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ESPN’s Legler: Nuggets have “bright future” building around Jokic

Mar 30, 2017, 12:00 AM | Updated: 10:44 am

The Portland Trail Blazers delivered perhaps the final blow to the Denver Nuggets playoff aspirations on Tuesday, taking essentially a two-game lead for the final playoff seed with a 122-113 win.

To add insult to injury, former Nuggets center Jusuf Nurkic, whom the team traded to Portland along with a first-round draft pick in exchange for Mason Plumlee, scored 33 points and had 16 rebounds.

But despite the sting of likely being eliminated from the postseason, ESPN NBA analyst Tim Legler said Denver has a lot to look forward to in building off this season.

“It stinks right now because you saw what happened last night. It still stings because that might have been the final crushing blow to Denver’s playoff hopes. But you’ve got to look bigger picture with this team,” Legler told “Schlereth and Evans” on Wednesday.

Legler said he didn’t expect the Nuggets to be a playoff team this season, nor did the team itself, he thinks. But with a “very, very young” core featuring breakout star Nikola Jokic, there’s “a lot of hope for the future.”

“They’ve got a really bright future, and it starts by building around Jokic, and now you move forward,” Legler said. “But now the expectations will be higher next year going into the season when making the playoffs will be a realistic goal now.”

Legler said the Nuggets got a little bit lucky with Jokic, selected 41st overall in the 2014 NBA Draft, and how good he’s become along with his “great character” But he did credit Denver for sussing out his potential.

So, you’ve got a second-round pick that now looks like he’s going to turn into a perennial all-star. So, that’s the biggest takeaway from this (season),” Legler said. “I think he is a better player with a higher ceiling than event they thought. And give them a lot of credit for identifying what he was.”

However, Legler did find disappointment in the play of Emmanuel Mudiay, who was expected to “take a big leap forward” this season and did not.

“That’s got to be a little bit disappointing. I don’t think you’ve written him off as to what he can do with his career,” Legler said. “But he shot 37 percent from the field this year. And he didn’t stay healthy, and he didn’t really improve his jump shot to where he needs to be a much more viable threat. So that’s probably one of the things you’d mark off on the downside.”

Follow digital content producer Johnny Hart on Twitter: @JohnnyHart7.

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