Now that the Nuggets’ roster is all but set, it’s a good time to reflect on some of the moves that were made during the offseason. Most of the attention is focused on the splashy transactions; let Kentavious The Caldwell-Pope journey and the signing of Russell Westbrookand even move up in the draft to select DaRon Holmes.
Recently, attention has shifted to the Summer League. and the international game; Holmes’ injury, the brilliance of Julian Strawther and Trey Alexander, and Jokic and Murray representing their respective countries at the Olympics.
But two smaller transactions really stand out. At first glance, they don’t seem connected, but they’re actually quite related. Those moves were the Reggie Jackson trade when the Nuggets He dumped Jackson along with THREE second-round picks to the Hornets and the signing of Dario Saric with full exception of the mid-level taxpayer.
Each of these deals seems pretty innocuous in a vacuum, but let’s rewind a bit to last offseason. The Nuggets were losing players, were short on cash, and needed to sign a backup point guard. They decided to bring back Jackson, which was fine, but they should have signed him to a veteran’s minimum contract.
Instead, they gave him the full TPMLE. To make matters worse, they gave Reggie a two-year deal with the second year being a player option. This was terrible market value since Jackson was barely playable. He happily opted out of his contract for this season, leading the team to get rid of three draft picks just to get Jackson’s contract off the books (reminder: they signed this deal last offseason).
It was a bad deal overall, but not the end of the world. Except the Nuggets apparently didn’t learn from the mistake and instead repeated it. Saric looks like a good backup center, but he didn’t have a market. The Nuggets probably could have signed him for the minimum price.
But for whatever reason, the team gave Saric his full TPMLE and, again, gave him a player option for the second year. Ideally, Saric will perform and prove to be an impact player for the Nuggets. But with his age, limited skill set, and injury history, it’s not entirely unrealistic to think he’ll struggle to even stay in the rotation.
Plus, who’s to say we won’t be in the same situation next year? Saric can prove he’s no longer a rotation player in the NBA this season, in which case he’ll almost certainly exercise his option and saddle the Nuggets with a bad, unwanted contract for the second year in a row. Will the Nuggets pay to get rid of Saric’s contract in a year? We can’t rule it out.
It’s disappointing and completely unnecessary. And to make matters even more frustrating, the Nuggets didn’t gain any advantage by getting rid of Jackson, they just saved the owners tax money. It’s a careless use of assets and sends the wrong message to the fan base. Continued moves like this will eventually prove disastrous for a team that tries to compete for a championship every year.
