Denver Nuggets season in review: Michael Porter Jr.

For Michael Porter Jr. the ’22/’23 season was all about a return to health and it was a fantastic bonus that as he did that he also became an NBA champion. Mike himself would probably tell you though that his performance in the 2023 NBA playoffs was not up to his standard and so he returned in ’23/’24 looking to make an even bigger impact as Denver’s sharpshooting forward. By and large ’23/’24 was a successful season for MPJ. Above all else he ended any shadow of a doubt about his health, missing just one game throughout the season. He also continued to play his role as well as you could hope, providing Denver with the long range threat they needed to round out their multitude of scoring options. He carried the team for large portions of their first round with the Los Angeles Lakers but perhaps still felt there was something left on the table in the postseason with his performance in the second round where Denver ultimately succumbed to the Minnesota Timberwolves in seven games. Now headed into the ’24/’25 campaign, the Nuggets will be leaning on Porter even more to make an impact.

’23/’24 season stats

Season Story

It didn’t take long for Porter to get going in the regular season. He started the year with a 12/12 double double and spent the rest of the first week struggling with some consistency with his shot. Come the beginning of November though he figured it out and ripped off a dozen straight games scoring in double figures, seven of which he topped twenty points. He also managed to hit double digit rebounds in that run on three separate occasions. If there was a complaint, the boards could be where it was placed. MPJ showed he’s more than capable of getting 10+ rebounds a night but his effort on that end sometimes waned which led to inconsistent totals. He went three straight games with ten boards at the end of November, then didn’t top the double digit mark again for another six contests. There was also not enough attempts to get to the basket. A superb free throw shooter, too often Porter didn’t force the issue leaving him with multiple games of zero free throw attempts. Part of that is by design, Porter simply doesn’t get a huge number of opportunities to take players one on one in Denver’s half-court offense, but some of it could be chalked up to settling for jumpers as well. None the less, with Jamal Murray spending the majority of the start of the season in the training room, Porter stepped up to be the second scoring option Denver needed and did it as well as anyone could hope.

Once Murray returned MPJ had a more muted role on offense but still filled it wonderfully, punishing any team who dared leave him to send a double at Murray or Nikola Jokic. When Murray once again got hurt in the Spring, Porter once again ramped up the scoring. He scored nine points against the Boston Celtics on March seventh (game 63 of the season), that would be the last game in the regular season that he didn’t end up in double digits. His second half of the season also included his season high scoring mark (a thirty-four point outburst against the lowly Portland Trail Blazers), dropping thirty-one points on the New York Knicks with 13/16 shooting and a twenty-five point game against the Lakers where he didn’t miss a shot. Heading into the postseason Porter was playing his best ball of the year and that carried over into Denver’s first round. He shot 55% from the field and 48.7% from three in that series. His lowest scoring output was nineteen points in game one. Simply put, without Porter the Nuggets don’t win that series against L.A. Unfortunately Porter’s consistency didn’t carry over after game one of the Minnesota series. He topped double digits just once after game one (the game three blowout) and even apologized to the team for his performance in the series.

’24/’25 outlook with the Nuggets

MPJ will need to pick up right where he left off at the end of the regular season with the Nuggets. Defenses will no doubt be testing whoever the Nuggets have in their starting two guard spot which is going to leave Porter with fewer open attempts from outside. It’s also another year removed from his back injuries and teams know fully that Porter is the third option on offense and an extremely dangerous one so he will be a keep part of any opponent’s gameplan. The good news is this is all very much in his wheelhouse. There’s no reason to think he won’t continue to be a 40%+ three point shooter and he’s not getting any shorter so rising up over defenders and burying three pointers in their eye will still very much be a thing. It would be great to see him ascend to a 20+ points per game player but one has to question whether that will ever happen for the Nuggets. MPJ is still going to get a reduced number of shots as a third option and unless Jamal or Nikola get hurt I don’t expect that change. The fact of the matter is there’s just not enough shots available to get Mike 20 attempts a night on average. If he did then he’d score 20+ easy.

He can continue to expand his game to help with that. We started seeing more and more of Mike’s ability to take his defender off the dribble and get to the cup last season, adding more of that to his game and being aggressive to the rim will not only help him to get more layups, but also earn more trips to the free throw line. It’ll be interesting to see if he gets more opportunities to stagger with the bench as well. Last season that job generally went to Murray and Aaron Gordon while Porter and KCP played largely with Nikola. I’d like to see Michael Malone put the ball in Porter’s hands more with the reserve group and allow him to step into that number one scorer role when playing with that group. At 6’10” Mike can rise up over anyone to shoot and also bully a lot of players. Put him against bench players and he becomes an absolute problem for defenders. Mike’s game certainly can shine in that role but again, it won’t happen when he’s deferring to Jamal and Nikola so running more sets for him with the bench is a way to maximize his offensive talents while simultaneously mitigating a lack of scoring punch from the reserves. More than anything though, Mike needs to repeat what he did last season which was stay healthy. The biggest knock on him still will be availability and the only way to truly defend him completely is if he’s not on the court at all. As long as he is healthy he will continue to be a huge part of the Nuggets core and a championship level top three player on the team.