DENVER — On Tuesday night, the Denver Nuggets will receive the championship rings they earned by winning their first NBA title back in June. They will walk out and be introduced one by one. They will see a banner raised to the ceiling. There will be lots of emotion.
And then their NBA season will officially tip-off against the Los Angeles Lakers.
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For Jamal Murray and his teammates, the emotions will be understandable. Murray has worked hard and through injury adversity to get to this point. But he and his teammates will be careful to try and balance it all. As special an event as ring night is — and as special as the ceremony will be for the city and community — Murray and the Nuggets are looking ahead. And when they scan the horizon, this is what they see: There’s a beefed-up Lakers team, who finally have the depth and shooting around LeBron James and Anthony Davis they have been lacking since 2020. There are the Phoenix Suns, who added Bradley Beal to Devin Booker and Kevin Durant. There are the Golden State Warriors, the Memphis Grizzlies and the LA Clippers.
You know the saying. Heavy is the head that wears the crown.
“The title is something that we already won,” Murray told The Athletic. “This is the extra stuff, and ring night is something we embrace. We have celebrated, but we have to be ready for what’s to come. If I had my choice, I would like to get my ring on the same day (you win the title).
“I’m ready to get back to it.”
Nikola Jokić is Denver’s best player and currently holds the mythical title of “Best Player in the World.” But in a lot of ways, Murray is Denver’s heartbeat. The beauty of Murray is the omnipresent chip he carries on his shoulder and a competitiveness that won’t allow the Nuggets to rest on their collective laurels. Where Jokić is sometimes quiet and unassuming, Murray’s ability to be vocal on the court and within the locker room offers a nice contrast. It’s the beauty of the Jokić and Murray partnership we don’t always get to see.
Last spring, “Playoff Murray” was back as he set the postseason on fire with 26.1 points, 7.1 assists and 5.7 rebounds per game while shooting nearly 39.6 percent from 3 and 92.6 percent from the free-throw line. That’s one of the reasons there will be a ring night at Ball Arena on Tuesday. Jokić has often been a series’ best player, but Murray’s ability to raise his game when it counted the most went a long way in helping put the Nuggets over the top. Against the Suns, he was one of the best players in a series that included Booker and Durant. Murray torched the Lakers. In the NBA Finals, he was good enough that the Miami Heat began blitzing his pick-and-rolls.
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But most importantly, he stayed healthy, which has long been an obstacle for him. In the bubble, he was hampered by a pulled hamstring, as the Nuggets fell to Los Angeles in the Western Conference Finals. In April 2021, he suffered a torn ACL that caused him to miss a total of 18 months. This time around, not only did he stay healthy, but he also got more athletic and spry as the postseason progressed, because after the ACL injury, Murray took a while last season to ramp up. There were times he didn’t trust his knee and found himself thinking too much instead of reacting when on the floor.
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Early in the season, the burst and explosion off the dribble weren’t really there. In December, when Murray hit the game-winner against the Portland Trail Blazers it was a significant benchmark. Even if he wasn’t all the way back physically, if nothing else, it served as a message that he had the ability to make shots when it mattered the most. The remainder of the season offered a slow ramp up and when the playoffs came around, he was one of the best players in that postseason.
“I thought we did a great job as a team staying in the moment, and staying positive,” Murray said. “We didn’t get down on ourselves if one of us turned the ball over, or took a bad shot, or something like that. We stayed together as a unit and that was something that was important to us.”
After watching Murray last season, it’s not difficult to imagine him not making an All-Star or an All-NBA team, even when you factor in how stacked the league is with dynamic guards. Still, Murray’s skillset stands out: his ability to make shots against the clock and under duress, his ability to keep his dribble on pick-and-rolls, while probing for offense, similar to what Steve Nash used to do during his prime with the Suns and his ability to complement Jokić down the stretch of games, with a two-man game that often presents advantageous results for the Nuggets.
The question for Murray is whether he can be the same guy in the regular season he becomes in the playoffs? What people don’t realize is that he’s not as aggressive during the regular season. It’s one of the reasons “Playoff Murray” has been a thing. This season, the Nuggets might need him at his best on offense for longer stretches. The question as to whether the 26-year-old can take that step toward individual accolades has been a consistent one during training camp.
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“What I want from Jamal is to be himself,” Nuggets head coach Michael Malone said. “If he does that, if he leads, if he’s consistently himself, all of the other stuff will take care of itself. But I want him to challenge himself to be a leader. I want him to do the things every day that got him to this point.”
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Considering he’s been in the league since 2016, it’s a little crazy to think about Murray theoretically being a year or two away from his athletic prime.
On Monday in the hallway of Ball Arena following practice and getting shots up, he laughed when thinking about his position as a team leader. Seriously. Who thinks at 26 that he’s going to be someone’s vet? The one who the young guys turn to in order to get advice? But that’s where Murray is in his career. He’s transitioning from being the youngster to mentoring the youngsters. And there will be at least a few in Denver’s rotation this season, especially with veterans Bruce Brown and Jeff Green now playing elsewhere.
There’s second-year forward Christian Braun, who will be Denver’s sixth man. Braun started off slowly last season, but by the time the playoffs rolled around he was a trusted member of Malone’s rotation. And he rewarded Malone by playing a significant role in the finals. By the time the Nuggets became champions, Braun was as important as anyone off the bench not named Bruce Brown. Peyton Watson and rookie Julian Strawther are young wings who could see minutes. Hunter Tyson and Jalen Picket are rookies who made positive impressions in the preseason. The Nuggets have one of basketball’s best starting fives, maybe the best. But, unlike last season, they are now young and callow in key spots. That’s where Murray and Jokić are going to need to fill in the blanks.
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Murray will see significant minutes with the second unit, something Malone likes to do in order to keep either Murray or Jokić on the floor at all times. In Murray’s case, his role with the bench will be more hands on than Jokić. But, off the court, Murray has to do it as well.
“It’s crazy,” Murray said. “I’ll say a couple of things and guys are going to hold on to that. To say something about dissecting the game and going into detail, and they actually keep it, that’s eye-opening to see. I want to be more well rounded in my leadership. I want the young guys to take their time, just play well, that kind of thing.”
The most important thing for ring night for Murray and the Nuggets’ is to have fun with it. Smile for the photos. Fill their collective Instagram pages with the kind of memories that last years. It’s a moment the Nuggets have earned.
But then, it will be a moment that will need to be placed on the back burner because, as soon as it’s game time, the entire NBA coming after the Nuggets.
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“What’s next for us is a back-to-back,” Murray said. “That’s the mentality that we have to have. It’s like a boxer who has worked his entire life to win the title, and now he has to defend that title. We know that people are going to be coming after us. And we know that come April, people are going to have the chance to take that title away from us.
“We’re champs now, but now we have to defend it. And we have to stay with that chip on our shoulder.”
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(Photo of Jamal Murray: Garrett W. Ellwood / NBAE via Getty Images)
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