With 17 regular-season games remaining in a tight playoff race that has the Nuggets on the outside, coach Michael Malone knows his team doesn’t have much time to figure it out. “When a player of Paul Millsap’s magnitude misses 44 games and comes back with 22 games to go, that is a huge challenge,” Malone said. “Especially when the team was playing so well.”
More on Denver Nuggets Turmoil?
Though Millsap has flashed active moments while blocking shots, making steals and maintaining stout position defense, Malone cautioned that the Nuggets can’t rely on one player to transform their performance on that end of the floor. “(Millsap) needs the other four guys to buy in and give the same effort that he’s giving,” Malone said.
Harrison Wind: Michael Malone ripped into his team during his postgame interview on @AltitudeTV for their lack of defense: “They kicked our ass, it's becoming the same story every single night….my message is stop feeling sorry for yourself…"
As the Nuggets get to work in preparation for the NBA season, Kenneth Faried stubbornly refuses to accept a reserve role and defiantly insists if Denver can’t give him the minutes on the court he deserves, there are 29 other teams in the league where he can go play.
“I’ll just put it out there for everybody. I’m not a bench player. I’ve been saying that for the longest. I’m a starter,” Faried said Monday, when I asked him about his status with the Nuggets. “I love to hear the crowd (when introduced as), ‘Starting at power forward, No. 35, Kenneth Faried.’ Yes, that’s me. One hundred percent, that’s been my whole life. And I’m going to fight for a starting position. I’m just not going to lay down and let somebody take it. ”
“There are 29 other teams,” said Faried, whose contract with the Nuggets runs through 2019. “If this team doesn’t want, or respect me enough, to play me the minutes that I think I deserve to play, then I understand that. Hey, there’s 29 others. Maybe I’ll go somewhere else and do what I need to do there. But at the same token, I’m here in Denver, and I want to play Manimal basketball, no matter what, every time I step on that court.”
Nate Timmons: There's definitely something brewing (about to boil over?) between Coach Malone & the players. Team seems like a mess.
