#CrystalBasketball: Ranking the Denver Nuggets After 2019-20
How does every NBA player stack up coming out of the 2019-20 playoffs?
That’s the question NBA Math staff members and contributors sought to answer, ranking each and every player in the Association on a 1-to-12 scale and then seeing who emerged with the highest averages. The distant past was irrelevant. Long-term potential doesn’t matter. Only the level at which we expected them to play right after the conclusion of 2019-20 matters, assuming health for those currently healthy and full recoveries from those presently injured, so long as they logged even a single minute during the regular season or playoffs.
All players—classified by the team for which they last appeared, even if they were since waived or released in some alternative fashion—were graded on the following scale by each evaluator, and ties between players with identical averages were broken by sorting the scores from best to worst and propping up the men who had the highest mark at any point in the top-down progression:
- Shouldn’t Get Minutes
- End-of-Bench Pieces
- Depth Pieces
- High-End Backups
- Low-End Starters
- Solid Starters
- High-End Starters, Non-All-Stars
- All-Star Candidates
- All-NBA Candidates, Non-MVP Candidates
- Lesser MVP Candidates
- MVP Frontrunners
- Best Player in the League (only one player could earn this grade on each ballot)
Now, for the Denver Nuggets:
Shouldn’t Get Minutes: 1.00 to 1.49
17. Tyler Cook: 1.2
16. Vlatko Cancar: 1.47
End-of-Bench Pieces: 1.50 to 2.49
15. Noah Vonleh: 2.29
14. Troy Daniels: 2.4
Depth Pieces: 2.50 to 3.49
13. Keita Bates-Diop: 2.5
12. Bol Bol: 2.64
11. P.J. Dozier: 2.86
High-End Backups: 3.50 to 4.49
10. Mason Plumlee: 3.64
9. Torrey Craig: 3.8
Low-End Starters: 4.50 to 5.49
8. Monte Morris: 4.57
7. Michael Porter Jr.: 5.0
6. Gary Harris: 5.21
5. Paul Millsap: 5.43
Solid Starters: 5.50 to 6.49
4. Jerami Grant: 5.57
3. Will Barton: 5.73
High-End Starters: 6.50 to 7.49
None
All-Star Candidates: 7.50 to 8.49
2. Jamal Murray: 8.07
All-NBA Candidates: 8.50 to 9.49
None
Lesser MVP Candidates: 9.50 to 10.49
- Nikola Jokic: 10.36
MVP Frontrunners: 10.50 to 12.00
None
Many thanks to the following people for their participation in this project: Arjun Baradwaj, Tara Biggs, Ryan Blackburn, Jacob Bourne, Tony East, Dan Favale, Adam Fromal, Katie Heindl, Jordan McGillis, Tom Rende, Adam Spinella, Jordan Spyropoulos, Bryan Toporek, Matt Way and Nate Wolf.