A former Denver Nugget blames George Karl for infamous playoff blunder
Apr 14, 2023, 2:46 PM
The Denver Nuggets are about to embark on what they hope is a magical playoff run where they capture their first-ever title.
A big reason the Nuggets have never won is because the 2009 Western Conference Conference Finals went off the rails when Denver couldn’t inbound the basketball. The Los Angeles Lakers stole late-game inbounds passes, failing to get the ball in in both Game 1 and Game 3 in a series they eventually lost four games to two.
The Lakers then easily beat the Dwight Howard-led Orlando Magic in five games to win a title.
For years Nuggets fans have blamed Anthony Carter and Kenyon Martin for the turnovers instead of hitting Carmelo Anthony and Chauncey Billups, but was it their fault? Smith thinks it was nine-year coach of the Nuggets George Karl’s fault
“He lives to take shots at people now, do you not think you made any mistakes,” Smith asked on JJ Reddick’s Old Man and The Three podcast. “We didn’t have one out-of-bounds play the entire time I played for this man.”
“If you go back to that Lakers series we lose on three out-of-bounds plays. Trevor Ariza steals all of them and we lose.”
Karl’s Nuggets never before got out of the first round and never got out of the first round again. Karl was fired after winning Coach of the Year in 2012-13. The Nuggets rebuilt and swapped Karl for Michael Malone and Anthony for Nikola Jokic before getting back to the playoffs and eventually another conference final loss to the eventual champion Lakers 11 years later.
This year the Nuggets would again match up with the Lakers in the conference finals if each team wins their first two series.
Smith played five seasons for the Nuggets, where his dunks and shooting sparkled. He wound up winning two titles with LeBron James in Cleveland.
Could Smith have got the job done in Denver first instead, had a few passes been completed? We’ll never know.
