How the Nuggets and Nikola Jokic have supercharged their average defense — and just in time

If the Denver Nuggets are overlooked as a championship favorite relative to the typical No. 1 seed, it’s because they ranked 15th in points allowed per possession. Even amid an unprecedented scoring boom, it’s rare for teams with an average or worse defense to win the title.

The Nuggets ranked 15th last season, 11th two seasons ago, and 16th in 2019-20 — the pandemic-interrupted season in which Denver won two seven-game series to advance to the conference finals. (This indeed happened, despite every postseason broadcast of the Nuggets featuring some reference to the pressure on Nikola Jokic to finally lead Denver deep into the playoffs.)

This is who the Nuggets are: an average defensive team. They have an all-world offense built around an all-galactic superstar, and a few teams with that profile — incredible offense, blah defense — have advanced to the promised land. But Denver’s defense has backslid in each of the past four postseasons. The regular-season trend of Denver being stingier on defense with Jokic on the floor has not held up in the past three of those postseasons.

That’s not entirely surprising. Every playoff opponent is good, and Jokic in the postseason plays more minutes against the best opposing lineups. In the past two playoffs, the Nuggets have missed critical players — including Jamal Murray in both postseasons, and Michael Porter Jr. last season. Most of those missing players leaned offense, but part of whatever steadiness Denver has achieved on defense is linked to its scoring like gangbusters — and setting its half-court defense.

Jokic brings some pluses on defense — he is a transformative rebounder — but he has real flaws. He is not a shot-blocker. Opponents shot 68.5% at the basket when Jokic was the closest defender, the second-highest (i.e., second-worst) mark among all players who challenged at least four such shots per game, according to NBA.com. He’s not quick enough to switch onto most primary or secondary ball handlers.

Those two weaknesses place pretty strict limits on Denver’s schematic flexibility. In the regular season, that isn’t a huge deal. Teams mostly stick to their core schemes from game to game. If one opponent presents some issues, well, the next night things might be better.

The playoffs are totally different. You face the same team over and over. To win it all, you have to beat four teams four times apiece. Every opponent brings its own challenges. Even the best teams have to be at least somewhat nimble. One scheme might not work for all four series.

Denver during the Jokic/Michael Malone era has not been very nimble. It has been hard to calculate the cost of that rigidity, because the Nuggets were drawing dead — due to injury — in each of the past two postseasons.

That began to change in the regular season with tweaks against specific opponents, and has accelerated in Denver’s first two wins in this series over the Minnesota Timberwolves. It’s working so far; the Wolves have scored a minuscule 103.2 points per 100 possessions in two games despite shooting decently (37%) on 3s.