Over the off-season, your Denver Nuggets signed two free agents, Al Harrington and Shelden Williams but failed to pull the trigger on a deal involving Carmelo Anthony (most notably a trade involving NJ Nets forward Derrick Favors). Still, this isn’t the Nuggets team of lore. It is evident that the franchise is ready to go through a “rebuilding” period as the team boasts one of the oldest in the National Basketball Association.
The team also has other concerns such as the health of head coach George Karl. Karl, who was diagnosed for a second time with Cancer, is back on the sidelines and happy to be where he’s at. "I just kind of feel fortunate to be in the league and hopefully regain my health to be 100 percent and to have a good basketball team," Karl said recently. "There's not much else I want other than a good family."
The outcome of the 2010/11 NBA season for the Nuggets will depend on a number of factors including the health of the team and Anthony making it past the trade deadline in February. If he does, look for the Nuggets with Carmelo, Kenyon Martin and Chris Anderson to be a formidable force.
The Denver Nuggets finished the 2008/09 season with a 54-28 record that was good enough to win the Northwest Division and come in second place in the Western Conference. George Karl marched his troops into the playoffs and all the way to the Western Conference Finals where they would finally succumb to the LA Lakers 4 games to 2.
In the offseason, the Franchise and George Karl traded away a first round draft pick to the Minnesota Timberwolves for the rights to Ty Lawson, the 18th overall pick in the draft. They then traded a 2nd round pick to the Pistons for Arron Afflalo and Walter Sharpe.
The starting lineup for the 2009/10 season features Chauncey Billups at the point, Arron Afflalo at the 2-guard, Carmelo Anthony at small forward, Kenyon Martin at power forward and Nene at Center. In the first two games, Carmelo Anthony totaled 71 points becoming only the 5th player in Nuggets history to open the season with 60 or more points through two games. Currently their record stands at 20-12, good for 1st in the Northwest Division and 3rd in the Western Conference.
The Denver Nuggets are one of only four ABA teams that merged into the NBA. They were in fact a Charter Franchise in the ABA and were previously known as the Denver Larks. They would march into the 1975/76 ABA playoffs where they would lose to the New Jersey Nets 4 games to 2. The next season saw the team merge with the NBA and they would not get another shot at the ABA Title. They would, however, win their first two Division Titles in the NBA immediately upon entering. Their fortunes would end in the postseason both years though.
The 80’s brought a new offense with the hiring of Doug Moe as the new head coach of the Team. Moe brought in a motion offense that focused on moving the ball until hitting the open man. Combined with the higher altitude of the team, this offensive proved to work and helped the team to become a scoring machine. The highlight of this era was a triple overtime game against the Detroit Pistons that ended with Detroit winning 186-184.
The 90’s saw the close of the Moe era and ushered in the Paul Westhead era which also employed a “run and gun” style of play. The team, however, played little to no defense and gave up almost as many points as they were able to put up and would suffer for it, finishing last in the league for Westhead’s first two seasons.
Prior to the beginning of the 92/93 season, the franchise hired ABA Legendary player Dan Issel to lead the team. Issel then drafted forward LaPhonso Ellis and guard Bryant Stith. In the playoffs the Nuggets made history becoming the only 8th seed to beat a number 1 seed. They would fall to the Utah Jazz in seven games in the 2nd round. Sharpshooter Dale Ellis joined the squad prior to the 94/95 season, then the franchise drafted guard Jalen Rose and the team finished out the season with a 42-40 record and again clinched the 8th seed in the playoffs. They were promptly swept by the San Antonio Spurs.
The next record the Nuggets would nearly set was during the 1997/98 campaign as they flirted with the fewest wins in an 82 game season. In the process, they tied the NBA’s all time worst single-season losing streak at 23 games, missing the mark by one game. They would tie the record with the Cleveland Cavalier about 6 seasons later in the 2002/03 season.
Carmelo Anthony arrived in the new millennium and was the third overall pick in the 2003 NBA Draft. A year later, after getting off to a rough start, Head Coach Jeff Bzdelik was released and replaced with LA Lakers star Michael Cooper on an interim basis. Prior to the end of the first half of the season, the franchise hired former Spurs star George Karl who led the team to a 32-8 second half of the season and into the playoffs against the San Antonio Spurs who would win the first round series 4 games to 1.
The following season saw the Nuggets win their first division title in 18 years and they were again in the playoffs seeded as the number three team in the Western Conference. Matched up against the LA Clippers, the Nuggets fell in five games. Not long afterwards, GM Kiki Vandeweghe was told his contract would not be renewed and shortly thereafter was replaced by Mark Warkentien.
In 2006, Allen “The Answer” Iverson joined the team and the Nuggets again made it into the playoffs. In the first round, the team again faced Tim Duncan and the Spurs and again faced defeat as they would fall four games to one once again. They would win 50 games the following year and would again be taken out in the first round by the LA Lakers in a sweep.
Iverson would be traded on November 3, 2008 for the return of Chauncey Billups, Antonio McDyess and Cheikh Samb. The team would again capture the Northwest Division with a 54-28 record and faced the New Orleans Hornets in the first round of the NBA Playoffs. After disposing of the Hornets if five games, they took on the Dallas Mavericks beating them four games to one and launching them into the Western Conference Finals for the first time since 1985. In the Conference Finals, they would face the LA Lakers again and would lose the series 4 games to 2.
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