NFL guidelines prohibit a controlling owner from also owning a majority share of an NBA, NHL or MLB team.

Kroenke’s ownership of the NBA’s Nuggets & NHL’s Avalanche have been preventing Stan from making a move on the remaining 60% of the NFL’s Rams.  The current owners of that 60%, brother-sister combo Chip Rosenbloom & Lucia Rodriguez, agreed last year to get out of the Rams business.  They even found a buyer in Shahid Khan, a businessman from Illinois in good standing with NFL brass.

But Kroenke and his 40% would not back down.

Stan exercised his option to match Khan’s offer in April, and has since been working to secure the support of NFL officials to become a multi-franchise controlling owner.  That hasn’t happened, despite a precedence set in Miami by Wayne Huizenga’s ownership of the Dolphins, Marlins & Panthers since 1994.

So Stan is getting creative.

A carefully-worded statement released by Kroenke Sports Enterprises yesterday indicated that the Kroenke “family looks forward to owning the Rams, Nuggets & Avalanche for years to come while being compliant with all stipulations set by the NFL.”

The Denver Post reported that Kroenke’s son, Josh (also VP of Team Development for the Nuggets), would take majority control of the Nuggets.  And although that report has not been confirmed, the Kroenke’s seem to be trending towards a splitting of sports franchise real estate within the family.

The NBA Board of Governors would need to approve such a transfer, and the NHL would need to approve any ownership movement with the Avalanche.  However, Stan & Company may stand a better chance of diversifying their collective ownership by avoiding a special exemption from the NFL.

The NFL’s competition surely won’t mind causing trouble for the biggest league in American sports.

And while the NFL can still stifle any potential sale of available St Louis Rams ownership to Kroenke, he has certainly raised the stakes by showing his willingness to press the issue further.  The NFL certainly doesn’t want to deal with a very public dispute over control of the Rams, especially if the matter drags on through the meat of football season.

The Battle of Wills: Stan v League is so far being won by Mr. Kroenke.

Note:

Kroenke has also been increasing his share of the English Premier League’s Arsenal Football Club.  Soccer’s entrenchment in English culture is as deep or deeper than American Football in the United States, and Stan’s dealings across the pond have drawn even more heated criticism and a more tense situation there.  Kroenke is now 0.1% away from being able to make a move towards controlling ownership with his current 29.9%.

None can say that Stan lacks gumption, as he takes on the Powers That Be in the Western World’s two biggest, most profitable sports entities.

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In this 2010 MLB season, one is at a loss when trying to analyze and explain the Colorado Rockies.

Sitting at 20-21 and 4 games back in the highly competitive NL West (the Padres, Dodgers and Giants all are within 1.5 games of one another), the Rockies can find some small consolation in knowing the bulk of their home games and divisional schedule remain. But the season is a quarter of the way through and time is running out for this team to find its identity.

Listing and repeating the numerous paradoxical offensive and pitching statistics at this point would be redundant.

Behind an offense that has shown a propensity for front-running, games have become fairly simple affair.

If the starting pitching is solid and the Rockies can find an early lead, they win. If the starters struggle or the defense shaky, the Rockies offense is incapable of coming from behind from even the smallest margins, if they are even allowed the opportunity by the bullpen to attempt a comeback.

Saberticians are of no use in trying to diagnose the woes of this ballclub, for the solution lays not within lineup juggling, bullpen matchups or stats about who has a higher 2-out basehit percentage, but with the fundamental premise of playing as team.

Night after night, the Rockies players look singular… un-unified and even robotic at times.

Though the game of baseball is based on individual matchups, the juggling of the lineup has clearly led to a lack of understanding of player’s roles within the offense. Carlos Gonzales, the team’s best offensive player at this point, has hit leadoff, 3^rd and 5^th, sometimes all within a week. The lack of hitting consistency can clearly be traced to the middle of the order where Todd Helton and Troy Tulowitzki share a troubling stat… the two have only combined for 3 home runs.

The pitching has been there, at times and even on days when staff ace Ubaldo Jimenez isn’t pitching.

Yet, injuries, weather delays leading to doubleheaders, and roster juggling have led to a strange brew in the rotation and bullpen and the lack of a defined closer is becoming glaringly apparent. The defensive play in the field can almost at this point be classified as a detriment. One of the top fielding teams in baseball the last couple years; this year’s Rockies seem to lack the sizzle of a slick fielding team. Balls are miffed, muffed and bouncing into the outfield and the team’s fielding leader, Tulo, appears to be pressing.

All of the aforementioned issues are particularly magnified on the road.

Watching the games in the late innings, one can almost feel the Rockies grit their teeth in anticipation of the error in the field or mistake over the plate that will break a tie or balloon a one-run lead into several.

Yet, despite all of the above, there is hope. Hope in the form of the possibility of a return to 2007 form by the now healthy Jeff Francis.

In the form of the best pitcher in baseball, U-Ball, who is having a year that is reminding people of Bob Gibson in 1968. In the form of Taylor Buchholz, Huston Street and Jorge De La Rosa, all of whom are projected to return from the disabled list in the next 3 weeks to finally add stability and potency to the bullpen and rotation.

And hope in the form that this team, a team that has played so well down the stretch in recent years, will understand that all their hopes and high aspirations cannot be realized unless they start to play as a team, unified as Colorado Rockies.

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If not for a Kenyon Martin layup, the Nuggets would have gone the first seven & a half minutes of the 1^st Quarter without scoring a single point.  That, combined with atrocious, stationary defense, gave the Suns a quick 18-2 lead over the visiting Nuggets.

Denver struggled so mightily through the opening salvo that they had a paltry 5 points at the midway point in the quarter.

Down 15 with 4:22 left in the 1^st, Carmelo Anthony nailed a tough 21-foot jumper.  JR Smith followed from 18 for 2, 25 for 3 & 26 for 3.  Chauncey nailed a 25-footer of his own on the next trip down the court to bring the Nuggets within 8 points at 23-31.

Unfortunately, Denver’s run fell short and the Suns called a quick timeout to right the ship.  By the end of the opening quarter, Phoenix had inflated its lead back to 12.

Most of the 2^nd Quarter was a back-and-forth slugfest that slowed to a crawl as the referees took over the flow of the game.  Neither team was able to gather any major momentum as casual contact became fouls.  Phoenix dropped a couple of key threes to stretch their lead.

That lead hovered around 16 points until Phoenix called a timeout with 2:35 left in the half.

Denver came out stout on defense, but started missing jumpers in bunches.  The Suns maintained their scoring pace, dropping 11 more to end the half up 70-49.

Even without the Nuggets’ early game struggles, they only shot 38% in the half against 56% for Phoenix.  And despite their spat of threes to close the gap in the 1^st Quarter, Denver started a dry run from deep that spanned the remainder of the half.  That translates to 3 of 10 versus 8 of 12 from beyond the arc and a breezy 21-point Suns lead.

That first half buzzer might as well have signaled the end of the game.

Denver was able to bring the Phoenix lead down to 13 midway through the 3^rd Quarter, but the Suns called a timeout and re-established their dominance.  An 11-2 Phoenix run coming out of that timeout effectively ended the Denver threat by expanding the lead to 22 points.

TNT must have been delighted to have such a barn-burner as their showcase game this late in the season.  No doubt Denver audiences bailed on Altitude early too.  The refs slowed the game with whistles to quell the brewing bad blood as the game got physical.

The final score in the Nuggets’ final game of the regular season was an embarrassing 101-123 depantsing.

The loss relegates the Denver Nuggets to a likely 5^th seed, as the Utah Jazz control their destiny in the race for the Northwest Division after a win at Golden State.  Phoenix travels to Salt Lake City tomorrow night to settle the Western Conference seeding with the Jazz.  Only a Suns victory can save the Nuggets from their late-season decent from 1-seed contenders to the 5-seed and a hellish road to the Finals.

The best Denver can now finish is the 4th playoff slot, a 1st round date with the Jazz, and a temporary home-court advantage. Should Utah beat the Suns tomorrow night, the Nuggets will open the 1st round on the road in Phoenix.

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The Denver Nuggets’ playoff seed could be #2 in the Western Conference.  Then again, it could be #8.

With 5 games left, even LA could lose every game and potentially get lifted from their slot as the #1 seed.  (Don’t worry Lakers Nation… they’re waiting for the playoffs to choke.)

Four teams currently sit at 50 wins, 27 losses.

The Nuggets (#3) are among them, tucked just below the Dallas Mavericks (#2) and above the Utah Jazz (#4) & the Phoenix Suns (#5).  The Lakers are a win away from clinching the top spot in the West, and both the Oklahoma City Thunder & San Antonio Spurs are within striking distance of everybody, but unlikely to make the leap.

We’ll know all about OKC’s chances of charging the upper echelon of the playoff field by Friday, as they play Utah, Denver & Phoenix all in a row between now and then.

All of the various tiebreakers could make it a circus to sort out.  Really, so many different potential realities exist over the next week that I have decided to point out the most crucial games by bolding them above.  It’s the best I can do to make sense of the coming madness.

Here’s how it all shakes out…

Dallas controls its destiny as the current #2 seed.

They will face off against Memphis tonight (win) and then travel to Portland (loss) & Sacramento (win) on consecutive nights.  The Mavericks will finish a 3-game West Coast swing in LA against the Clippers (blowout win) one week from today.  They finish their season at home versus the San Antonio Spurs (loss) who have slowly, methodically battled their way to the #7 seed.

Dallas looks likely to hold onto their position at the top of the heap, but have been inconsistent all season.  As Dirk goes, so do the Mavericks.

Final 5 Prediction: 3-2

Phoenix is a long-shot to catch up from the #5 slot

The Suns have been on a tear, winning 24 of their last 30 games.  They welcome the Spurs to Phoenix on Wednesday (win) before traveling to Oklahoma City (loss) on Friday.  Then they return home for two games in three nights against Houston (win) & Denver (win) before heading immediately to Utah (loss) a night later to close out their season.

The Suns are a dangerous team entering the playoffs, but will be too tired traveling to Utah the night after a home game versus the Nuggets to catch up to Dallas in the standings.

Final 5 Prediction: 3-2

Utah sits at #4 looking up at the NW Division title

The Jazz are a serious danger to the Nuggets in the NW Division title race.  Denver won the season series, so Utah will have to out-win the Nuggets from here on.  But they have an interesting mix of easy teams on the road and tough teams at home.  Not a good combination for a club that struggles outside of Salt Lake City

Tomorrow night the Jazz will welcome a dangerous team to town in the Oklahoma City Thunder (win), but Utah has handled the Thunder very well in the past.  The Jazz then go on a 3-game swing through Houston (loss), New Orleans (win) and Golden State (loss) before coming home to face Phoenix (win) a night later.

That’s right, Utah and Phoenix will meet in SLC for an all-out battle on April 14^th to close the season.  Luckily the game is on ESPN so everyone can watch the fireworks.

Final 5 Prediction: 3-2

The Nuggets probably need to win 4 of 5 to improve beyond the #3

Even then, a loss to Phoenix on the final night of the Nuggets’ regular season could spell doom for their seeding if the Suns can hold par until then.  In fact, Denver is the most vulnerable team in this field with injuries to Kenyon Martin & Chris Andersen still handicapping their frontcourt.  The Nuggets have taken a big (6’11”) step towards fixing that problem.

On top of all that, the Nuggets will be without head coach George Karl, likely well into the postseason.  That means Adrian Dantley will be on an island making the tough decisions about how to handle bumps in the road along the way.

And bumps there will be, as the Nuggets head to Oklahoma City (loss) on Wednesday before coming home to face the Lakers (win) on Thursday night.  Then the rising San Antonio Spurs (win) come to town Saturday, followed by Memphis (big, thumping win) on Monday.  The final test will be in Phoenix next Tuesday, and that game is likely to mean the difference between potentially two or three spots on the playoff ladder for both teams.  Call it serendipity, the whole nation will watch that battle live on TNT.

Final 5 Prediction: 3-2

You may have noticed that I predicted each team to finish 3-2 over their last 5 games.  This is no fluke.  It is not a designed reading of schedules intended to raise the tension.  No, this is actually how I expect the final 5 games to shake out.

If the breaks go as predicted, even if Denver loses to the Suns in their final regular season game, then the Nuggets will hold onto their current seed.  Phoenix will have won the season series, but Denver would move forward as the #3 so long as they stay on par with Utah and ahead of Oklahoma City to win the NW Division.  (The Lakers will almost assuredly win the Suns’ Pacific Division.)

So get to a TV if you can, find a bar with the full NBA package if you must, but watch as many of these games as you can.  It may just be a warm up for the Main Event, but this next week is going to be one hell of a show.

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Ubaldo Jimenez rocked the radar gun at 99 mph, with an average fast ball speed of about 96 mph, and became the first Rockies starter to win on Opening Day in 6 years on Monday afternoon.

The Rockies faced a tall task in entering Milwaukee to take on the heavy-hitting Brewers, but Jimenez pitched 6 solid innings for the win.  Matt Belisle and Matt Daley put in solid performances in middle relief, the former putting out a fire started by lefty reliever Randy Flores in the 7th.  Daley induced a bases-loaded pop fly on the infield to end the Brewers’ only real threat to a Colorado lead that started at 2-0 in the 1st Inning.

The Rockies led 4-0 before Milwaukee fought back with tallies in the 5th & 7th.  Both teams scored in the 9th Inning to make it a 5-3 final in favor of Colorado.

Shawn Estes was the last Rockies starter to get a win for Colorado on opening day.  Ubaldo Jimenez got into some trouble in the 5th, but calmed down and closed the inning with only a single earned run.  That was the only run Jimenez, the Rockies’ new staff ace, gave up on the day.

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With 8 games to go, the Nuggets will need a win tonight at the Mavericks and a strong finish to reacquire the 2^nd seed in the Western Conference playoff field

Despite a losing effort in Orlando on Sunday, the Denver Nuggets clinched a playoff slot with 8 games to go.  Memphis lost to Milwaukee in OT to set a basement for the Nuggets’ playoff seeding.

Now Denver will travel to Dallas for a showdown with the Mavericks.

The Nuggets need this game for a lot of reasons… namely the three teams surrounding them in the standings.

The Dallas Mavericks sit at 2^nd in the West just a half game ahead of Denver with one less loss and a game in hand.  Dallas has a cakewalk to the 2-seed with 4 of their remaining 9 games coming against non-playoff teams.  Unless the Nuggets steal a game in Dallas tonight, they will be watching as the Mavs walk away with the home-court advantage.

The Utah Jazz are tied with the Nuggets at 48-26.  Denver won the season series so Utah will need to win an extra between now and mid-April to take over the Northwest Division. Aside from a home game against the Knicks tonight and a home-and-away series versus the Golden State Warriors, the Jazz have a tough schedule to close out the season.  If the Nuggets hold

The Phoenix Suns lurk a half game back from both Denver & Utah with one less win but a game in hand.  The Suns have a difficult road stretch this week, all against Eastern Conference teams.  If Phoenix can improve at all on their 7-game winning streak against poor-to-middling opponents (or just grab 2 of 4 through the end of the week) the Suns will control their own destiny to close out the season.  They play 3 of their final 5 at home, and their final two are against Denver (home) and Utah (away).

Quite the recipe for a rapid rising of Phoenix in the standings.

Not only is an ascension likely for the Suns, they actually have the best chance of the four teams chasing the Lakers to pull off a miracle and steal the top seed from LA.

Denver, who bit at the heels of the Lakers for much of the season, is missing too much in the absence of Kenyon Martin.  Aside from his stellar low-post defense, Martin was hauling in an average of 9.6 rebounds per game before his knee sent him to rehab.  In recent games, the Nuggets have been missing those two elements very much.  Even bad offensive rebounding teams like the Raptors & Knicks simply got too many second and third chances against the Nuggets without Kenyon to chase them out of the paint.

That brings us full circle: back to tonight’s game at Dallas.

There is no quick-fix for what ails the Nuggets.  Without Kenyon Martin and the steadying influence of George Karl on the sidelines, they have looked (and played) like a middling playoff team of late.

Without the remaining Nuggets stepping up, most notably the bench players (we’re all looking at you JR), Denver will end up exactly that… a middling playoff team with an uphill climb back to the Conference Finals.

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Avalanche defenseman Ruslan Salei, fresh off of a season-long injury, is back among the ranks of the unavailable. Salei played for his native Belarus in the Olympic Games, and has been back on the ice for Avalanche, picking up one assist in six games. This time the injury is a generic sounding “torso” injury, and according to team he’ll be on the bench indefinitely.

The “indefinite” nature of the injury points to something more than just a common bump or bruise, and could spell the end of Salei’s tenure with the Avs, thanks to his $3M per year expiring contract.

On the other side of the injury coin, Kyle Cumiskey is set to return Tuesday against the Canucks. Cumiskey, suffering the after effects of a concussion, is in the midst of a breakout year, playing in 44 games and notching 14 points (7 goals, 7 assists).

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Johan Petro started this game.

Believe it.  Petro… started.  And yet somehow it all made sense.

Petro started at Center, played for seven minutes, didn’t take a single shot, grabbed five rebounds, and dished a single assist to Melo out of a double-team for a huge early dunk.

Then Johan vanished.

Petro was replaced by Chris Andersen, their shared singular task to guard the paint against the very tall, skinny Portland Trailblazers.  In the absence of the injured Kenyon Martin, smallish Center Nene played Power Forward while two beanpole goliaths swatted away Blazers.  It was brilliant.

By the time Denver went to their smaller lineup, bringing in JR Smith for Andersen, the Nuggets had a 61-42 lead with under two minutes left in the first half.  Denver finished that half on the strength of a bullying Carmelo Anthony drive down the right side of the lane for two points and a 66-49 lead.

Then the world went crazy.  Avatar missed out on Best Picture (The Hurt Locker), and James Cameron didn’t win Best Director (Kathryn Bigelow, also The Hurt Locker).  Somewhere, an Avatar fan is actively fantasizing an Oscar sweep.

But the Nuggets were unfazed.  Towards the end of the 3^rd Quarter we got a great example of why Denver is so functional in the midst of seeming chaos.

JR Smith took a terrible fading jump-shot from 24 feet with two Blazers in his face.  Portland drove the court, worked the left side, and Martell Webster charged in for a sure score.  Then Chris Andersen rose from the paint and swatted the would-be dunk aside.  Nene grabbed the rebound, chucked a strong pass over two Blazers, and JR Smith slammed a half-windmill in front of a rabid Denver crowd.

Smith, who took a bad shot & got beaten defensively, had the presence of mind to charge upcourt as soon as he saw a block.  The Nuggets thrive on playmaking, and they are a team of versatile, athletic basketball players.  That’s why Denver is virtually unstoppable when they find a groove.

The groove is contagious, and that’s why we saw Aaron Afflalo, Johan Petro and even Anthony Carter making plays throughout a 3^rd Quarter where Portland fought tooth & nail to scrape their way back into the game.

And when the Trailblazers got within ten late in the 4^th Quarter, it was JR “Swish” again who started the Rain of Threes that has become the Nuggets’ trademark in big wins.

The Denver Nuggets took down a big divisional matchup against the dangerous Portland Trailblazers 118-106 at Pepsi Center.

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Trap-Style Defensive Hockey: Natural Predator of the Chaos-Style Hockey Team

In order to understand the way I view hockey, you must first understand how I watch the games.

North American Pro Hockey is a goal-based game with a field of play separating two goals, and an object that must pass into one goal or the other for a score.  In these types of games, position & movement (whether individual or coordinated) become the most important facets of the game. Furthermore, position & movement influence who will do well or poorly, not only in given situations but also over the course of the game.

In the case of hockey, the most intriguing aspect is that the game is played on ice. This detail removes much of the control a given player may have over the object, especially compared to Basketball or Lacrosse where a player will have much greater control.  Basketball & Lacrosse (and to a certain extent soccer) are sports where teams may take their time setting plays up before the action begins, and then run a set play that has been carefully laid out and practiced ad nauseum. So the scheme can change from team to team or from situation to situation.

But hockey is so unpredictable in its nature that you can’t scheme more than a handful of scripted plays, and even then you will rarely run through the progression perfectly (despite what you may have seen in a certain investment firm’s commercials.)  All professional teams have chosen to rely less on micromanaging a multitude of unpredictable events, and rely more on developing a basic philosophy about how to react.  Playing Style has become the cornerstone of dictating how teams will try to use position and movement.

To elaborate:

Styles of Play break down into three major categories…

Control Hockey

Chaos Hockey

Trap Hockey

The perfect examples today of Control-Style teams are the Detroit Red Wings and the Pittsburgh Penguins.  These are teams that want to control the puck, obviously.  They are forceful and decisive.  On defense they take calculated risks when challenging attackers for the puck.  They frequently engage in aggressive fore-checking, though only when they have the play backed up.   On offense, puck movement is the name of the game and player movement is almost always rigidly coordinated (or at least as rigid as you can get in a fluid, unpredictable sport.) They will play in triangles frequently so that the player with the puck will have passing options.  They knife toward the net frequently, but typically in situations when they have two defenders at the blue line in case the play back-fires; and the knifing player is frequently a decoy to draw away defenders from a sharpshooter.  In short terms, they are teams that try to blend talents of smart positioning and smart movement.

Good Chaos-Style teams are the Avalanche & the Washington Capitals.  Chaos teams play up-tempo, damn the cannons, full speed ahead.  They are resourceful and quick.  On defense, they take numerous risks and almost always engage attacking players.  They fore-check constantly in all situations, the goal being to move the game into its unpredictable tendency, and then quickly grab the upper hand.  On offense, common strategies are Dump and Chase and Crash the Net.  Chaos teams believe in a simple philosophy; no one knows what will happen on the ice, so the fact that they know no one will know is an advantage. (Try saying that three times fast.)   Chaos teams try to make position as useless as possible, and turn the game into a series of actions entirely composed of movement.

Some Trap-Style teams are the Florida Panthers & the bane of the Avalanche, the Minnesota Wild.  Trap teams like the game to move slowly. Trap teams are cautious and patient.   On defense, they take firm positions and rarely engage an attacker until they have a clear advantage.   The fore-check is not used until it is a clear fore-check situation.  On offense they will always leave two and frequently three defenders near the line, thus forcing their own attackers to play 3 on 4 or 2 on 3 hockey.   The philosophy is to play safely and eventually the other team will make a mistake.  Trap teams try to remove as much movement from hockey as possible, and make the game entirely composed of positioning.

These three styles create a kind of paper, rock, scissors effect.  Your typical Chaos team will beat your typical Control team consistently, while your typical Trap team will stifle the Chaos team while struggling mightily against the Control team (But Dan, how come the Red Wings beat us for so long?  Simple. Because we sucked for a long time.)

This explains part of the sudden, though not unexpected (at least not by me), resurgence of the Avalanche.  The Red Wings and Penguins are the last teams to win the Cup, and the league is beginning to copy some of what they do.  Remember back in the Mid-ots when the Wings, Devils, Senators & Stars were all really dominant, and now all but one has fallen on hard times.   Remember the Avs were struggling to make the playoffs half the time, and the other half struggling for respect.  It’s because everyone and their sister was playing Trap hockey, from Anaheim to Florida and St. Louis to Carolina (I even saw Edmonton play trap one game… seriously! Edmonton!) So a more balanced control team would rise to top by playing with a consistent advantage.  But copy-catism isn’t just for the NFL or the major political parties, the NHL is changing to a more Control-Style of play to follow in the footsteps of recent Champions.  Teams like the Avalanche, the Capitals, Edmonton (eventually), and the Rangers get a boost from being handed an advantage by the copy-cats, while teams like Florida, Carolina, and Minnesota sink to the bottom.   But the inherent mismatch of the Trap vs. Chaos still exists, which brings me to last week’s game versus the Wild.

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Billups & Anthony have anchored the league's 3rd-best team

Before characterizing the Nuggets, who have quietly been ambushing opponents and analysts alike, let’s review where they currently stand in relation to the rest of the league:

With 35 games to be played…

-Denver is currently in first place in the Northwest Division with a record of 32-15, which is 4 games ahead of both Utah and Portland,

-Denver holds the second-best home record in the league at 21-3,

-the Nuggets have the third-best overall record in the NBA behind only Cleveland and the L.A. Lakers; both of whom Denver has defeated,

-finally, Denver has defeated Cleveland, L.A. and Orlando; each of which stands atop their respected divisions.

With all of these impressive stats in place, the Nuggets are still lacking two important elements; bench productivity and size.

Compared to last year Chris “Birdman” Anderson is averaging less points and blocks per game, and J.R. Smith is also averaging less points per game, yet receiving more minutes (due to team injuries.) Neither player is producing as they did the previous year, and it is putting pressure on the rest of the Nuggets’ reserves. A lot of that pressure has been placed upon a rookie point guard in Ty Lawson & new starter Aaron Afflalo, both of whom seem to have embraced their hastily-given responsibilities.

In relation to size, Denver’s Nene does have a nice quick shot and great game endurance, but he lacks attitude and gives up a little in height to consistently pull down offensive and defensive rebounds. Melo, Chauncey and Kenyon Martin, despite injuries have managed to develop a great on-court relationship, leading to greater point and assist production for each.

An adversary of this season’s Nuggets has undoubtedly been the challenge to sustain a healthy starting five. Melo, Chauncey, Nene and Kenyon Martin have all seen their unwanted share of the bench this year, with that in mind it is fare to say that the Denver Nuggets are a better team than their impressive record indicates. Heading down the stretch I believe this team can push themselves to peak in time for the playoffs, while maintaining a rotation that gives Melo and Chauncey time to rest and recover. That means Coach Karl will not only have to game-plan against specific opponents, but also game-plan for the best interest of his star players as well.

With all that said, I believe the Nuggets will be the greatest threat to the Lakers as Los Angeles tries to repeat last year’s Championship run.

With a tough 35 game schedule ahead, I predict the Nuggets, healthy or not, can come away with a 23-12 record and take the division running away. This week the Denver Nuggets schedule looks like this:

Monday, February 1st, Sacramento (Home) *Must Win

Wednesday, February 3rd, Phoenix (Home) *Shoot-Out, Win

Friday, February 5th, L.A. Lakers (Away) *Hangover, naw, we’ll beat ‘dem Lakers

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