The Denver Nuggets made the bold late-season decision to fire head coach Michael Malone and elevate David Adelman to the role.
Under Adelman, Denver took the Oklahoma City Thunder to seven games in the second round of the NBA Playoffs. Following their postseason loss, the Nuggets now turn their focus on adding to their newly restructured coaching staff.
According to NBA insider Marc Stein, the Nuggets are interested in hiring former NBA Champions J.J. Barea and Jared Dudley as assistant coaches alongside Adelman.
“Denver has secured permission to interview Dallas‘ Jared Dudley for David Adelman’s staff, league sources say,” Stein wrote on X. “The Nuggets, I’m told, have also shown strong interest in ex-Mavericks guard J.J. Barea for a spot on Adelman’s staff.”
Denver named Adelman as their long-term head coach following their playoff exit.
Potentially Adding Former Champions To Coaching Staff
Barea won an NBA title with the Dallas Mavericks in 2011 as a key part of their rotation alongside Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Kidd, and Jason Terry. He worked as a player development coach for the Dallas Mavericks in 2021 and most recently served as head coach of Mets de Guaynabo in the Puerto Rico professional basketball league.
For Dudley, he won his NBA championship as a player with the Los Angeles Lakers in 2020 playing with LeBron James and Anthony Davis. In his post-playing career, he has spent the past four seasons with the Mavericks as an assistant coach alongside Kidd. According to Stein, Dudley has received interest from multiple teams this offseason in hopes of adding him to their staff.
“Dudley already had interest from Memphis and Cleveland after Phoenix interviewed him as part of its HC search,” Stein wrote.
The Nuggets fired Malone, their only championship-winning head coach, with just a week left in the 2024-25 regular season. In his place, they elevated Adelman, who had no previous head coaching experience but expected him to stay with the team for the next few seasons.
Now, they are looking to add the two former champions to their coaching staff in hopes of reaching the NBA peak, as they did in 2023.
Nuggets Quiet Offseason
Unlike other teams around the league, Denver has remained relatively quiet throughout the early stages of the 2025 NBA offseason. Their stars, Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray, Aaron Gordon, and Michael Porter Jr. are all under contract for at least the next two seasons.
Most notably, former MVP Russell Westbrook declined his 2025-26 player option with the Nuggets and will enter free agency. Westbrook came off the bench in a majority of Denver’s games this year, averaging 13.3 points, 4.9 rebounds, and 6.1 assists on 44.9% shooting in 75 regular season appearances.
Denver also expects to lose DeAndre Jordan and Dario Saric in free agency and will soon have to decide on the upcoming extensions of Christian Braun and Peyton Watson.
The Nuggets were the only team who didn’t make a selection in either round of the 2025 NBA Draft. Executive vice president of basketball operations Ben Tenzer said that they were close to making draft-day moves, but none came to fruition.
“I think there were some situations in the first round and the second round it was close,” Tenzer said. “We had our targets. We looked hard at those targets. Had to evaluate where they would get to. Could we get there? It’s tricky, but I would say we were moderately close in a couple different scenarios.”
After the draft, Denver did sign Missouri guard Tamar Bates to a two-way deal but continued to focus on their veteran-heavy lineup in hopes of making another deep playoff run next season.
The Nuggets reportedly plan to make more moves in free agency rather than through trades, but for now, their focus is on hiring former champions Barea and Dudley to their newly constructed coaching staff.
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