Category: Denver Nuggets Blog

Here’s the Denver Post reporting on Nuggets forward Danilo Gallinari:

Indications are that Gallinari will be ready for training camp. He sat out this season after needing a second ACL surgery in January. But he’s running now. And jumping. And dunking.

“It felt great just to grab that rim,” Gallinari said, smiling.

He’s not doing anything too crazy, but he’s ahead of schedule and said he will be ready when October arrives.

“It’s going very good,” he said. “The guys are trying to keep me calm, because I feel like I can do a lot of stuff. They are holding me back. Finally, I feel like I did the right thing with the right surgery.”

Gallinari was the Nuggets’ second-leading scorer in the 2012-13 season and one of their best 3-point shooters. They could have used him this season.

Here’s ESPN News Services reporting on explosive scoring guard Nate Robinson, who is good at coming off a bench, scoring in a hurry and creating havok:

Denver Nuggets point guard Nate Robinson, who is out for the season after suffering a torn ACL in his left knee in January, vows that he’ll exercise his player option and return to the team next season.

“Things happen,” Robinson told the Denver Post on Wednesday. “God always has a plan for everybody. So, it’s just another obstacle that I’ve got to hop over and keep pushing. But for me, it’s going push me to continue to work hard.

Here’s the Denver Post reporting on the Nuggets, who for the moment can hold their heads high once again:

These postgame shindigs had become so nuts-and-bolts, it took until the end for anyone to remember to step back and take a look at the entire forest. The Nuggets had won. There were reasons for that, of course. Many of them.

But the Nuggets had won on Wednesday night, after losing six straight. After not winning at home since Feb. 5. That, in and of itself, no matter how it was accomplished, was a relief.

Nuggets 115, Mavericks 110.

The Pepsi Center crowd could finally exhale.

Finally.

“It’s been a long time,” a relieved Nuggets coach Brian Shaw said. “It feels good. Especially here, where we’ve let down our crowd so many times. It just goes to show that when we have the healthy bodies and we play the way we’re capable of playing, we can play with anybody.”

Here’s the Denver Post blog reporting on the Nuggets and head coach Brian Shaw, who likes his players but doesn’t like seeing the squad give up when things look bad:

A new, potentially harmful narrative arose out of a couple of radio interviews Nuggets coach Brian Shaw conducted this week — one that he hates his roster and vice versa.

Not true, he insists.

“I can’t remember who it was that asked me yesterday; he said ‘Would you have taken this job with the roster, if it was just the guys who are healthy and playing right now would you have taken this job?’” Shaw said. “I said, after interviewing for head coaching jobs as many times as I did, 11 times prior to this interview, and not getting a job, I said ‘Yeah, I most likely would have taken it.’ But the expectation and everything else would have been different, knowing if there wasn’t going to be Gallo, JaVale (McGee), Nate (Robinson) for half the season and the situation be what it is.

“So, no, I don’t hate the roster. What I hate is having to beg guys to play. That simple. That shouldn’t be a part of what coaching should be. And circumstances are what they are. None of us asked for it.” …

Shaw: “I’ve always said I can live with the losses, as long as we fight. But what’s hard for me is when we go from a tie or something in the first quarter, to down 20 by halftime, and then we come out in the third quarter and we just give up. And I felt like that’s what some of our guys were doing. Now, it’s important for me to understand that those guys who are continuing to do that, going forward in the future, they aren’t going to get my vote of confidence to keep them here if that’s what they are showing when the going gets tough.”