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    Why Denver Loves the Nuggets Star Nikola Jokic

    Jokic, the Nuggets center, may be the best player in the N.B.A., but he avoids the spotlight. Still, in his own way, he has endeared himself to a city hungry for someone to believe in.About two miles from downtown Denver, the yellows, oranges and reds of a spray-painted mural fill the cracked, gray cement wall of a building that houses a temporary employment agency. The mural rises about 20 feet and depicts an expressionless Nikola Jokic next to a much more emotive Jamal Murray, his eyes narrowed and arms extended as though he is wielding a bow and arrow.Thomas Evans, a 38-year-old artist, finished the mural of the two Denver Nuggets stars recently as the team prepared to begin the N.B.A. finals. On Thursday afternoon, hours before Game 1 of the championship series against the Miami Heat, Damien Lucero was blaring his song “It’s Nuthin” while recording a rap music video in front of the mural. Lucero, 21, goes by Dame$, pronounced “Dames” (not to be confused with Dame D.O.L.L.A., the rap name of Portland Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard). He said the mural inspired him and some collaborators to write the song as a tribute to Jokic.He rattled off some of his favorite lines:“Clean sweep, yeah, it’s all me.Had to smoke him out like I puff trees.Four mo’ dubs then we pop rings.Triple dub, ain’t no joke, he the new king.”The old king — at least to those who want to describe him that way — is LeBron James, whose Los Angeles Lakers were swept by the Nuggets in the Western Conference finals. James is the biggest star in the N.B.A., with four championship rings, piles of endorsement deals and a constant presence on social media and television. Jokic has none of that.“I see a lot of myself in him,” said Evans, who also goes by Detour.“I’m in the studio all day working on my artwork, and I’m not really front-facing as much as other artists may be,” he said. “I don’t always want to be in front of the cameras. I don’t always want to be in magazines. I want to actually just do my work and let that speak for itself.”Thomas Evans finished the mural of the Denver Nuggets stars Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray during the team’s run to the N.B.A. finals.In the N.B.A., stars often take on their city’s identity — or imbue the city with their own. Magic Johnson’s love of luxury and glamour made him a perfect fit for Los Angeles; James’s embrace of celebrity has made him the same. Patrick Ewing’s physicality screamed New York City. Jokic, a 28-year-old Serbian who may be the best player in the N.B.A., is a bit of an enigma, similar to Tim Duncan when he was in San Antonio. And that suits Denver and Colorado just fine, according to those who live here.“The kind of talent that he is, you know, a modest talent, not somebody who is searching out the spotlight, a team player, somebody who’s down to earth,” said Senator Michael Bennet, Democrat of Colorado. “I think Denver and Colorado, we view ourselves as down to earth.”On Thursday, Bennet wore a Nuggets warm-up jersey in Washington, D.C., on his way to vote to raise the debt ceiling.Stars like Jokic, who has won two Most Valuable Player Awards, can be close to a one-man stimulus for a city. The mayor of Denver, Michael B. Hancock, estimated that the Nuggets’ playoff run alone this year could bring in a $25 million economic boost.Even so, Jokic has almost no cultural footprint off the court as the Nuggets jockey for attention locally with the N.H.L.’s Avalanche and M.L.B.’s Rockies (all of which are overshadowed by the N.F.L.’s Broncos). But this obscurity is apparently by his own design. Talk of stardom appears to bore him. Asked whether he was the best player on the Nuggets, Jokic told reporters on Wednesday: “Sometimes I am, sometimes I’m not. I’m cool with that.”Murray, whose nickname is Blue Arrow because of his basketball shooting skills, appears to be more comfortable in the spotlight than Jokic. He’s personable, expressive and active on social media. When Jokic is not Denver’s best player, Murray almost certainly is. He has promoted at least 10 brands over the past year, according to SponsorUnited, compared to just two for Jokic. It’s unusual for a top player like Jokic to be so elusive off the court.“I don’t know how much influence he really has because he doesn’t put himself out there,” said Vic Lombardi, a Denver sports talk radio host.Fans outside Ball Arena in Denver before Game 1 of the N.B.A. finals between the Nuggets and the Miami Heat. Denver won the game, 104-93.Jamie Schwaberow/Getty ImagesJokic rarely does interviews outside of mandatory news conferences, where he gives mostly anodyne answers. He has a deal with Nike but does not have a signature shoe. He doesn’t host a podcast, and his politics are a mystery. He has appeared in a handful of commercials in Serbia. Jokic said recently that basketball was “not the most important thing” in his life and probably never would be.“I would think he would be more connected just because it’s required when you’re a player of that caliber,” said Andre Miller, who played for the Nuggets in the early 2000s and again a decade ago. He added: “I think he approaches it as, I’m just a basketball player. Mild-mannered. He goes and plays ball and he goes home. So it makes his job a little easier and it keeps all the distractions out.”Jokic doesn’t do many interviews or commercials, which is unusual for a top star.Kyle Terada/USA Today Sports, via Reuters ConNuggets forward Jeff Green said, “His job is to play basketball, not to meet everybody’s needs.”Vlatko Cancar, another teammate, chuckled when asked about Jokic as a public figure.“When you’re a star at that level it’s just so hard to please everybody,” he said. “I feel like he would like to sign autographs for everybody and shake their hands and take pictures with everybody. But it’s just too hard because it’s one of him and it’s millions of others.”Gov. Jared Polis of Colorado called Jokic “a rarity in the modern sports age.” He said people in Colorado “admire him all the more for not being an off-court distraction like other so-called stars are, you know, too often in both basketball and other sports.”Senator John Hickenlooper, Democrat of Colorado, said that Jokic was like a “large bear that can do ballet.”“And that is a great look for Colorado, because we’re a former cow town — a mining town,” Hickenlooper said. “We come from honest, hardworking roots. Denver now is pretty athletic, and I’m not sure we’re quite up to ballet yet, but we’re getting there.”Jokic had 27 points, 10 rebounds and 14 assists in Game 1 of the finals.Pool photo by Kyle TeradaWhite N.B.A. stars are often described in positive terms that are less frequently applied to Black players, such as gritty and unselfish. Still, discussions with those who know and follow Jokic suggest his reputation as a willing passer is deserved. Jokic has said he prefers to pass rather than score.His approach to stardom creates a challenge for the N.B.A., which is constantly looking to expand its reach. But the league doesn’t always help itself: The Nuggets, even with a two-time M.V.P., were not on national television during the regular season as much as some less-talented teams.In addition, a portion of Colorado residents have not been able to watch Nuggets games for the last four years because of a dispute over carriage fees between Altitude, the regional sports network, and Comcast. N.B.A. Commissioner Adam Silver said Thursday that it was a “terrible situation.”Hancock, the mayor, called it “really unfortunate.”“That robs these great young players of the notoriety they deserve and particularly in this season where they have done just phenomenal things,” he said.Stan Kroenke, who owns the Nuggets and the Avalanche, also owns Altitude. Polis, the governor, said he had “called upon both sides to work it out.”In Serbia, Jokic’s home country, the N.B.A. is popular. When he is home for the off-season, he lives as he does in Denver: away from the public, according to Christopher R. Hill, the U.S. ambassador to Serbia. But Jokic is someone “everyone is talking about right now,” he said.“The games tend to be at 2 o’clock in the morning,” said Hill, who lived in Denver for a decade before leaving for his post in 2020. “People stay up for those. It’s incredible. I’ll be talking to somebody in the Serbian government and they’ll start yawning — ‘Sorry, I was watching Jokic last night.’”The Serbian journalists Nenad Kostic and Edin Avdic have reported on Jokic since he was a teenager and now consider him a friend. They traveled to Denver to cover him in the finals, and had dinner with him the night before Game 1. They said celebrity makes him uncomfortable.“It’s not about money,” Avdic said. “It’s not about fame. It’s — I think — too much hassle for him. No, it’s too much of a burden for him.”Kostic said that Belgrade, Serbia’s big-city capital with nightlife, often becomes home for famous Serbian athletes, even if, like Jokic, they are from smaller towns.“Nikola is not like that,” Kostic said. “He likes to spend his days in Sombor, in the small city where he was born, where everybody knows him and they leave him alone.”Jokic was named the most valuable player of the Western Conference finals after the Nuggets swept the Lakers in four games.Ashley Landis/Associated PressTwenty years ago, the Nuggets drafted a player who was almost the polar opposite of Jokic: Carmelo Anthony. He was a more traditional franchise star, doing commercials, selling jerseys and putting out signature shoes. Starting when he was at Syracuse University, he made waves in popular culture, with his style and confidence. He spent more than seven seasons in Denver, coincidentally wearing No. 15, which Jokic wears now.Kiki Vandeweghe, the Nuggets executive who drafted Anthony, said both players’ approaches to stardom worked just fine for the franchise from a business perspective because of how well they performed on the court. He said Jokic “makes his team better.”“He comes with it every night,” said Vandeweghe, who played for the Nuggets in the 1980s. “He represents in many ways what the city’s all about and his team wins. And that’s a successful franchise.”Evans, the muralist, said he typically doesn’t paint celebrities, but found Jokic’s growing relevance worth the art. He finished his first mural of Jokic in February in the Five Points neighborhood of Denver. He added Murray in his second, the one finished just before the N.B.A. finals.Caroline Simonson, a 22-year-old Nuggets fan from Boulder, said she paid $810 to attend Thursday’s game and sit in the bleachers. She said Jokic’s public persona “limits his connection to maybe N.B.A. fans across the country, but not to the city of Denver.”“We’re prideful. We know what Colorado is,” she said. “If other people don’t know what it’s worth, we know what we’ve got here. It’s special to us. Sometimes we want to keep it to ourselves. We get to keep Jokic to ourselves.” More

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    Denver Nuggets Role Players Get to Be Stars, Too

    The Nuggets can sweep the Lakers in the Western Conference finals, and it’s not just because of Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray. The role players have been just as important.LOS ANGELES — To win a championship in the N.B.A., a team almost always needs at least one transcendent player.But the championship journey will also depend on how well a team’s role players do their jobs.The Lakers, with 17 titles, know this well. Would they have won in 2010 without Metta Sandiford-Artest, or in 2002 without Robert Horry? Shaquille O’Neal, who won three championships for the Lakers with Kobe Bryant, often talks about the importance of the “others” — the players who aren’t stars.The Lakers franchise has found itself on the unpleasant side of the calculus this year. In the Western Conference finals against Denver, Los Angeles has the weaker supporting cast. The Nuggets, who lead the best-of-seven series, 3-0, are not just beating the Lakers with the talents of Nikola Jokic, a two-time N.B.A. most valuable player, or Jamal Murray, their dynamic guard. Aaron Gordon’s toughness, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope’s poise, Bruce Brown’s versatility and Michael Porter Jr.’s persistence are helping them get it done.On Monday, the Nuggets will try to complete a sweep of the Lakers to go to the franchise’s first N.B.A. finals. There have certainly been moments when Jokic and Murray have carried Denver, but a critical part of the Nuggets’ success is that they haven’t always had to do that. When Murray and Jokic ebb, the team’s role-players flow, and together they beat back any tide the Lakers have sent at them.Nuggets Coach Michael Malone said forward Aaron Gordon had “checked his ego” to fulfill his role for the team.Mark J. Terrill/Associated Press“There’s a lot of guys that can go get it,” Gordon said. “So we just go with the hot guy.”Jokic is the engine that powers the Nuggets, but Gordon also called him “one of the most unselfish basketball players.” Jokic is averaging a triple-double in the playoffs, with 29.9 points, 13.2 rebounds and 10.1 assists per game. But even when he isn’t at his best, his mere presence changes the game. That happened on Saturday, in the Nuggets’ 119-108 win in Game 3 with the Lakers. Jokic had just 5 points and 2 rebounds at halftime, then got into foul trouble by committing his fourth less than halfway through the third quarter.“There wasn’t a panic,” Nuggets Coach Michael Malone said. “It was: ‘OK, he’s out. That means somebody else has to step up.’ I think that’s something our team has done time and time again.”The Nuggets’ players have not just accepted roles that require them to defer to others, but embraced them in service of winning a championship. Jokic was the team’s only All-Star this year and no Nugget made an All-Defensive team; Jokic has never played with someone who made those teams while playing with him.On Saturday, Caldwell-Pope scored 12 points in a critical third quarter when Jokic was in foul trouble and Murray had cooled off after scoring 30 points in the first half.The last time Caldwell-Pope played in the Western Conference finals, it was 2020 and he was a Laker tasked with defending Murray. The Lakers beat Denver to win the West, then bested Miami to win the title. Caldwell-Pope knows what it will take for Denver to win this year.“We’re No. 1 in the West for a reason,” Caldwell-Pope said. “I believed it from the jump that we could win a championship. That was everybody’s mind-set. We knew how we could jell together and play together.”Bruce Brown had 15 points for Denver off the bench in Game 3.Ashley Landis/Associated PressDenver’s Jeff Green, who played 23 minutes on Saturday, has been on nine teams in the past eight seasons. Porter, whom the Nuggets drafted in the first round in 2018, missed most of last season with a back injury. He scored 14 points and led the Nuggets with 10 rebounds on Saturday. Brown, who had 15 points off the bench, signed with Denver last summer.Gordon, drafted fourth overall by Orlando in 2014, was once best known for his impressive showing in the league’s dunk contests. His stats on Saturday didn’t look all that impressive — 7 points, 3 rebounds and 4 assists — but his defensive contributions were key. He blocked a shot late in the third quarter that helped the Nuggets maintain the lead.“He has checked his ego at the door,” Malone said. “He knew coming into this year with Jamal and Michael back that his role would be different, and he never fought that.”That isn’t always the case on ambitious teams, and this N.B.A. season provided examples of the friction that can emerge. Golden State’s younger players, for example, clamored for more playing time. But Denver, which led the West for much of the season, is an example of how good it can be when the system works.“Everybody realizes when we need something, we need a spark,” Murray said. “Could be Joker, could be me, could be Bruce, Jeff off the bench — whether it’s a chase-down block or a charge or something. Everybody has something they can come in and impact the game with.”The Lakers were another example of a team that struggled to satisfy everyone in their roles this season. In February, they traded away Russell Westbrook, who had been unhappy in a bench role. He had joined the team less than two years ago in a multi-team deal that also sent Caldwell-Pope to the Washington Wizards from Los Angeles. Moving on from Westbrook was part of a larger effort to add several new role players, who have had many electrifying games. But against the Nuggets their shortcomings have been clear.The Lakers’ role players struggled in Game 3. D’Angelo Russell, left, was just 1 of 8 from the field.Ashley Landis/Associated PressThe starkest example was D’Angelo Russell, who scored just 3 points on 1-of-8 shooting in Game 3 and committed three turnovers.Lakers Coach Darvin Ham could offer only this about the performances of the Lakers’ role players: “I thought they did the best they could, all of them.”But sometimes it takes more, like what Sandiford-Artest gave the Lakers in the 2010 N.B.A. finals against Boston.In Game 7, Bryant, the team’s leading scorer during the regular season and the playoffs, made only 6 of 24 shots. The Lakers had mostly relied on Sandiford-Artest for his defense as a past defensive player of the year, but in that game he scored 20 points and hit a crucial 3-pointer with less than a minute left.On Saturday, Sandiford-Artest sat across from the Lakers’ bench, a powerful reminder of how important role players can be to win a championship. More

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    ‘It Hurts’: Season Is Over Before Nets See How Good Big Three Can Be

    Injuries kept the Nets from knowing what they could really look like once their stars — Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and James Harden — were playing well together.Whether Kevin Durant, James Harden and Kyrie Irving could collaborate, share the basketball and play good enough defense to bring a championship to New York’s less heralded N.B.A. franchise were unknowns that nagged at the entire league.Now, after being eliminated by the Milwaukee Bucks on Saturday night in Game 7 of their Eastern Conference semifinal series, the Nets cannot hush their skeptics until next year. After a 48-24 season and playoff ride that lasted only two rounds, the biggest questions about their three stars remain unanswered.Injuries overrode potential basketball issues and neutralized the Nets’ status among Las Vegas oddsmakers as title favorites. Durant, Harden and Irving shared the floor for only 43 seconds in the Bucks series. In Game 7, with only Durant as a dependable offensive option and Irving in street clothes, Milwaukee outlasted the Nets, 115-111, in overtime at Barclays Center, which inflicted a searing pain of its own.“It hurts,” Coach Steve Nash said, lauding the efforts of Durant, who scored 48 points in 53 minutes in Game 7, and Harden, who also played all 53 minutes, despite a hamstring strain. “I hurt for them more than anything.”The N.B.A.’s 75th season will be remembered for its Covid-19 protocols, game postponements and empty arenas for months. But the Nets became the league’s biggest on-court story after their acquisition in January of Harden from the Houston Rockets. Five years after General Manager Sean Marks was hired to rescue a franchise devoid of elite talent and draft picks, Marks built a legitimate contender by assembling one of the most impressive offensive threesomes in league history.The trouble for the Nets was not their defensive shortcomings, the depth they sacrificed to make the trade with the Rockets, the lack of available practice time during the coronavirus pandemic or Nash’s inexperience as a first-year coach. It was this: In the regular season, Durant, Harden and Irving were healthy enough to play together for only 202 minutes across eight games. Their 130 minutes together in a five-game dismissal of the Boston Celtics in the first round proved to be their only burst of continuity as a unit. Milwaukee won three of the final four games of the series after Irving’s nasty right ankle sprain in the first half of Game 4.These playoffs were supposed to be the Nets’ chance to shift a slice or two of cultural relevance to Brooklyn from Manhattan in a city teeming with Knicks fans. In the end, neither Marks nor Nash really came away knowing what the Nets could really look like when whole.Some key moments that brought the Nets to this point:Durant and Irving Sign OnEntering the 2019-20 season, there was much speculation about where Durant and Irving would end up. Earlier in the previous season, Irving had committed to staying with Boston long-term, while Durant seemed to be on his way to another title with Golden State. As the world found out after their seasons unraveled — Durant’s through an Achilles’ tear in the 2019 N.B.A. finals — they wanted to play together.The Nets had enough salary cap flexibility to sign them, as well as their friend DeAndre Jordan. The Knicks had the same wherewithal, but Durant and Irving chose the Nets and took Jordan, who finished the 2018-19 season with the Knicks, with them.Nets officials made the moves knowing Durant would probably miss his entire first season as a Net while recovering from the Achilles’ injury. Irving wound up playing only 20 games in his first season in Brooklyn because of shoulder problems. Both are now halfway through four-year deals.Nash’s HiringSteve Nash had a 48-24 record and was the Eastern Conference’s coach of the month in February in his first season as a Nets and N.B.A. coach.Elsa/Getty ImagesThe Nets shook the N.B.A. again by hiring Nash as coach in September 2020. He had no coaching experience, even at the assistant level, but he won two Most Valuable Player Awards and was one of the best point guards in league history.He was essentially chosen by Marks, his former Phoenix Suns teammate, who felt he had the gravitas and communication skills to manage the Nets’ two mercurial stars. Harden would not arrive until a few weeks into Nash’s first season on the bench. The Nets also brought in Mike D’Antoni, Nash’s former coach in Phoenix, to lend veteran guidance.“I wasn’t hired to come in and be a tactical wizard,” Nash said on a podcast hosted by the N.B.A. sharpshooter JJ Redick.Hiring Nash, who is white, nonetheless elicited criticism, given the dearth of Black coaches in the N.B.A., whose player pool is estimated to be nearly 80 percent Black. Nash’s hiring came after Jacque Vaughn, who completed the 2019-20 season as the team’s interim coach and had the Nets playing unexpectedly well without Durant and Irving in the N.B.A.’s so-called bubble in Florida. Vaughn, who is Black, stayed on as an assistant alongside D’Antoni and Ime Udoka. On ESPN, Stephen A. Smith called Nash’s hiring “white privilege.”“Well, I did skip the line, frankly,” Nash said at his introductory news conference. “But at the same time, I think leading an N.B.A. team for almost two decades is pretty unique.”The Harden BlockbusterHarden entered this season as a disgruntled member of the Rockets. He wanted out after D’Antoni and Daryl Morey left the team without an established coach and its top front-office executive, and Harden pushed for a trade to the Nets to reunite with Durant, his former Oklahoma City Thunder teammate. It was an audacious move for someone with three years left on his contract — and it cemented the Nets as league villains when it worked.Harden reported late to training camp to apply pressure on the Rockets to trade him. Appearing to be in less than optimal shape made his disinterest palpable during the eight regular-season games he played. The Nets, off to a 6-6 start, ignored Harden’s checkered playoff résumé and the rampant skepticism that one ball would not be enough to satisfy three high-volume scorers, and proceeded with trade talks.In January, the Nets acquired James Harden, pictured shooting over Giannis Antetokounmpo, but he strained a hamstring and missed more time than he had in any previous season.Wendell Cruz/USA Today Sports, via ReutersIn a four-team trade, Marks agreed to surrender control of the Nets’ top draft pick through 2027 to the Rockets and deal two young fan favorites, Caris LeVert (to Indiana) and Jarrett Allen (to Cleveland), to land Harden. As a bonus, the trade kept Harden from landing alongside center Joel Embiid in Philadelphia, after the 76ers offered the Rockets a deal involving Ben Simmons.The deal remains a gamble for the Nets. Every year without a championship will increase the scrutiny and pressure. Management must decide whether to pursue contract extensions with Durant, Harden and Irving that would cost hundreds of millions in salary and luxury tax or risk seeing any of the three opt for free agency after next season under their current contracts.“This is just the start of our journey,” Joe Tsai, the Nets’ owner, said on Twitter after the Game 7 loss. Known as one of the league’s wealthiest owners alongside the Los Angeles Clippers’ Steve Ballmer, Tsai certainly has the financial might to keep the core together.Irving’s AbsencesDuring the pursuit of Harden and after his arrival, Irving missed seven games in January for personal reasons. Marks said Irving’s sudden unavailability and the acquisition were “completely separate.” Yet the Nets felt it was urgent to maximize Durant’s championship window and made the trade with that in mind, according to two people familiar with the club’s thinking who were not authorized to discuss it publicly.Kyrie Irving, left, who was out since Game 4 with a right ankle sprain, supported his Nets teammates from the bench in Game 7 against the Bucks on Saturday night.Elsa/Getty ImagesThe Nets knew they wouldn’t have a training camp to try to assimilate Harden into the team, but figured that by bringing in a durable player, they would almost always have two elite players on the floor. It also became clear, soon after Harden’s arrival, that he was best suited to be the team’s playmaker, according to one of the people. Clear, even, to Irving.“We established that maybe four days ago now,” Irving said in February. “I just looked at him and I said, ‘You’re the point guard and I’m going to play shooting guard.’ That was as simple as that.”Cries that Harden was a luxury item for the Nets faded fast. The team went 29-8 in the regular season in games that Harden played and 12-11 without him.InjuriesHealth woes began almost immediately; Spencer Dinwiddie was lost to a season-ending knee tear just three games in. Dinwiddie averaged a career-high 20.6 points per game the season before, and he was expected to be yet another scoring threat on a team full of them.Durant overcame his Achilles’ tear in a big way, ending his season with 49 points against Milwaukee in Game 5 and 48 points in Game 7. But he wound up playing in only 35 of the Nets’ 72 regular-season games because of a hamstring injury. Harden, who was dealing with his own hamstring injury, missed more time in the regular season (21 of the final 23 games) and playoffs than he had in any previous season.The Nets were rocked in April when LaMarcus Aldridge, a former All-Star they had signed after he negotiated a buyout with the San Antonio Spurs, retired at age 35 because of a longstanding heart condition. Nash used a franchise-record 38 starting lineups in those 72 games and four separate ones in the Bucks series, leaning upon the well-traveled Jeff Green; Blake Griffin, a former All-Star who joined the team in April; and Griffin’s former Detroit Pistons teammate Bruce Brown.For the playoffs, the Nets finally seemed healthy — for one round. Harden missed all but the opening minute of the first four games of the Milwaukee series and lacked explosion or lift in his legs when he volunteered to return for Game 5 after Irving’s ankle sprain. Green’s plantar fascia strain kept him out of the first three games with the Bucks.“It’s been a really difficult year,” Nash said. “We’ve had a lot thrown at us.”Even with the injuries and Milwaukee’s stars healthy, the Nets came within an inch of advancing to the next round. With one second left in regulation in Game 7 and the Nets down by 2 points, Durant made a contested shot from the right wing that appeared to be a 3-pointer for the win. But his toe was on the 3-point line, and it counted as a long 2, sending the Nets to overtime instead of to the Eastern Conference finals.“My big ass foot stepped on the line,” Durant said. “I was just seeing a little screenshot how close I was to ending their season on that shot. But it wasn’t in God’s plan, and we move on.” More

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    Jeff Green, the N.B.A.’s Roving Role Player, Hopes to Settle Down in Brooklyn

    The Nets’ Jeff Green has played for 10 teams, two shy of the record. “It confuses me, but it isn’t frustrating,” Green said, adding, “I go out and just do the work.”Jeff Green has not played basketball everywhere, but it’s on his list. The Nets are the 10th N.B.A. team he’s played for since he was drafted in 2007, two shy of the record shared by Chucky Brown, Jim Jackson, Tony Massenburg and Joe Smith.Green, 34, is one of 18 players in N.B.A. history to play for at least 10 teams. He is now in the playoffs as a core member of the Nets — one of his seven postseason teams.During the regular season, he played some of the best basketball of his career, posting a career high in offensive efficiency, while starting for more than half the season filling in for the All-Stars Kevin Durant, James Harden and Kyrie Irving. On one of the most loaded teams in N.B.A. history, Green has carved out a niche for himself, averaging 11 points and 3.9 rebounds per game, with the occasional highlight-reel dunk.Because of a plantar fascia strain in his left foot, Green missed six straight playoff games before returning on Sunday for Game 4 of the Nets’ second-round series against Milwaukee, a Nets loss that left the best-of-seven series tied at two games apiece. Now, the Nets find themselves in an unexpected dogfight against the Bucks. And with Irving having sprained his ankle and Harden’s hamstring ailing, Green will be called upon once again to play a significant role.But Green’s career has been an especially odd trek, even in a league where players are moving around more than ever. Green has been productive but has not cashed in with long-term deals: He has joined seven of his 10 teams since the 2014-15 season. His last five contracts — with the Nets, Houston Rockets, Utah Jazz, Washington Wizards and Cleveland Cavaliers — were for one year or less, at the minimum rate. One of those was a 10-day contract with the Rockets.Green has routinely averaged around double digits in scoring and outperformed the expectations for someone with his pay. In Game 7 of the 2018 Eastern Conference finals, he had 19 points and 8 rebounds for Cleveland against the Boston Celtics, helping the Cavaliers advance to the championship round.But instead of landing him a substantial contract, that performance, after a strong regular season, only led to another minimum contract — the kind of status often reserved for players who are on the fringe of the N.B.A. or at the end of their careers.“It confuses me, but it isn’t frustrating,” Green said in a recent interview. “You know, this stuff, that’s out of my control. I go out and just do the work. And I let my agent handle the logistics of the contract terms, but it is confusing to the point of, ‘What else do I need to do to prove that I’m not a minimum guy?’”Green said that he would like to stay with the Nets past this year.“I’d love to settle down in one place,” Green said. “There’s Brooklyn. I’d love to settle down in Brooklyn. I’m not too concerned with the N.B.A. record or how many teams. When you think about it, if I was to play 22 years, played on 15 teams, what does that say? It has no teeth behind it.”Green defending Jayson Tatum during the Nets’ first-round series against Boston.Kathy Willens/Associated PressGreen’s lack of multiyear offers hasn’t gone unnoticed. After he agreed to yet another minimum deal, with the Jazz in 2019, Dwyane Wade said in a viral Twitter post: “I do NOT understand how and why Jeff Green keep signing these 1 year deals for the minimum. This is now 3 years in a row. He’s never injured, He’s never been a problem in the locker room, He’s athletic, he can shoot the 3, he can guard multiple positions and he’s not old.”DeAndre Jordan, Green’s friend and Nets teammate, called it “a little unfair,” but added, “Obviously, teams want him because he continues to get signed.”For a year.So instead, Green has settled for life as a professional basketball nomad.Green, a native of Cheverly, Md., began his N.B.A. journey in 2007 after three years at Georgetown. He was drafted fifth overall by the Boston Celtics and immediately traded to the Seattle SuperSonics in a package for Ray Allen. The Sonics had already drafted Durant at No. 2 overall. Because of Green’s athleticism and scoring ability, there was hope that Green would become a star next to Durant.That never materialized. At his best, Green has showed a talent for scoring, but not much else — which helps explain why he hasn’t been able to settle with one franchise. And while in some cases an N.B.A. player might bounce around because of concerns about locker room presence, Green has a positive reputation off the court.Kevin Ollie, a teammate of Green’s in Oklahoma City after the Seattle franchise moved, said Green’s personality was “bubbly,” but “detail-oriented” on the floor. “You see the hard work, but then you see love behind the hard work,” he said.Ollie knows what it’s like to move around: He played for 11 teams, one more than Green. He is one of around 200 teammates that Green has played with in his N.B.A. career. Ollie said one of the challenges of playing for so many teams was constantly having to uproot his family, particularly his children. Green said his wife, Stephanie, “makes it very easy.”“I just live in the moment,” Green said. “I’ve enjoyed each city that I’ve been in, each team, teammate, that I’ve been with.”Ish Smith, now a guard for the Washington Wizards, his 11th team, said playing for so many franchises means locations that should be familiar are not: the grocery store, the arena, the practice gym.“The difficult part is when you leave one team and go to another team, you’ve got to pick up all your stuff,” Smith said. “All your belongings. Get traded to a new team and get acclimated to a new system and a new area. New everything. And then that’s just the off-the-court stuff. The on-the-court stuff is, playing-wise, knowing what each team wants from you.”He added, “But the blessing is you’re in the N.B.A.”Asked if he was going to get the record for most teams played for, Smith said, “For sure.”Green supplemented LeBron James’s 35 points in Game 7 of the 2018 Eastern Conference finals with 19 points of his own.Elise Amendola/Associated PressOne of the players that Smith would have to overtake is Jackson, who played for 12 teams from 1992 to 2006. Jackson said he was able to more easily adapt to that many franchises because he could play multiple positions.“Each person’s journey is a lot different,” said Jackson, who is now an analyst for Turner Sports. “With Jeff, and kind of like mine, you perform a role which the organization asks you to, and you perform it to the best of your ability. After that, there’s nothing you can do. If they choose to go in a different direction, whether contract-wise, they’ve got a younger player that comes in, or they can move you for an asset, it’s really out of your control.”That Green is even still in the league is surprising. In January 2012, when he was 25 and playing for the Celtics, he had surgery for an aortic aneurysm that was discovered in a routine physical. The heart surgery likely saved his life. He missed the 2011-12 season.A decade later, Green said he never doubted that he would play again.“I reflect on it by being grateful and blessed to wake up and still be able to play. That’s my reflection,” Green said. “My goal after the surgery was to go out and play as hard, and have people forget that I even had surgery. And I think that was the goal and I think I succeeded.”Instead, Green talks about playing into his mid-40s, like his former teammate Vince Carter, who played for eight teams. But either way, Green said he is satisfied with his career plight.“You can’t take this career, these opportunities for granted,” Green said. “Regardless of how many teams that I’ve been on, the end of the day, my goal was to play in the N.B.A. and I’m still doing that.” More