Denver's NBA title is no magic

The Nuggets win the NBA Finals

The Denver Nuggets didn’t surprise themselves with this championship.

Last year’s Warriors may have surprised themselves, slightly, if the Warriors are honest. The 2019 Raptors were likely caught at least a little off center with the team’s riotous run to the ring. The 2021 Bucks, maybe, it was Milwaukee’s first turn at a title in decades.

In May the Nuggets ended the NBA’s longest streak without a Finals appearance, yet the Nuggets never felt like a club which deserved a run or two through the ringer before claiming victory. Denver knew it had something in October, and followed through.

Mixing the right characters is easiest with an MVP but the clock ticks, a franchise has a finite amount of market space to fit the right players around the redoubtable Valuable Player in time enough to hit paydirt.

Denver’s shovels clinked too many times to count.