The Nuggets don’t exactly have a crowded safety net behind Jamal Murray, which is why the idea of sliding DeMar DeRozan into that spot is worth a real look. On the standard roster, Tyus Jones is the lone point guard.
KJ Simpson is there too, but only as a depth piece on a two-way contract. That leaves Denver with a thin answer whenever Murray heads to the bench.
DeRozan, though, gives the Nuggets a possible workaround that isn’t all that far-fetched. He has handled point guard duties before, and not just in a limited, emergency sense.
He did it well. The twist is that this wasn’t a gimmick in some throwaway stretch - Gregg Popovich was the coach who trusted him with it.
And when the winningest head coach in NBA history asks you to expand your game, that tends to carry some weight.
Under Popovich, DeRozan produced the three best assist seasons of his career. He averaged 6.2 assists, then 5.9, then 6.9 across his three years with the Spurs, while keeping his turnover rate about the same. That stretch clearly worked, and DeRozan has said the experience changed the way he saw the game.
"You can't just dribble, dribble, dribble, you've got to be efficient with everything you do. ... Slowly but surely, it made me a better basketball player, understanding stuff on the court instead of just scoring. ... To combine those two things and the knowledge that came with it, I think put me in a place to where I'm at now," Derozan said in a 2022 ESPN column by Jamal Collier.
That kind of history makes the fit in Denver easy to picture. DeRozan has always been a strong passer, even if scoring was his calling card first.
Popovich pushed him outside his comfort zone and unlocked a different version of his game. There’s no reason the Nuggets can’t borrow from that blueprint now.
He also brings the kind of availability Denver could use. DeRozan has played starter minutes throughout his career, and he’s been one of the more durable players in the league.
Pair him with Nikola Jokic, and the Nuggets could have a half-court engine humming even when Murray sits. DeRozan won’t replace Murray’s outside shooting - he’s a career 30.2% from three - but that doesn’t mean he can’t run the offense.
He proved with the Spurs that he can operate as a floor general and a distributor, functioning as the primary ball handler in an offense built around secondary playmakers and shooters in a drive-and-kick setup. He doesn’t need to launch from deep to keep the machine moving. He can find the open man, keep the ball flowing, and make the most of Jokic’s gravity.
So the answer to Denver’s depth issue might already be on the roster. David Adelman just has to be willing to think creatively and give DeRozan another turn in that point-forward role he’s handled before.
In Other News...
Nuggets Roster Shuffle Suddenly Feels Like More Than Bookkeeping
What looked like a routine roster move for Denver quickly became part of a larger summer reshuffle. Julian Reese, a 6-foot-9 forward-center who spent last season on a two-way deal with Washington and saw action in 13 NBA games, was brought in as part of the Peyton Watson sign-and-trade before the Nuggets decided to move on from him.
The waiver clears the way for Denver to keep working the back end of its roster, and the timing matters with the two-way market still in play. It also leaves the Nuggets with an open two-way spot, another small but meaningful piece of business as they sort through how they want the rest of the group to look. [Read more 🡒]
Bruce Brown's Next Move Feels Stranger After Nuggets Changed Course
Bruce Browns place in Nuggets lore is secure after he helped drive the 2022-23 championship run, but his offseason has taken on a stranger feel as Denver has moved on without him. The Nuggets have remade the back end of the roster by bringing in Tyus Jones, DeMar DeRozan and Alpha Diallo to replace Tim Hardaway Jr., Jalen Pickett and Brown, a clear sign that the bench the team is trying to build now looks different from the one Brown fit so well.
Brown remains on the market, even with reported interest from the 76ers, and the longer he waits, the more his next stop starts to feel like a lingering mystery. Denvers choice of Diallo as a defensive specialist says plenty about the direction of the roster, too, with the Nuggets leaning toward a different kind of answer for the bench minutes Brown once covered so well. [Read more 🡒]
Nuggets Face A Real Jokic Lineup Debate After Last Year's Defensive Issues
The Nuggets kept their core intact this summer, but the most interesting changes came around the edges, where the bench got a fresh look with DeMar DeRozan, Marvin Bagley III, Alpha Diallo and Trevon Brazile. With Denver still trying to solve the defensive problems that cropped up last season, the front office and coaching staff are clearly open to different lineup wrinkles, especially ones that add more size without sacrificing too much of the offense that runs through Nikola Jokic.
One of the ideas worth watching is how much the Nuggets lean into bigger combinations, since the team has been searching for ways to make life easier on that end of the floor. Bagley gives them another option to pair with Jokic, and the intrigue is less about whether the Nuggets can create a different look than whether that look can hold up when the games tighten and the margins get smaller. [Read more 🡒]