So if we can make it throughthis segment, then we'll keep
the title and move forward.
We have three nominees For ourfavorite yoke-ism of the week
(10:12):
and then we will give our winner.
So we'll start from the bottom.
Number three Yoke-ish had twoSombor doubles this week.
If you're not familiar withthat, a Sombor double is it's
kind of like a term that Nuggetsnation has kind of dubbed when
Yoke-ish has Almost a tripledouble but he falls either one
point, rebound or assist shortof a triple double.
(10:35):
So we've we've named that aSombor double, which is still an
amazing game.
It just doesn't fall into thecategory which we talked about
last week where he's he's risingup the all-time ranks of triple
doubles.
So I I'll have to look it upfor next week.
But he, he has a ton of Sombordoubles and that's why it was
just so hilarious last year whensome analysts were saying that
(10:59):
he tries to pad his stats andthe only cares about stats,
because he really doesn't care.
Nominee number two you.
The two failed highlight passesthat I spoke about earlier the
between the legs and the behindthe back post up.
It would have been awesome toadd those to the highlight reel,
but it was not meant to be, andnow he's kind of shown himself
(11:19):
that he can do it, so I'm surewe'll see it again in the future
.
Number one he had a hilariousquote after the Dallas game.
Luca is obviously the DallasMavericks best player.
It's always fun to see the bestplayers in the NBA go up
against each other, and soobviously one of the kind of
softball questions the reportersasked him after the game was
(11:39):
what is it like playing againstLuca Doncik?
And obviously they're friendsand they have a history together
and everything.
So his answer was hilarious.
He said oh yeah, I like playingagainst Luca Luca because I
beat him and then I can make funof him and it just so perfectly
shows that's how Yokech thinksabout stuff.
It's not like, oh, I have tobeat him to show the whole world
(12:02):
that I'm the best.
He's just he just wants to havebragging rights over his buddy.
So I love that.
Now, while all those nomineeswere great Yokechisms, the
number one winner of the week isYokech's conditioning.
Now I talked about how thenuggets have played the most
games in the NBA and we've hadback to backs.
We've had five games in sevennights and I talked about guys
(12:26):
like Jamal kind of getting worndown and beat up and one thing
that really sticks out aboutYokech is that that does not
show for him.
He's beaten people down thecourt in the second half.
He's helping these bigcomebacks.
He doesn't seem to get tired inthe second half in these back
(12:47):
to backs anytime.
It's really outstanding for howhuge he is and people obviously
say that he's out of shapebecause he doesn't have the big
beach muscles, but he is strongas can be.
His conditioning is fantasticand it's really showing Like
he's wearing these other centersout and I think that's part of
his plan.
(13:07):
Like he'll sprint up and downthe court in the first half just
to wear them out and thenthey're not able to handle the
fast break in the second half.
They're not able to handle himin the post when he's spinning
right by them or even drive andbuy him.
One of his favorite plays sofar this year is kind of faking
the pick and then sprinting liketowards the basket and his
(13:27):
teammates pass him the ball andhe gets a nice easy layup.
So conditioning Yokeism of theweek.
Next segment is the confidencescale on.
How confident am I that thenuggets are going to repeat Now?
Last week was a 10 because wewere undefeated and just playing
amazing basketball With thatMinnesota game.
(13:49):
With a loss under our belt, Ican't say a 10 anymore.
I'm going to go all the waydown to a nine.
I am still really confident.
The nuggets look so good andI'm just so excited.
Seven and one top of the west.
The only negative is Jamal'sinjury, so hopefully he gets
(14:12):
healthy quick and, like I said,fully.
Healthy is the key because Idon't want it to be an on and
off thing, but I am prettyconfident Still in the nuggets
repeating.
Next segment what am I lookingforward to?
So in this upcoming week, I'mlooking forward to more of the
(14:32):
nuggets young bench.
Now.
I mentioned Colin Gillespieplayed in the Pelicans game on
Monday and I was pleasantlysurprised with how well he did.
I obviously, with his injurylast year, I hadn't seen a lot
of Colin play and it was reallyinteresting to see because he
kind of got beat pretty bad whenhe was trying to play defense
(14:54):
in the first half and didn't domuch on offense, but then in the
second half he really steppedit up.
He was fighting over screens ondefense, kind of being a pest.
He was running the offensepretty well.
So I don't know, I'm kind ofexcited just to have a solid
backup point guard that can comein if Chimal or if Reggie is
(15:15):
hurt.
And we still have Jalen Pickett, who I'm excited to see as well
.
So our point guard depth islooking really great.
And then obviously I mentionedit a bunch before but the three
some of Christian Brown, peytonWatson and Julian Strother
together I think is going to bejust an amazing combination for
the bench.
So I'm excited to see our youngbench continue to get more
(15:36):
minutes.
And then, second, by the time Irecord next week, will the
nuggets be able to get theirrecord to 10 and one?
They have three games, I think,coming up in the next week, not
easy games.
They're going to be playing theWarriors, the Rockets, who are
actually playing well, and thenthe Clippers.
So 10 and one is doable.
(15:56):
And man, that would look niceon the standings there.
But that's, that's kind of whatI'm looking forward to this
upcoming week.
As I mentioned last week, I wantto have this section of
recommendations, just ways fory'all to become better fans and
just enjoy the sport.
Enjoy the not necessarily justthe nuggets, but just basketball
(16:16):
in general.
If you like this podcast at all, hopefully you checked out six
trophies that I recommended lastweek, and this week's
recommendation is anotherpodcast that I really enjoy and
it actually just launched lastweek, so you're getting in on
the ground floor.
It is the All City, all NBApodcast hosted by Adam Mahrez
and Tim Legler.
(16:36):
Those are two of my favoritebasketball voices.
Adam Mahrez, one of thefounders of DNVR, and Tim Legler
obviously has been on ESPN for20 years, so them together, I've
really been enjoying theconversations.
It's more of a total leaguewide look, which is always fun
for me to listen to as well.
But check out All City, all NBApodcast.
(16:59):
It's great.
And then, of course, last butnot least, everyone's favorite
category.
Oh, there are other teams.
I have been accused of onlytalking about the nuggets and
only caring about the nuggets,and while 99% of this podcast
will end up being about thenuggets, it's time for
(17:20):
everybody's favorite category.
So teams I'm kind of worriedabout is kind of how I went in
this direction, or the directionfor this week, and I know it's
way way too early to say anyoneis is out of it or anything like
that.
But the expectations that theseteams had going into the season
to how they've played so far,just I'm I'm a little worried.
So first we'll say the sonsthey haven't had Bradley Beal
(17:44):
yet.
They've had Devin Booker formaybe half of the games, and so
there's nothing what they'regoing to be like later on.
But I think the injuries justshow the lack of depth on this
team and it's, it's not beenpretty so far.
The Kings, kind of the samething.
The Aaron Fox out.
I think it just shows how muchthey depend on him.
(18:05):
Even the guy like Sabonis,who's really good, kind of
depends on Fox to get him theball and open up those lanes and
really kind of set the tablefor him.
So sons, kings, and then theGrizzlies started out.
Oh and six, they finally got awin.
The whole joke used to be thatthey were better without
Jaumarant, and he's suspendedfor the first 25 games this
(18:29):
season.
But they, they have definitelynot been better with them this
season.
So they are struggling.
Steven Adams is hurt for theentire year, and so I just think
this, this is going to be arough year for the Grizzlies.
They're.
They're the one out of allthese teams that I just I don't
see them digging themselves outof the hole already.
(18:50):
And then last, going over toEastern Conference, I thought
the Bucks were going to beamazing.
Just, they're starting five,the tandem of Dame and Giannis.
Now, while the Bucks have agood record they they currently
are four and two as I recordthis but they just haven't
looked as good as I thought theywould, either with the Dame
(19:11):
Giannis combo and offense, orthe defense is just been
atrocious really.
And so it'll be interesting tosee if they're just kind of
easing their way into it andlearning each other's play
styles and they can.
Well, it's nice to be able tosay you can turn it around when
you're already four and two, butI thought I thought they would
look a lot better.
So I'll be keeping my eye onthat.
(19:33):
And that was oh, there's otherteams, all right y'all.
Thank you so much for listeningagain.
Quick little podcast.
It's been another fun week.
We'll continue to do these, andI got a couple of fun
interviews lined up for some.
Some other fans who are arefans from afar, so keep an eye
on the feed.
There'll be new podcasts comingout soon.
(19:55):
Thanks y'all, yeah.
Hey everyone, welcome back to Fandom from afar.
It's been another week alreadyand I appreciate all the
feedback that I got from thefirst week in review.
I had fun doing it, so we'regoing to do it again.
So this will be the review forweek two for our Denver Nuggets
NBA season.
First we'll go over the gamesthat happened since last time
recorded.
There were four of them.
(00:24):
Pretty fun week overall.
Nuggets went three and one.
That one was to the MinnesotaTimberwolves.
They lost one, 10 to 89, andtruthfully it wasn't even that
close.
The Timberwolves just dominated.
It was one of those nights.
The Nuggets on the road, I'mguessing in Minnesota in
November it's pretty cold, Idon't know what was going on,
(00:45):
but they just did not have itthat night and it's just one of
those games.
I tried to tell myself thatlast year but it was very
frustrating because the Nuggetshad quite a few of just one of
those games.
But now that we gotchampionship rings then it's a
little bit easier to take thesegames.
(01:06):
So it was just a blowoutdominated, nothing really to say
.
But I'm really interested inthe next matchup whenever these
teams play again.
I think the Nuggets obviouslythey got pride on the line.
They don't want to have a teamout there that just has
dominated them and is really abad matchup for them overall.
(01:27):
But I think the Nuggets skilllevel they should be able to
handle the T-wolves no problem.
Obviously they did in theplayoffs last year, but it'll be
interesting.
I think the Nuggets will comeout a little more motivated next
time those teams play.
So it should be almost like aplayoff atmosphere.
So I'm excited to see that OnMonday night Minnesota actually
(01:50):
took down Boston.
So the two top teams are whatpeople consider the top teams in
the league.
Minnesota has beaten them bothand at the time of this
recording they've given themtheir only losses that they have
on the season.
So if I'm a Timberwolves andthat's pretty exciting so I'll
have to reach out to my buddyRyan, who was on the podcast
(02:11):
earlier on and see how he'sfeeling about those Timberwolves
.
The next game was against theMavericks and this was a fun one
.
This was the first game of thein season tournament, so they
had the crazy court and the newjerseys and it was fun.
The Mavericks actually came inundefeated as well.
So it was a good test for bothteams and Nuggets kind of took
(02:33):
care of business.
They really looked like thebetter team.
They had just an answer foranything the Mavericks wanted to
do, including Luca, which Lucahas been having an amazing
season, but it was really fun tosee the Nuggets have multiple
options that can guard himpretty well, the most surprising
being MPJ.
(02:54):
He was kind of shutting himdown a little bit.
Luca was trying to drive orpost up and kind of do some
isolation on him and MPJ wasn'thaving any of it.
He's using his height Like MPJis a legit 6'10", 6'11" and he's
using his height to kind ofgive guys space, because he
knows he's not as quick as mostguys but he's bothering people.
(03:15):
He's playing some defense andit's really fun to see, because
of course Michael Porter canshoot as good as anyone in the
league and if he's adding somedefense to it as our fourth,
fifth, like third option onoffense, that's pretty deadly.
So it was really fun to see MPJ.
I think he's finally gettinghealthy.
He had the ankle issue in thepreseason and so it's fun to see
(03:40):
him kind of putting it alltogether now and it kind of
coincides with Jamal's injury,so it's perfect timing.
But it's also just veryexciting for the big picture to
see MPJ playing defense like heis.
And then also he had 24-9 inthe Dallas game and if he's
putting that in every night,that's just huge for the Nuggets
(04:02):
Next game second night of aback-to-back we had the Bulls
come in and it was close for thefirst half, but it was one of
those things where the Nuggetswere kind of playing with their
food a little bit.
They didn't try very hard in thefirst half and then the third
quarter just came out and theyreally it was beautiful to watch
(04:23):
, but they they kind of put thebulls away in the third quarter.
Michael Porter Jr Again 27points in this game too.
Like I said, he's just he'sreally just kind of putting it
all together.
It'll be really interesting tosee if the nuggets continue to
have such a great record thatChances are they're gonna end up
with two all-stars.
Like they can't just say it'sall yokich, especially when you
(04:45):
have such Great performances byteammates.
So if Jamal's out for anextended period of time, then
it'll be interesting to see ifMPJ can become an all-star this
year the way he's playing.
Like I would not.
I would not doubt it.
So unfortunately, like I said,jamal is hurt and he tried to
play a little bit in thisChicago game but ended up having
(05:07):
to leave with hamstring injuryand already before that he had a
thumb injury and a wrist injury, and he, more so than anyone
else, has kind of showed thedownside of having all these
games so early in the season.
The, at the time of thisrecording, the nuggets are seven
and one, which is the mostgames played in the NBA, and
(05:29):
they've all been prettycondensed into a short period of
time.
And so I think Him, more sothan anyone, has really kind of
gotten beat up by all thesegames.
And it's really unfortunatebecause obviously all the fans
really wanted him just to kindof continue on from what he was
doing in the playoffs and makingall-star team, and I was even
predicting he was gonna make anall-NBA team.
(05:50):
But Right now, with with himbeing out, I really don't want
them to rush him back.
I would rather him take histime, get fully healthy and then
come back and and then we'llmake our run.
Like I really wouldn't evenmind if he took a couple weeks
off just to make sure it wasn'tone of those lingering things
where he tries to come back andthen tweaks it again and then
(06:12):
he's just out for more time.
So Get healthy, jamal, butwe'll we'll hold down the fort
while you're going.
And Then the last game wasMonday night against the
Pelicans and Zion.
They were missing CJ McCallumand we were missing Jamal.
So both teams are a littleshort-handed, but it was a good
game.
(06:32):
The Pelicans were actually upby 20 in the first half and it
was looking like, oh no, this isgonna be another Effort, like
we saw against the Timberwolves.
But then the third quarter cameand, oh my goodness, the
Nuggets just really kind ofshowed what they could do and
they ended up winning the gameby 18.
(06:54):
So talk about a 38 pointturnaround in a pretty short
period of time.
And of course, Jokic was a bigpart of that.
He had an amazing game.
He really controlled everything.
He had 35, 14 and 12, but thatdoesn't even really Showed just
how much he dominated the game.
He's amazing, he's really takenit to another level and and I
(07:17):
already thought he was the bestplayer in the world.
But it's just so fun.
Every night he has new ways ofkind of Controlling the game and
just having fun out there.
Like on the Pelicans game hehad a couple passes that the
guys ended up blowing shots thatwould have been just all-time
highlights with like behind theback from the post past to
(07:37):
Reggie Jackson that blew thelayup and then he had one where
he went between his legs to KCPfor a three who just happened to
miss.
But he's just tried new stuffjust because he can and it's
kind of fun.
Now a big story.
The second half to was becauseof Jamal's injury, reggie got
moved to the starting lineup andthen Colin Gillespie was
(07:58):
Playing a little bit, but Julianstraw there got a lot more time
than he normally does and ifyou listen to my podcast Last
week, I was really hoping thathe would get to play more and he
did not disappoint.
He Came out and was playingsome good, good, solid minutes,
nothing special.
But then once he made his firstshot, it was on like he he was
(08:19):
making everything and they werefrom deep and he was Staring at
the crowd kind of doing the themean mug, all pumped up and
everything.
It was so fun.
And then his Conferenceafterwards he said that that was
the loudest crowd he's everplayed in front of and it kept
pumping him up.
And so if that, hopefullythat's just the beginning of
what we see from Julian movingforward and hopefully that'll
(08:40):
earn him some good minutes now.
I did mention that the the benchwas playing with Kong,
gillespie and and straw there,but Christian Brown, peyton
Watson, zeke, like they're,they're all.
They're continuing what wetalked about last week and
they're just playing so well andI no longer cringe when Yoke it
goes out, because that was just.
(09:02):
We would bleed points last yearwhen the bench had to come in.
But this year we just have sucha good fit that they play hard.
They're shutting people down ondefense, but they're actually
scoring a little bit too, andnow, adding strother into this,
it could get really exciting andhopefully Create a little bit
more opportunity for thestarters to rest.
We don't want anyone else kindof getting worn down like we saw
(09:26):
with with Jamal.
So the bench has been reallyexciting and Strother most
recently was just Insane.
It was great.
Now the next segment is calledmy favorite Yoke-ism of the week
.
Now I might have to change thattitle after listening to the
(09:47):
podcast Last week.
It was going great until Itried to say that title and then
all of a sudden it sounded likeI had Mouthful of marbles and I
just didn't have a tongue thatworked or something like that.
I don't know why my braincannot say yoke-ism, but so far,
so good today.
So if we can make it throughthis segment, then we'll keep
the title and move forward.
We have three nominees For ourfavorite yoke-ism of the week
(10:12):
and then we will give our winner.
So we'll start from the bottom.
Number three Yoke-ish had twoSombor doubles this week.
If you're not familiar withthat, a Sombor double is it's
kind of like a term that Nuggetsnation has kind of dubbed when
Yoke-ish has Almost a tripledouble but he falls either one
point, rebound or assist shortof a triple double.
(10:35):
So we've we've named that aSombor double, which is still an
amazing game.
It just doesn't fall into thecategory which we talked about
last week where he's he's risingup the all-time ranks of triple
doubles.
So I I'll have to look it upfor next week.
But he, he has a ton of Sombordoubles and that's why it was
just so hilarious last year whensome analysts were saying that
(10:59):
he tries to pad his stats andthe only cares about stats,
because he really doesn't care.
Nominee number two you.
The two failed highlight passesthat I spoke about earlier the
between the legs and the behindthe back post up.
It would have been awesome toadd those to the highlight reel,
but it was not meant to be, andnow he's kind of shown himself
(11:19):
that he can do it, so I'm surewe'll see it again in the future
.
Number one he had a hilariousquote after the Dallas game.
Luca is obviously the DallasMavericks best player.
It's always fun to see the bestplayers in the NBA go up
against each other, and soobviously one of the kind of
softball questions the reportersasked him after the game was
(11:39):
what is it like playing againstLuca Doncik?
And obviously they're friendsand they have a history together
and everything.
So his answer was hilarious.
He said oh yeah, I like playingagainst Luca Luca because I
beat him and then I can make funof him and it just so perfectly
shows that's how Yokech thinksabout stuff.
It's not like, oh, I have tobeat him to show the whole world
(12:02):
that I'm the best.
He's just he just wants to havebragging rights over his buddy.
So I love that.
Now, while all those nomineeswere great Yokechisms, the
number one winner of the week isYokech's conditioning.
Now I talked about how thenuggets have played the most
games in the NBA and we've hadback to backs.
We've had five games in sevennights and I talked about guys
(12:26):
like Jamal kind of getting worndown and beat up and one thing
that really sticks out aboutYokech is that that does not
show for him.
He's beaten people down thecourt in the second half.
He's helping these bigcomebacks.
He doesn't seem to get tired inthe second half in these back
(12:47):
to backs anytime.
It's really outstanding for howhuge he is and people obviously
say that he's out of shapebecause he doesn't have the big
beach muscles, but he is strongas can be.
His conditioning is fantasticand it's really showing Like
he's wearing these other centersout and I think that's part of
his plan.
(13:07):
Like he'll sprint up and downthe court in the first half just
to wear them out and thenthey're not able to handle the
fast break in the second half.
They're not able to handle himin the post when he's spinning
right by them or even drive andbuy him.
One of his favorite plays sofar this year is kind of faking
the pick and then sprinting liketowards the basket and his
(13:27):
teammates pass him the ball andhe gets a nice easy layup.
So conditioning Yokeism of theweek.
Next segment is the confidencescale on.
How confident am I that thenuggets are going to repeat Now?
Last week was a 10 because wewere undefeated and just playing
amazing basketball With thatMinnesota game.
(13:49):
With a loss under our belt, Ican't say a 10 anymore.
I'm going to go all the waydown to a nine.
I am still really confident.
The nuggets look so good andI'm just so excited.
Seven and one top of the west.
The only negative is Jamal'sinjury, so hopefully he gets
(14:12):
healthy quick and, like I said,fully.
Healthy is the key because Idon't want it to be an on and
off thing, but I am prettyconfident Still in the nuggets
repeating.
Next segment what am I lookingforward to?
So in this upcoming week, I'mlooking forward to more of the
(14:32):
nuggets young bench.
Now.
I mentioned Colin Gillespieplayed in the Pelicans game on
Monday and I was pleasantlysurprised with how well he did.
I obviously, with his injurylast year, I hadn't seen a lot
of Colin play and it was reallyinteresting to see because he
kind of got beat pretty bad whenhe was trying to play defense
(14:54):
in the first half and didn't domuch on offense, but then in the
second half he really steppedit up.
He was fighting over screens ondefense, kind of being a pest.
He was running the offensepretty well.
So I don't know, I'm kind ofexcited just to have a solid
backup point guard that can comein if Chimal or if Reggie is
(15:15):
hurt.
And we still have Jalen Pickett, who I'm excited to see as well
.
So our point guard depth islooking really great.
And then obviously I mentionedit a bunch before but the three
some of Christian Brown, peytonWatson and Julian Strother
together I think is going to bejust an amazing combination for
the bench.
So I'm excited to see our youngbench continue to get more
(15:36):
minutes.
And then, second, by the time Irecord next week, will the
nuggets be able to get theirrecord to 10 and one?
They have three games, I think,coming up in the next week, not
easy games.
They're going to be playing theWarriors, the Rockets, who are
actually playing well, and thenthe Clippers.
So 10 and one is doable.
(15:56):
And man, that would look niceon the standings there.
But that's, that's kind of whatI'm looking forward to this
upcoming week.
As I mentioned last week, I wantto have this section of
recommendations, just ways fory'all to become better fans and
just enjoy the sport.
Enjoy the not necessarily justthe nuggets, but just basketball
(16:16):
in general.
If you like this podcast at all, hopefully you checked out six
trophies that I recommended lastweek, and this week's
recommendation is anotherpodcast that I really enjoy and
it actually just launched lastweek, so you're getting in on
the ground floor.
It is the All City, all NBApodcast hosted by Adam Mahrez
and Tim Legler.
(16:36):
Those are two of my favoritebasketball voices.
Adam Mahrez, one of thefounders of DNVR, and Tim Legler
obviously has been on ESPN for20 years, so them together, I've
really been enjoying theconversations.
It's more of a total leaguewide look, which is always fun
for me to listen to as well.
But check out All City, all NBApodcast.
(16:59):
It's great.
And then, of course, last butnot least, everyone's favorite
category.
Oh, there are other teams.
I have been accused of onlytalking about the nuggets and
only caring about the nuggets,and while 99% of this podcast
will end up being about thenuggets, it's time for
(17:20):
everybody's favorite category.
So teams I'm kind of worriedabout is kind of how I went in
this direction, or the directionfor this week, and I know it's
way way too early to say anyoneis is out of it or anything like
that.
But the expectations that theseteams had going into the season
to how they've played so far,just I'm I'm a little worried.
So first we'll say the sonsthey haven't had Bradley Beal
(17:44):
yet.
They've had Devin Booker formaybe half of the games, and so
there's nothing what they'regoing to be like later on.
But I think the injuries justshow the lack of depth on this
team and it's, it's not beenpretty so far.
The Kings, kind of the samething.
The Aaron Fox out.
I think it just shows how muchthey depend on him.
(18:05):
Even the guy like Sabonis,who's really good, kind of
depends on Fox to get him theball and open up those lanes and
really kind of set the tablefor him.
So sons, kings, and then theGrizzlies started out.
Oh and six, they finally got awin.
The whole joke used to be thatthey were better without
Jaumarant, and he's suspendedfor the first 25 games this
(18:29):
season.
But they, they have definitelynot been better with them this
season.
So they are struggling.
Steven Adams is hurt for theentire year, and so I just think
this, this is going to be arough year for the Grizzlies.
They're.
They're the one out of allthese teams that I just I don't
see them digging themselves outof the hole already.
(18:50):
And then last, going over toEastern Conference, I thought
the Bucks were going to beamazing.
Just, they're starting five,the tandem of Dame and Giannis.
Now, while the Bucks have agood record they they currently
are four and two as I recordthis but they just haven't
looked as good as I thought theywould, either with the Dame
(19:11):
Giannis combo and offense, orthe defense is just been
atrocious really.
And so it'll be interesting tosee if they're just kind of
easing their way into it andlearning each other's play
styles and they can.
Well, it's nice to be able tosay you can turn it around when
you're already four and two, butI thought I thought they would
look a lot better.
So I'll be keeping my eye onthat.
(19:33):
And that was oh, there's otherteams, all right y'all.
Thank you so much for listeningagain.
Quick little podcast.
It's been another fun week.
We'll continue to do these, andI got a couple of fun
interviews lined up for some.
Some other fans who are arefans from afar, so keep an eye
on the feed.
There'll be new podcasts comingout soon.
(19:55):
Thanks y'all, yeah.
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