Nikola Jokic’s most impressive raw statistical season may never be replicated. The Nuggets are perfectly fine with that.
They recognize that he’s one of the most gifted scorers in the NBA. They’re more than happy to indulge that skill when a matchup or a defensive coverage calls for it. (They have this week.) But they also know his greatest strength — and their greatest strength as a team — is engineering easy offense by committee, by means of motion and creativity.
If they’re going to average 120 points anyway, might as well do it with a more balanced scoring diet than last year, when Jokic set a career-high with 29.6 per game but none of his teammates were within eight of him.
Jokic didn’t overtake Jamal Murray as Denver’s leading scorer until their seventh game of the season, after a 33-point performance Wednesday against a Miami Heat frontcourt that was woefully undersized and inexperienced the instant Bam Adebayo exited with a foot injury. Entering a back-to-back this weekend against Golden State and Indiana, the Nuggets possessed the third-best offense in the NBA behind Jokic’s 12 assists per game. It didn’t matter that his points were down to 24.1. He had two other teammates exceeding 20.
By design? Not entirely. Jokic is basketball’s preeminent read-the-game decision-maker, after all. Except for this detail, outlined by first-year coach David Adelman.
“If we can get through games without having to post him up 25 times, I think that’s beneficial for us and his body,” Adelman said. “But if the game demands it, he will. And I think he’ll score like he needs to. But staying in the split game and the elbow game, it can get redundant, but I think it keeps everybody involved. And he keeps everybody involved anyway, because he’ll get doubled in the post or whatever it is. But (we’re) trying to play that team game as much as we can.”
Indeed, Jokic has been playing out of the high post above the free-throw line more frequently, rather than parking on the lower block as a default. Split actions have been accentuated as an early staple of the Adelman regime — reminiscent of his father’s elbow-entry offenses — with the three-time MVP center playing puppet master from the middle of the floor.
Aside from the fact that it’s effective, the court position from which Jokic operates is more broadly representative of Adelman’s regular-season philosophy. To spam post-ups every game in November would be to sprint the first half-mile of a marathon.
“To be honest, I don’t really think that I can feel, ‘Is it four post-ups or six post-ups?’” said Jokic, who has never been fond of acknowledging the slightest possibility of fatigue. “Sometimes it’s not even a post-up (when I go closer to the basket). Sometimes it’s just like, ducking in. Sometimes in transition, I’m just gonna find the space and seal my guy. So it depends on the game, the opponent.”
He might not notice the difference, but that’s what coaches are for.
“Sometimes the isolation stuff is old-school NBA and you have to go there,” Adelman said. “He’s incredible. He’s one of the best post-up players I’ve ever seen. But I have to worry about the wear-and-tear of his body, too. That’s a responsibility I have.”
Part of the equation is Denver’s improved depth. In many cases last season, the four players sharing the court with Jokic showed him deference to a fault, especially late in close games. The Nuggets became prone to operating with one-dimensional caution, hesitating to shoot open 3s, immediately looking to return the ball to Jokic in the post and subsequently telegraphing entry passes. Defenses fronted him, double-teamed him down low, dared Denver to win games outside of the paint.
With a more complete roster to foster off-ball movement, Adelman believes “we can get away with playing the game more fluid as opposed to just force-feeding him the ball all the time,” he said. “Because I just think naturally, getting hit, getting beat up, getting bumped, going from block to block … we’ve had to move him around over the years. We start him on the left side and then he runs across to the right side, and three different people get a chance to hit him. I know he’s a big guy, but that does wear on him.”
The split game capitalizes on Denver’s abundance of guards and wings who are good screeners. One player initiates by entering the ball to Jokic at the elbow or high post, then setting or receiving a screen from another teammate. Those two off-ball players can react to the defense as they split apart, leading to slip cuts to the rim by the screener, hand-offs with the player receiving the screen, backdoor cuts, catch-and-shoot 3s … the list goes on.
“The better screen you set, typically once you get somebody on the rim, two (defenders) go to somebody and somebody (else) is open,” Christian Braun said. “And if they’re not, Nikola is looking at the opposite corner. So there’s a lot of different options out of it.”
Enough options that Jokic consistently has a safe and productive decision to make with the ball. His assist-to-turnover ratio was 4.4 as of Friday, up from 3.09 last season. (The year Denver won the championship, it was 2.72.)
As Adelman said, it’s not that he’s suddenly abandoning the low post as an option. In fact, Jokic’s 35 post-up possessions through seven games were still the most in the league, according to NBA data provided by Synergy, and his efficiency has been mind-boggling. He’s shooting 20 for 26 (77%) on those post-ups, and the Nuggets are averaging 1.4 points per possession, the highest scoring rate for any player credited with 10 or more post-ups so far this season.
That should drop to a more reasonable number as the sample size grows. Jokic has been able to pick on a few low-quality defenses already, particularly New Orleans and Sacramento. He’s shooting 77.1% inside the arc, 16% better than his career average.
But that’s kind of the point. Jokic’s 2-point attempts are way down, cultivating his increased efficiency by allowing him to shoot less and facilitate more. (His 19 potential assists per game are also an uptick.) Adelman would rather be selective than over-reliant on his superstar’s post-ups. Jokic may have set a career-high in scoring last season, but the Nuggets’ point-per-possession efficiency out of that play type was 1.09 — their lowest since 2020-21.
“I really enjoy playing low-post game,” Jokic said. “… I don’t want to say (it’s) my identity, but I think that’s something that I personally love, to play on the block. But I think in the flow of the game, you can find those empty spots and create for others or screen for others, or be aggressive on different places on the floor.”
Want more Nuggets news? Sign up for the Nuggets Insider to get all our NBA analysis.