The Nuggets parted ways with both Michael Malone and Calvin Booth because of a ‘cold war’ that was brewing behind the scenes. Can Daryl Morey and Nick Nurse avoid the same fate?
Last Tuesday, the Denver Nuggets made the shocking decision to fire title-winning head coach Michael Malone with only three games left in the regular season. They also announced that they wouldn’t be extending the contract of general manager Calvin Booth, which expires after this season.
ESPN’s Ohm Youngmisuk reported “there was growing tension between Malone and Booth” heading into the season that “grew into a ‘cold war.’” According to Tony Jones, Sam Amick and Zach Powell of The Athletic, Malone and Booth “had been at odds over everything from roster construction to the way players were used, creating tension that started to bleed into the rest of the organization.”
“Booth wanted Malone to use younger players that he drafted and to stray away from using veterans for so many minutes,” they wrote after the news broke. “Jalen Pickett is a good example of this, according to league sources. Booth was dismayed that Malone went with Russell Westbrook over Pickett down the stretch of multiple games last week. On a macro level, Booth and Malone disagreed on several things.”
The Sixers haven’t run into that issue yet with head coach Nick Nurse and team president Daryl Morey. If anything, the Sixers’ relentless wave of injuries this year forced Nurse to lean more heavily on young players than anyone anticipated coming into the year. Although that didn’t translate to many wins, it could have positive downstream effects for the Sixers once they get closer to full health.
Before tearing his meniscus in mid-December, Jared McCain showed flashes of stardom while emerging as the early Rookie of the Year front-runner. When Quentin Grimes arrived at the trade deadline, he seized the opportunity in front of him and established himself as a clear starting-caliber player moving forward. And with the Sixers playing out the string on a lost season in recent weeks, rookie second-round big man Adem Bona has been demonstrating the developmental strides he’s made throughout the year.
All three could be game-changers for the Sixers, who project to be well over the salary cap as long as they have the trio of Joel Embiid, Paul George and Tyrese Maxey on their books. The NBA’s new collective bargaining agreement is effectively designed to hamper teams with multiple max contracts by limiting what they can do in trades and free agency. Teams like the Nuggets and Sixers not only need to hit on their draft picks, but they also have to lean on them more than a win-now team typically would under the old paradigm.
That’s been an issue with Nurse dating back to his Toronto days. It was on full display early this season, too. Kyle Lowry and Reggie Jackson were clear net negatives, but Nurse continued to play them over some of the Sixers’ other young options off the bench. Playing Justin Edwards or Ricky Council IV over either of them wouldn’t have saved the Sixers’ season, but the ineffectiveness of the Sixers’ AARP bench unit didn’t help with their early-season tailspin.
Morey and Nurse need to be in philosophical alignment about the balance of veterans and young players both on the roster and in the rotation moving forward. It’s going to become increasingly difficult for them to replenish their supporting cast around their Big 3.
Luckily, they both seemed on board with the same vision at their end-of-season press conference on Sunday.
“I would say one of those things is I was very focused on finding veteran-type players who generally perform very well in the playoffs, and I didn’t put enough emphasis on the team getting through the regular season,” Morey said. “So next season, for sure, we will be a younger, more dynamic group.”
Nurse added that the “game keeps getting faster and more dynamic,” and that the Sixers needed to be “a little bigger, longer, stronger, more athletic” for “really basic things like defensive transition or defensive rebounding.” (They finished 28th this season in defensive efficiency in transition and 30th in defensive rebound rate.)
The Nuggets are the perfect cautionary tale for the Sixers in that regard. Since they won the 2022-23 championship, they’ve experienced a talent drain. Key reserves Bruce Brown Jr. and Jeff Green both left for richer deals in 2023 free agency, while starting 2-guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope signed with the Orlando Magic this past offseason.
Christian Braun has adequately filled KCP’s shoes in the starting lineup this year, but the Nuggets are short on reliable bench depth. Their other young players have yet to pop in the way that Booth planned.
The emergence of McCain and Grimes gives the Sixers a head start over the Nuggets in that regard. But given their expected roster-building restrictions this offseason—they’ll likely be limited to the $5.7 million taxpayer mid-level exception and only minimum contracts beyond that—they might struggle to add an impact player via free agency. That puts a premium on both internal development and the signings that they do make.
That’s another area where the Nuggets whiffed in recent years. They signed Reggie Jackson to a two-year, $10.3 million contract with their taxpayer mid-level exception in 2023 and wound up spending three second-round picks to salary-dump him the following offseason. They spent their taxpayer MLE this past offseason on Dario Sarić, but The Homie has played only 210 total minutes for them to date.
Again, Morey and the Sixers’ front office have an advantage over the Nuggets in that regard. They nailed a pair of minimum signings over the past two years—Kelly Oubre Jr. in 2023 and Guerschon Yabusele this past offseason—and have found other inexpensive contributors via the draft (McCain, Bona) and free agency (Edwards, Patrick Beverley). In fact, Morey cited the front office’s ability to work the margins as one of the main reasons why he was comfortable building a Big 3 while other teams look to shed costs in the second-apron era.
“In those situations, I like having the challenge,” he told reporters last May. “To me, finding the guys that are overlooked [for lesser deals]. The Kelly Oubres of the world. Getting a Kyle Lowry. Getting players like that. I like that challenge. I think that’s something that the front office is very good at.”
The Sixers need to look no farther than the 2024 Philadelphia Eagles for a crystal-clear example of how the front office/coaching staff dynamic can propel a team to a championship. General manager Howie Roseman knocked it out of the park last offseason both in the draft (Quinyon Mitchell, Cooper DeJean) and free agency (Saquon Barkley, Zach Baun). From there, head coach Nick Sirianni pushed the right buttons throughout the year to get his team to the promised land.
Heading into last offseason, Roseman said the Eagles needed to embrace more of a youth movement and that Sirianni was on board.
“I think that for us to play our young players, to develop them, I think that’s something that Coach and I have talked about to not be afraid of,” Roseman told reporters. “That’s why you draft them. That’s why you sign them.”
Morey and Nurse seem to be on a similar page heading into this offseason. But if they deviate from that plan or begin to clash at some point, they could find themselves suffering the same fates as Malone and Booth if the Sixers underachieve again next year.
Unless otherwise noted, all stats via NBA.com, PBPStats, Cleaning the Glass or Basketball Reference. All salary information via Salary Swish and salary-cap information via RealGM.
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