The Washington Wizards kicked off the trade season this year by sending C.J. McCollum & Corey Kispert to the Atlanta Hawks in exchange for Trae Young. Young is now out with injury which means the Denver Nuggets will get a very underwhelming opponent tonight at Ball Arena. The Nuggets meanwhile continue to battle injuries, Christian Braun recently tested his ankle in live game action and clearly wasn’t ready, while Denver is still missing two other starters, including Nikola Jokic, and key backup Jonas Valanciunas. This won’t be as easy as it looks.
The Basics
Who: Denver Nuggets (28-13) vs Washington Wizards (10-30)
When: 7PM MST
Where: The Can. Denver, CO.
How to watch/listen: Altitude TV and Altitude Radio 92.5FM
Rival Blog: Bullets Forever
The Matchup
| Position | Nuggets | Wizards | Advantage |
| PG | Jamal Murray | Bub Carrington | Nuggets |
| SG | Jalen Pickett | Tre Johnson | Even |
| SF | Peyton Watson | Justin Champagnie | Nuggets |
| PF | Aaron Gordon | Kyshawn George | Nuggets |
| C | Spencer Jones | Alex Sarr | Wizards |
| Bench | Bruce Brown, Zeke Nnaji, Tim Hardaway Jr., Julian Strawther | Jamir Watkins, Will Riley, Marvin Bagley III, Malaki Branham, AJ Johnson | Even |
Injury report*: Jamal Murray – probable (ankle/illness), Aaron Gordon – probable (hamstring), Bruce Brown – probable (knee), Nikola Jokic – out (knee), Christian Braun – out (ankle), Cameron Johnson – out (knee), Jonas Valanciunas – out (calf), Tamar Bates – out (foot), Curtis Jones – out (G-League); Khris Middleton – questionable (knee), Tristan Vukcevic – questionable (knee), Bilal Coulibaby – out (back), Cam Whitmore – out (shoulder), Trae Young – out (quad). *The Washington Wizards official injury report was not available at time of writing.
The Three Things
The thing to watch for: Dealing with Alex Sarr
Whether or not Alex Sarr is living up to his #2 overall pick status from a year ago is probably a matter of debate but there’s little debating his length. Sarr is a legitimate seven footer who’s averaging 17 points and 7.5 rebounds. He operates pretty much exclusively in the paint but does make full use of the space. He can also on occasion step out to the three point line so the Nuggets can’t just ignore his jumper either. He creates a challenging proposition for the undersized Nuggets with his length and skill. I imagine Spencer Jones will get the first crack at it, but don’t be surprised to see some significant Zeke Nnaji minutes tonight as he’s the best suited physically to match up with Sarr.
The thing to remember: Denver has been sleeping on the Wizards
Not many teams swept the Nuggets in the regular season last year but one them was the Washington Wizards. That’s right, Denver constituted approximately 11% of Washington’s wins last season. Prior to last season the Nuggets swept the Wizards three seasons in a row…maybe there is something to this Sarr thing…I digress. Every team is guilty of overlooking bad teams and dropping a game and last season that team for the Nuggets was the Wizards. Hopefully they all remember that and look to put this game away early.
The thing to bet: Zeke Nnaji over 4.5 rebounds (-114)
Like I said, I think Zeke plays a lot tonight. 5 boards is also pretty low for a guy who plays backup center right now and is getting roughly 20 minutes a night off the bench. If this bet isn’t for you then you can always bet the over on Peyton Watson points at 19.5 (-118) which sort of feels like free money at this point.
