Denver Nuggets Are Unlikely to Make Major NBA Trade Deadline Moves
With less than 24 hours until the NBA trade deadline, which is set for Thursday, February 8 at 3 p.m. EST, fans are anticipating the inevitable flurry of last-minute deals, some of which could potentially change the league’s competitive landscape and sway teams’ fates.
But if you’re hoping for spectacular, star-studded trade movement, don’t expect the Denver Nuggets to create any significant ripples before the deadline.
For a number of reasons, it looks like Denver will make just minor movements around the margins of their rotation in the final hours before the trade deadline.
Championship Starting Five
The first and most crucial reason for this is that Denver’s starting five is already not just fully formed, but also a proven championship lineup headlined by the NBA’s greatest player, Nikola Jokic, who has won two MVP and Finals MVP awards. And, assuming head coach Michael Malone repeats his rotational patterns from last year’s playoffs – a safe assumption given the winning results – it is expected that he will limit his postseason rotations to just eight or even seven players, down from the nine or ten he frequently puts on the court during the regular season.
This pared-down rotation limits the utility and urgency of adding new players who, given what Denver can and is willing to give up, are unlikely to leapfrog the Nuggets’ primary bench players in Reggie Jackson, Christian Braun, and Peyton Watson, or possibly even deeper bench players like Juilian Strawther and DeAndre Jordan.
Denver’s midseason acquisition of center Thomas Bryant last year serves as a valuable reminder of this dynamic. Although bringing Bryant on board for the Nuggets’ limited resources appeared reasonable on paper, he struggled to find a constructive fit that worked with Denver’s style of play and ultimately ended up playing zero minutes in the playoffs, with DeAndre Jordan and Zeke Nnaji both receiving spot starts ahead of him. And this year, if the Nuggets make any new signings before the deadline, they will almost definitely serve as injury insurance rather than important players on the floor.
The fact that the Nuggets do not need to fill any openings in the top seven or eight slots on their depth chart is key in reducing the need for improvements. Because the combination of being a taxpaying team and possessing substantial tradeable assets or players makes it difficult, if not impossible, to make any serious roster changes at this point.
With $177.9 million on their books this season, the Nuggets are $12.6 million over the $165.3 million luxury tax threshold, resulting in a projected luxury tax penalty of $22.7 million. In addition, when the Nuggets signed Reggie Jackson with the entire taxpayer mid-level exception of $5 million for this season (plus $5.25 million with a player option next year), they hard-capped themselves under the $182.8 million “second apron” of
Luxury tax. Because they are now just around $4.7 million under the second apron, the Nuggets, even with trade exceptions, cannot take on any payroll over that level. Furthermore, being above the first tax apron requires that the wage worth of any exchange match within 110%, rather than the more flexible 125%.
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