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Sunday 12 May 2019 10:16, UK
Jamal Murray has blossomed into the partner Nikola Jokic needed to help the Denver Nuggets build an offense that will thrive for years to come, writes Sky Sports NBA analyst Mark Deeks.
Our previous looks at the Denver Nuggets have been focused largely on the particular brilliance of Nikola Jokic. And how can they not? Through his innate excellence passing the ball combined with an ability to score in the low post, Jokic is simply one of the best offensive players in the NBA, somewhere in the top 10 to top five range. He is superb and the lynchpin of what Denver, the No 2 in the Western Conference, are all about.
No one ever goes it entirely alone, though. Especially big men who need someone to get the ball to them. Just as Tim Duncan needed Tony Parker, Jokic needs someone to get him the ball in good positions, rather than him having to go outside and get it all the time. Someone who can play off him and exploit the space opened up by his eternal threat. Someone who can score from outside while he scores on the inside. Someone with whom he can build an offense for several years.
That player has been Jamal Murray, and the two-man game between them is the founding principle around which the contending Nuggets are reliant.
Of all the streak scoring guards there in the NBA today, Murray is one of the streakiest. Take for example his run of six games in late December and early January, in which he posted scoring nights of nine, 31, 46, eight, 36 and eight, in that order. The average of 23.0 points per game is very nice, but quite literally tells only half the story.
Murray's individual performances also have a significant impact on how the Nuggets fare in general. Every player's numbers are better in wins than in losses - that is why they are wins, after all - but Murray's especially are; he averages 19.5 points on a .569 true shooting percentage with a +7 net rating in 49 wins, which all plummet to 15.8/.477/-21 in losses. Think of it as being the same as the scoring difference between Mike Conley and Rajon Rondo. That is to say, it is a substantial one.
The thing to be looking out for, though, is the rate of improvement.
Long-standing belief holds that point guard is the hardest position to learn at the NBA level. The NBA is fast, and the defensive schemes are complex, resulting in dozens of instantaneous decisions to be made on each possession in a game that usually features more than 200 possessions a night.
The point guard is the head of all that and generally the lead decision maker - even a point guard playing with the great decision maker and focal point that is Jokic still has to get the ball to that point, and know what to do in their expanded off-ball/decoy role as required.
It was not clear how Murray and the Nuggets around him would respond to their first playoff series, and of entering as high as a No 2 seed with a target on their backs despite being so relatively unproven. With the regular season they had, they bypassed the hungry underdogs stage normally so integral in the growth of a contender.
In the incredibly difficult first-round playoff series against the San Antonio Spurs, the Nuggets faced a very serious test for a No 2 seed; they had to go a full seven games, with a nail-biting tight four-point win in Game 7, to advance to round two.
They nevertheless passed that test, and so did Murray, who also reaffirmed the importance of his individual performances. In the four wins of the Spurs series, he scored more than 20 points. In the three losses, he scored less than that. As he goes, so do the Nuggets. And as the season has gone on, Murray is starting to better understand when it is 'Go Time'.
The beneficial side-effect of Denver's midseason slew of injuries was that the pairing of Jokic and Murray, the two who came through it relatively unscathed, became such an offensive mainstay during that time that they made significant progress in their chemistry they will never now undo.
With Will Barton missing half the year (and playing badly once returning), Gary Harris still not being quite right and Paul Millsap also in and out of the line-up, Murray and Jokic were left with either shooters (Malik Beasley, Juancho Hernangomez) or cutters (Torrey Craig, Mason Plumlee) that they had to create the space for.
Therein saw a substantial share of Nuggets possessions beginning out of pick-and-roll plays between those two. And with a 30-16 record in games that at least one of Barton, Harris or Millsap missed, the efficacy is apparent.
For 18 years, John Stockton and Karl Malone of the Utah Jazz formed a deadly pick-and-roll duo that set all kinds of records. By the time of their respective retirements (2003 for Stockton, 2004 for Malone), Stockton was the all-time leader in assists, his 15,806 still to this day far out ahead of second-place Jason Kidd (12,091), while Malone finished second all-time in points scored with 36,928.
The pair were largely responsible for each other's presence in those annals; the pick-and-roll play between them, in which Malone would screen for Stockton who would then either find Malone rolling to the rim or popping out to the mid-range, is one of the most iconic and ruthless plays in NBA history. It wasn't glamorous. It didn't need to be. It just worked.
The game has changed since then, yet at its core, the NBA remains a pick-and-roll league. And it surely always will do. Basketball is predicated on creating space in which to move, pass and shoot, and when done right, the nuances of the pick-and-roll incorporate all three.
The game's evolution, however, has seen an emphasis on floor spacing and multi-positional shooting, as the mathematical benefits of a higher volume of three-point shots have taken hold in the new orthodox way of thinking. This has meant starting pick-and-rolls from further back, spreading the floor and placing an emphasis on floor spacing.
Stockton and Malone would still work, to be sure, yet these developments call for greater range for all players involved; pull-up threes for the ball handler, three-point range for the popping big man.
Murray is not the passing machine Stockton was. He is a natural scorer who is continually learning the point guard position on the fly, and whose instincts are to hunt for scoring opportunities rather than passing ones. This though fits nicely into the model of the larger, more athletic playmaking lead guard that is much more prevalent in the modern NBA. And given that Jokic has that passing instinct, the pairing is starting to click.
Murray has had to learn the off-ball movement to capitalise on the space Jokic creates over time. Something that comes so naturally for Harris has been a learning curve for the young Canadian. Yet Murray excels in the mid-range area, via both the floater and the pull-up jump shot, while also shooting 36.7 per cent from three-point range on a high volume of attempts.
Jokic, too, is able to hit from outside when left open, and his own go-to floater (a necessity given that he has the vertical leap of a rhinoceros) is just as good of a weapon in these situations as Murray's.
More importantly, Jokic is among the NBA leaders in screen assists; that is to say, being credited for creating space for a basket without needing to touch the ball and just setting a good pick. That only works as a concept if the ball handler can use the angles of that screen to create a little space and hit the resultant shot. Murray has become that guy, and his ability to do that in bursts has made him a threat to change the outcome of any given game.
Through the pick-and-roll, the give-and-go, the pick-and-pop and the mutual exploitation of the space that the decoy threat of the other offers, Murray and Jokic have developed a very strong understanding of basketball's most fundamental principles.
It is Murray's growth, though, which has seen the Nuggets claim contender status when once they were so thought of as pretenders.
His development has not been quick, but it has been steady and continuous.
And as the Nuggets find themselves just one win away from a Conference Finals appearance, he is ascending at the right time.
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