The Nuggets' Uneven Offseason Puts All the Weight — and the Pressure — on Jokic

If the last week taught us anything about the Denver Nuggets, it's that the franchise is determined to thread a needle it may not have the thread for. Denver made its two headline moves within 24 hours of each other — trading away a fan favorite and signing a veteran — while the biggest story of the entire summer continues to hover in the background: Nikola Jokić has still not signed an extension.

The Nuggets sent restricted free-agent forward Peyton Watson to the Cleveland Cavaliers in a four-team deal that also involved the Clippers and Wizards, per The Athletic. In return, Denver received a pair of draft picks, including an unprotected 2031 first-rounder. Watson will sign a four-year, $88 million contract with Cleveland — a price tag Denver clearly wasn't willing to match.

Just a day later, the Nuggets added six-time All-Star DeMar DeRozan on a one-year, $3.9 million deal after he was waived by the Kings. It's a low-cost swing at shot creation, but several outlets have already noted it doesn't fill Denver's most pressing need. And with the bench now thinner than it was before the Watson trade, there's a real question about how much mileage the starters can absorb.

Jokić's Contract Looms Over Everything

The most consequential storyline isn't a signing or a trade — it's what hasn't happened. Jokić enters the season with his future unresolved; he can hit free agency next summer, and reports indicate he's already passed on a Denver supermax offer more than once. CBS Sports framed it bluntly: the Nuggets are "daring Nikola Jokić to leave after a listless summer."

Denver was operating over the second apron for most of the offseason, which restricted its flexibility. The Watson trade handed back some draft capital, but it also stripped a young, versatile defender from a roster that now leans even harder on its MVP.

The sportsbooks still view Jokić as one of the favorites to win MVP — BetMGM has him at +550, implying roughly a 15.4% chance — but individual hardware won't ease the concern that the pieces around him have gotten thinner, not deeper.

What It Means for the Season Ahead

Denver's early schedule offers no favors. After a pair of games against Utah to open things up on October 4 and 7, the Nuggets face the Lakers in Los Angeles on October 17, then the Thunder on the road on October 23 — two teams with plenty of motivation and, in OKC's case, a deeper roster.

Last season's trip to the playoffs showed just how much the Nuggets depend on Jokić carrying the offense. Adding DeRozan gives them another proven scorer who can create his own shot in the halfcourt, which takes some pressure off the Jokić-centric attack. But the concern, echoed in multiple analyses of the revamped depth chart, is that Denver's bench could leave the starters with extra work in 2026-27. With Watson gone, the wing defense gets thinner, and the onus of anchoring that end of the floor falls even harder on the big man.

The Nuggets also filled an open two-way roster spot late in the week, a small but necessary step toward rounding out a rotation that still looks a piece or two short of the West's elite.

There's a scenario where this all works: DeRozan provides enough scoring punch, Jokić delivers another MVP-caliber season, and the 2031 draft capital becomes a useful asset down the road. There's also a real risk that Denver has spent the summer doing just enough to remain competitive while giving Jokić every reason to wonder if the front office shares his urgency.

For a franchise with a championship window that runs exactly as long as its star stays, the next few months will be as much about watching the team on the floor as it is about monitoring what happens off it.