Bruce Brown became the NBA Champion last season with the Denver Nuggets. He lifted the elusive trophy in his first year at the franchise as he joined the Nuggets after a two-year stay with the Brooklyn Nets. The forward has experience of playing with greats like Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and also with Nikola Jokic and hence he understands what greatness feels like.
The forward has now made another move to join the Indiana Pacers. Recently, in a podcast called Tidal League, he spoke about his experiences in the last two franchises and also highlighted the difference between the above-mentioned superstars.
“Playing with Ky [Irving], James [Harden] and K [Durant] is very different playing with Nikola [Jokic]. … I feel like Nikola’s too unselfish. He gonna make the right play every single time,” he began. “K (Durant) and Ky can shoot over 2 people and score. Nikola not going to do that. He gonna pass it and believe that you gonna make that shot every single time.”
While a lot of people expected the trio of Kyrie Irving, Kevin Durant and James Harden to work for the Brooklyn Nets but it fell flat completely. The trio’s best achievement in the postseason is to win one playoff series against an injury-marred Boston Celtics back in 2021.
However, the switch from Brooklyn to Denver was very fruitful for Brown as he won the trophy last season. The Nuggets were led by an able leader in Nikola Jokic while Jamal Murray also supported him really well as they defeated the Miami Heat to lift the franchise’s first-ever NBA Championship.
Brown was a very important piece in the puzzle for the Nuggets as he provided the hustle and defence from the bench which the team needed at crucial junctures. He also reminisced how he managed to hit a few big shots during their championship runs. He mostly credited Jokic for those passes. “There’s multiple times this year I’ve taken game-winning shots off his pass and he’s supposed to shoot it.”
After a solid last season performance, Bruce Brown was sure that he was going to get serious offers from many franchises and therefore he signed a two-year 45 million deal with the Indiana Pacers as an unrestricted free agent. While the Nuggets will get a new player in his role, their main motive will be to defend the championship and with Murray and Jokic at their best, it is pretty much possible for the Denver Nuggets.
