Timeline 25: Remembering the night Taco Bell overshadowed Nikola Jokic
Jul 8, 2020, 6:00 AM
On March 6, 1995, The Fan was born. In the 25 years since, a lot has transpired on the fields, courts and ice in Colorado, giving the hosts and listeners who’ve been part of the station during that time plenty to talk about and debate.
During the course of the next few weeks, we’ll take a look back at that history, remembering the good times and the bad, the winners and the losers, the successes and the failures. It’s a series we’re calling “Timeline 25” and it continues today with a look at a one of the sneakiest big moments in Colorado history – the 2014 NBA Draft.
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When the 2014 NBA Draft rolled around, Nuggets fans weren’t terribly excited. The team was coming off of a disappointing 36-46 campaign, a far cry from the 57-win season they had posted the year before. In his first season, Brian Shaw had been an abject failure as the team’s head coach, proving to be a lousy replacement for George Karl.
That said, Denver wasn’t bad enough to earn the kind of draft pick that would generate excitement amongst the fan base. After failing to strike gold in the NBA Draft Lottery, the Nuggets sat with the 11th overall pick, no man’s land for trying to find an impact player.
On draft night, however, there was a moment of excitement. With their pick, Denver drafted Doug McDermott, a sharpshooting small forward out of Creighton. “Dougie McBuckets” had led the nation in scoring as a senior with the Bluejays, so there was a feeling that he could come light up the scoreboard in the Mile High City.
The enthusiasm didn’t last long, however. About an hour later, the Nuggets traded McDermott to Chicago for 16th and 19th overall picks, which were Jusuf Nurkic, a center who played the season before in Croatia, and Gary Harris, a shooting guard from Michigan State. The deal brought eye-rolling from Denver fans, a group that was tired of the team taking fliers on foreign-born players, a path that had failed to work out on multiple occasions.
After that, most fans stopped paying attention. Even if they had stayed tuned into the broadcast, you’d have missed the Nuggets pick. When it was their turn, ESPN went to commercial, airing a spot for Taco Bell’s quesarito when Denver made their selection at No. 41 overall.
Instead of hearing commentary about the choice, Nuggets fans were left with just a name, position and school / country on the network’s bottom scroll. “Nikola Jokic | PF | Serbia” was all anyone heard about the choice.
It was the continuation of a funny tradition in Denver sports. Back in the 1970s, Broncos fans were convinced that Howard Cosell used to intentionally leave the team out of his halftime highlights on “Monday Night Football.” They’ve also taken note in recent years that ESPN seems to go to commercial right when it’s the Broncos turn to make a pick in the NFL Draft. So Jokic was just the latest addition to the Mile High City getting slighted by the national TV folks.
He’s had the last laugh, however. While the big man might not have had much of a “draft moment,” he’s certainly made his name known in the years since.
The last two seasons, “The Joker” has earned a spot on the Western Conference All-Star team, averaging more than 20 points per game in each campaign. He was also named first-team All-NBA in 2018-19, an honor he could repeat this season.
Jokic has also helped the Nuggets improve as a team. He’s a tremendous passer, allowing Michael Malone to run his offense through his center, an oddity that makes Denver tough to defend. He’s a triple-double machine, able to score, rebound and collect assists as well as any player in the Association.
Last season, this helped the team capture the No. 2 seed in the West and advance to the second round of the playoffs. This year, the Nuggets are currently the third seed in the conference, considered a legitimate championship contender when the NBA resumes play later this month in Orlando.
Jokic is a the cornerstone of the franchise, which is why the Nuggets signed him to a five-year, $148-million contract in July 2018. He provides the team with the best chance they’ve had to win a title in years.
All of this due to a player who received virtually zero attention when he was drafted. At the time, Nuggets fans were presented with more information about a cheesy fast-food menu item than the center who would transform the organization.
