45 million in 2 years! The Nuggets are in trouble, and the championship shooter wants to go?

Basketball Big History Ball

2024-06-17 12:24Published in Fujian

The future of Pope at the Nuggets is uncertain.

According to a report from HoopsHype's Michael Scotto, the Nuggets are concerned that Pope may decline to exercise his $15.44 million player option for next season, then enter free agency and get a two-year, $45 million short contract — similar to Bruce Brown's contract last year with a second-year team option.

Later, Forbes Sports reporter Evan Sidery also reported that a team with plenty of salary space could offer Pope more than $20 million a year to take him away from the Nuggets.

This offseason, there are a total of seven teams with more than 30 million salary space, namely the Pistons 68 million, 76ers 62 million, Magic 53 million, Jazz 36 million, Thunder 33 million, Hornets 33 million, Raptors 30 million, in addition to the Spurs also have 19 million space.

Let's talk about Pope's situation first, Pope reached a two-year 30 million early contract extension when he joined the Nuggets in 2022, and this season is in the first year of this contract, with an annual salary of 14.7 million, and a player option of 15.44 million next season, and the Nuggets are not without reason to worry about his departure.

In the regular season this season, Pope played a total of 76 games for the Nuggets, all starts, averaging 31.6 minutes per game, scoring 10.1 points, 2.4 rebounds, 2.4 assists and 1.3 steals, shooting 46.0%/40.6%/89.4% from three, and 60.2% from the field.

Pope's positioning in the Nuggets is very simple, it is 3D, and his performance is also very good, 40% three-point shooting rate in catch-and-shoot and 44% three-point shooting rate in large open positions, and throughout the season, Jokic's teammate who passes the most is Murray, and the second most is Pope, reaching 912 times, which is enough to see his importance in the Nuggets' offensive system.

Defensively, Pope is the core of the Nuggets' outside defense, and needs to face the opponent's backcourt offensive leader, and in the regular season, he also did a good job, averaging 13.7 shots per game, reducing the opponent's shooting rate by 1.8%, and the three-point shooting rate by 3.6%, including the interior 6 feet, which can reduce the opponent by 7.7%, which is quite good.

The stats also prove the importance of Pope, who has been in the regular season this season:

-- When Pope was on the floor, the Nuggets scored 122.4 points per 100 possessions, outscoring their opponents by 11.3 points

- Pop was not on the court, and the Nuggets scored 107.8 points per 100 rounds, a net loss of 4.0 points

His cumulative plus/minus is +572, which is not only second for the Nuggets, but also fifth in the league (both the Nuggets are first and the league's first is Jokic +682).

Pop's downside is that he didn't play well in the playoffs.

Although he played 6 of 8 in a single game and scored 14 points, 2 rebounds, 3 assists and 4 steals in a single game in 6 of 8 in a single game, and played Timberwolves G5 with a highlight of 6 of 8 in a single game, getting 16 points, 5 rebounds and 4 assists, but throughout the playoffs, Pope averaged only 8.1 points per game, shooting 39.5% from the field and 32.7% from three-point range.

Playing the Timberwolves in the second round, it is not an exaggeration, Pope can be said to be blown up by Edwards face to face, he defended Edwards for a total of 39 minutes and 183 rounds, Edwards was 23 of 46 during this period, and got 60 points and 13 assists.

But to be honest, it's not Pope's fault that he can't bear Edwards, after all, the latter's explosiveness and offensive skills are really good, as a comparison, Murray defended Edwards in the second round for a total of 11 minutes and 58 rounds, during which Edwards was 14 of 19 and got 34 points and 6 assists.

Moreover, Pope is a player who has proven himself in the playoffs.

Last season, the Nuggets won the championship, Pope contributed a lot, he averaged 10.6 points, 3.3 rebounds, 1.6 assists and 1.3 steals per game, shooting 45.7%/38.0%/82.9% from three, and the Lakers averaged 14.8 points per game and 44.4% three-point shooting in the Western finals.

Interestingly, Pope helped the Lakers win the championship in 2020, when he averaged 10.7 points per game in the playoffs, shooting 37.8% from three-point range, and made eight three-pointers and averaged 15 points per game in the final three games of the Finals.

So, even if Pope doesn't play well in this year's playoffs, he is still a rare piece of the championship puzzle, and the important thing is that Pope and the Jokic system built by the Nuggets are really a good match, if Pope leaves, can the Nuggets guarantee to find a suitable replacement player? I'm afraid it's hard to say.

It needs to be said that Pope's situation is different from Bruce Brown last year, the biggest reason why the Nuggets let Brown go last year is that Brown only played for 1 year with the Nuggets, and the Nuggets could not use the early bird to renew the contract, and could only give less than 7 million at most, while the Pacers opened 48 million for two years, so it is clear how to choose.

However, Pope was traded to the Nuggets, and now he has played for two years with the Nuggets, and he has met the Bird clause, in other words, how much he can get depends on the sincerity of the Nuggets, and the 31-year-old must want to get a bigger contract, and the Nuggets need to be ready.

For the Nuggets, they will inevitably encounter the usual problems of the strong teams.

Looking at the whole league, there are only three teams with three top salary players, one Timberwolves, one Suns, and the other is the Nuggets, among which Jokic needless to say, it must be a super top salary, Murray, Porter's next contract may not be the top salary, but it is certainly not too much, plus Pope, Gordon...

It can only be said that the Nuggets also have their own troubles, but I have to admit that these five are really strong, and they are all at the peak of their age, and the Nuggets must grasp the past few years if they want to win the championship - this team has already experienced the pain of losing Brown this year, and it shouldn't risk losing Pope again, right?

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