Nuggets News and Notes: Special on Mason Plumlee trade

Mason Plumlee – Jusuf Nurkic Trade Analysis

Who wins in Nuggets-Trail Blazers center swap?
Sam Vecenie gives his outlook on Sunday’s trade

With their trade, the Nuggets eye the playoffs and the Blazers eye an even bigger trade
The Plumlee-Nurkic trade affirms Denver’s playoff thirst and sets Portland up for a bigger bang

Nuggets best Blazers in Nurkic-Plumlee swap
SI’s Ben Golliver grades how Denver and Portland fare in the deal

Grading the trade: Blazers deal Plumlee to Nuggets for Nurkic
CBS Sports’ Ananth Pandian hands out grades

Trade Breakdown: Nurk & Plum
An in-depth, statistical look at Jusuf Nurkic and Mason Plumlee

Mason Plumlee’s memorable Sunday involves break-in and trade to Denver
New Nugget Mason Plumlee had quite the Sunday

Trade Grades: A partridge and a Plumlee
Another Plumlee brother finds himself on the move

Radio

Nuggets GM Tim Connelly discusses Plumlee trade – 2/13/2017

CSN Northwest’s Jason Quick : Portland trading Plumlee hit the team hard. Denver got a good one – 2/13/17

Chauncey Billups on Plumlee trade and state of the Nuggets: “If you’re going to be a real good team, you got to have a couple super stars, right now Nuggets don’t have one” – 2/13/17

Power Rankings

ESPN (Marc Stein)

Current: 15
Last week: 16

The Nuggets celebrated the Nikola Jokic Show at Madison Square Garden — The Joker scored 40 points on (yikes) 17-for-23 shooting — by making their second trade of the season. To add to the completely salary-cap-floor-related acquisition of Mo Williams, Denver will Monday complete a far splashier swap that sends Jusuf Nurkic to Portland (along with a first-round pick) in exchange for Mason Plumlee. How many more deals will we see from the Nuggets over the final 10 days of Trade Season until June? Our over/under is a solid one … with Gallinari generating much of the buzz as we speak.

NBA (John Schuhmann)

Current: 17
Last week: 16

Mason Plumlee probably can't hurt a defense that already ranks 30th, he'll surely get a chance to play alongside Nikola Jokic, and the Nuggets will hope he can help in those minutes that Jokic sits. Since Jokic became the starting center, they've been 12.5 points per 100 possessions better with him on the floor (plus-6.0) than they've been with him off the floor (minus-6.5). He went for 40 in Friday's win in New York, but the defense, as well as the absence of Danilo Gallinari, is preventing the Nuggets from gaining any separation in the race for eighth in the West. Maybe acquiring the ninth-place team's starting center will help.

Sport’s Illustrated (Jeremy Woo)

Current: 16
Last week: 16

Nikola Jokic (who you should read about, courtesy of Lee Jenkins) just dropped 40 points at the Garden, which is extremely noteworthy. Let’s just hope Mason Plumlee ends up being worth a first-rounder.

CBS Sports (Matt Moore)

Current: 18
Last week: 17

The Mason Plumlee trade gets rid of a headache in Jusuf Nurkic while adding a better player in Plumlee. They didn't need the draft pick. But Plumlee doesn't solve their biggest issue, which is defense. They still need wing upgrades on the perimeter if they want to secure a playoff spot. But man, alive, casual fans need to start caring about Nikola Jokic because he's insane. Go watch that 40-spot against the Knicks if you want proof.