The top two assist-getters on the Nuggets are a flabby center and Jamal Murray. The flabby center gets way more, but I always think of Murray as more of the “shooty” kind of guard. Not the “passy” kind. But he’s averaging almost five assists per game this season. Who says the “Jamal Murray at point guard” experiment didn’t work? I don’t know if anyone is saying it now, but they were definitely saying it before.
The Nuggets are proof positive that a team doesn’t need to start a real PG if they don’t want to. As long as the rest of the players can kind of pass, and at least one of them can bring the ball up the court without getting pickpocketed, things will work out. They do have Monte Morris for when they want some real PG action, and he’s great, but it almost feels weird when he’s out there. If they wanted to trade him to say… the Bucks for say… Thon Maker, they could be maybe the first team ever to just not have a true PG on their roster (just forget about Brandon Goodwin for now). That would be fun, wouldn’t it? I’m mainly thinking about how fun it would be to not have to watch Maker on the Bucks anymore, but it would also be fun for the Nuggets. Except that they’d have Maker.
Murray played a whole bunch of minutes tonight, almost a full 48, which is the main reason why he got 31 and 8. Whenever a player starts getting that much playing time in a game, I start putting asterisks next to every available stat. This isn’t the 50’s anymore, and any more than about 38 minutes reeks of statpadding.