Nuggets make dynasty mission clear, “not satisfied with one!”

DENVER—Moments after the Denver Nuggets beat the Miami Heat 94-89 in Game 5 of the NBA Finals to secure the Mile High City the first basketball title, a declaration was made.

With the confetti falling, smiles a perking, Micheal Malone grabbed a microphone from the championship podium and declared to the entire country, “We’re not satisfied with one, we want more.”

As long as Nikola Jokic is in his prime the Nuggets will have a chance. And the good news is only one of Denver’s important non-Nikolas, their rotation players, is a free agent this summer. The decision to stay or get paid for Bruce Brown will be tough and understandable. But at the end of the day, given Joker’s greatness, the Nuggets owe it to Jokic to keep a championship window open for years.

By weighted age based on minutes played, the Nuggets were just an average of 27.4 years old, the second-youngest NBA champion in the last 40 years, behind only the 2014-15 Warriors.

So the job now is on Nuggets lead executive to keep the Nuggets competing for titles. He’s up for the challenge.

“I got three more on my mind,” Booth said in a locker room to Denver Sports and other media.

Calvin Booth “we go three more on our minds”

Another staffer “year one of our championship run” pic.twitter.com/CxGP18t8OK

— Jake Shapiro (@Shapalicious) June 13, 2023

Booth was in his first season running the Nuggets and he added Brown as well as Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, who were both incredible for Denver as they went 16-4 marching to a parade. It was the second-best record in winning a championship since 2003 (2018 Warriors were first,) and no team since the 1999 Spurs had never trailed in a series or lost a playoff game by 10 or more.

Jamal Murray joined the likes of Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan and LeBron James with his NBA Finals performance while Jokic is simply non comparable to anyone.

So when Malone and Booth say this could just be the beginning, which was the talk in the locker room, they might be right.

“The evolution in this game and how you go from a nobody to an upstart, and you go from an upstart to a winner and a winner to a contender and a contender to a champion, and the last step is after a champion is to be a dynasty,” Malone said. “So we’re not satisfied. We accomplished something this franchise has never done before, but we have a lot of young talented players in that locker room, and I think we just showed through 16 playoff wins what we’re capable of on the biggest stage in the world.”

***