Denver's Defensive Downshift

On Christian Braun and the loss of KCP

Photo by Jilbert Ebrahimi on Unsplash

Last year, the Nuggets had the best five in basketball.

There were other lineups with better net ratings for their starting fives, but from the very first game against the Lakers on banner night all the way through the end of the season, the starters were outrageously good.

They outscored opponents by 13.6 points per 100 possessions. That was even better than the previous season’s mark of 13.1.

When the Nuggets moved on from Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, much of the decision was built on the idea that Christian Braun could replace, if not exceed, KCP’s contributions.

That… is not what’s happened.

HOW DENVER GOT WORSE DEFENSIVELY

Here’s a look at the Nuggets’ starters, with KCP until this season, with Christian Braun this season, and with Aaron Gordon in all three seasons.

Yikes.

The offense is down six points from last season. OK, the Nuggets have dealt with Aaron Gordon injuries and Jamal Murray looked like a shell of himself for the first six weeks of the season. That’s fine, because 119.30 is still good enough; it’s No.1 among teams with at least 200 minutes played this season.

(Boston’s starters have a 124 offensive rating in 198 minutes, just missing that cut. Fun with parameters!)

But look at that defensive dropoff. It doesn’t seem like much, just a 3.1 drop. But it’s pretty massive.

If the starters played all 48 minutes, which they could not do because they would die, the Nuggets’ starters in 2023 would have had the 5th-best defense in the NBA.

This season, at 114.3, if the Nuggets starters played all of every game, which they cannot because they would die, Denver would have the 20th-ranked defense. They currently rank…. 19th overall.

If you’ve been paying any attention, you didn’t need me to tell you that the Nuggets' defense has been worse this season. What’s surprising is that it’s happened among the starters, with only one starter replaced with an overall net-good defender.

You also didn’t need me to tell you the starting unit has been worse this season. What’s surprising is that while the offensive drop is significant, we’ve also seen that same drop on defense.

Making this all about the move from Christian Braun to KCP is too simple. There are some things we can identify that are different, though. Among them, Denver’s ability to get over screens is worse this season without KCP.

CONTAINMENT FAILURE

That matches the eye test.

Effectively, Braun is a better isolation defender, particularly against bigger wings. A lot of Nuggets’ fans support of moving on from KCP to Braun was that Braun would have done a better job on Anthony Edwards, who mostly isolated, and cooked, KCP.

But Braun struggles getting around screens and recovering in trail.

Watch him get peeled here, which allows Tyus Jones to get down hill vs. Jokic in drop.

I will say that watching these clips, I came away impressed with Braun. Yes, he gets peeled and struggles with that recovery step off the screen. But so often he’s guarding guys like Kyrie Irving, Luka Doncic, Darius Garland, and so many of these shots are tough.

Braun’s going to get better at this. Whenever I do this analysis it feels harsh criticizing it because how would you like it if you had to run into Jusuf Nurkic 30 times a game and if you fall back by a step you get blamed with allowing a score?

I’m not going to go into it now, but I do need to note how often on these plays that Joker doesn’t put a hand up. He doesn’t contest. He doesn’t show against them. He’s just dropping and watching them shoot. This saves his energy but there are different ways to play drop and Jokic is taking the path of least resistance.

Now, a pull-up mid-range jumpshot is not a bad outcome on average. It’s better than Irving a. getting to the rim or b. kicking to a shooter. And Jokic has to manage the roll man, which is his primary responsibility, because if he puts too much emphasis on the ballhandler, someone else has to tag the roller and if you tag the roller you give up threes, which I’ve also killed Denver over giving up too many of.

But Joker’s level of effort in drop is low. He’s averaging what is a second-to-career-high in usage, career high in touches, carrying the team every night with one of the best offensive seasons in NBA history. The workload on him in this many minutes after this many games after this many seasons is immense.

All of that can be true and Joker can also be mostly taking possessions off.

Notably, Denver is playing slightly less drop with Joker this season, 67% compared to 70% last season. But they are playing drop 80% of the time with CB defending the ballhandler compared to 67% with Murray.¹

Screen navigation is something that is one of the tougher things for perimeter defenders. A lot of guys can check dudes one on one. Navigating over screens, recovering after the hit to get back, contesting from behind without fouling, all of these things make up basketball defense at the highest level.

If Denver helps out CB at all, they give up a three because they have no ability to recover.

But it’s something they’re worse at this season. The bigger problem, though? Isn’t about switching from CB to KCP. It’s losing the ability to play both of them.

WOMBO COMBO

Here’s a look at the minutes last season with CB and KCP on and off the floor.²

Ignore the CB solo minutes, that’s just the non-Jokic bench effect.

But a 104.4 defensive rating in over 500 minutes last season with those two together is phenomenal. The 115 defensive rating with KCP on-court without CB is not great, but it’s fine.

So what about this season?

You’ll note that Christian on-court at 113 without Russ is better than KCP last year without CB. That tracks, right? The Denver defense is actually better with CB in a lot of ways, depending on who’s on the floor.

But missing out on those elite defensive minutes with KCP and CB is bad. I said this summer that Russ is a Bruce Brown replacement, not KCP replacement:

You’re not just missing the combo minutes, though. You’re missing those minutes from last season where CB could help the stagger units with Joker. CB and Joker had a 109 defensive rating without KCP last season; KCP had a 110 defensive rating without either of the others, showing that KCP is a little more of a floor raiser defensively than Christian, which you would expect given their experience levels.

That tracks when we look at the on/offs.

Lower is better; Denver was 0.7 better in halfcourt defense with KCP last season, two points better in transition, but Denver was only two points better in halfcourt defense with KCP on-court, compared to 6.5 this season with CB.

So the Denver defense was better last season with KCP on-court than they are this season with CB, but the Nuggets are way worse defensively with CB off the floor than they were without KCP… because CB played in those minutes. ³

THE LESSONS

The common sentiment is that Denver is coasting, and can turn it on when it wants to. The second-half vs. Atlanta is a proof of concept, supposedly. Except the Hawks were in altitude and shorthanded.

As for that clutch time defense that was so good for years and years? Denver is 17th in clutch-time defense this season.

They can get better, and they do have another gear they can get to, especially when Aaron Gordon returns. But Denver’s defense has structural issues from containing three-point attempts to screen navigation, to defensive rebounding, to transition.

More time, internal improvement, and a higher level of effort will fix some of these things by a certain degree. But these issues are why if Denver’s looking for a trade this season? It can’t be for an offensive player.

It’s why the trade ideas for Zach LaVine ultimately don’t make sense unless you’re trying for a six-month transition of the roster by first moving LaVine, then Murray. Otherwise, Denver needs wing defenders, and badly.

OTHER NOTES

• Weird trend: in Denver losses, they allow 1.6 fewer three-point attempts per 100 possessions than their opponents average on the season. The problem is they average 1.8 more makes. When Malone says the problem is makes and not attempts, he’s not entirely wrong.

• The defensive rebounding issues are baffling for a team that was so good at it for years and employs the third-best rebounder in the league. Malone said in response to a question from me this week that it’s not simple effort, it’s about ball watching, leaking out too early to try and score off Joker outlets, and not getting crackback box-outs. MPJ took a lot of responsibility when I asked him about it, saying he’s got to be better on that end, while also saying he feels like the number of threes being taken means some weird bounces (and he’s right).

• Denver’s year over year transition splits are crazy. They’ve gone from a great defensive team in transition to a terrible one.

• Points in the paint is trending up as Denver plays more drop, and drop allows you to stay home on shooters, too. But too often Denver gets caught overhelping, which is a league-wide problem. Most of that is timing and execution, but it’s also not something that will necessarily get fixed in the last four months of the season.

1. Via Second Spectrum data provided to the Dig.

2. Via PBPStats.com.

3. This is the Julian Strawther effect, but I don’t want to blame the kid too much. He gives great effort defensively, he just doesn’t know what he’s doing yet.