The Denver Nuggets were “oh-so-close” to winning the Western Conference Championship. A glorious playoff run was capped by a deafening loss to the Lakers, as the Nuggets fell apart down the stretch. However, the work was done. Chauncey Billups had returned to his native Denver to lead his hometown team back to the glory that all fans expect. The Nuggets went from a 50-32 SU record and a sweep in the first round in 2007-08, to finishing second in the Western Conference at 54-28 SU and lost to the Lakers again, this time 4-2 SU in the conference finals.

The key component of their loss was J.R. Smith, the often selfish shooting guard who put up more bricks than an overworked mason expert during the series against L.A. Smith averaged a modest 15.2 points and 2.8 helpers for Denver during the regular season, but those number careened during the playoffs. Against the Lakers, the 23-year-old Smith averaged just 12.7 points and shot .387 from the field. Smith also went 4-for-13 from the line and turned ball over 2.17 times per game. If there was any weak leak on the Nuggets, it was J.R. Smith.


Instead of moving quickly in free-agency to replace J.R. Smith, George Karl and the Nuggets have elected to keep him. This comes in the staggering wake of Smith’s unbelievably immature off court blunders. In 2007, he ran a stop sign that killed his friend, and passenger, Andre Bell. He was sentenced to 90 days in county, but served just 24 days as he could fulfill the rest of his sentence by performing 500 hours of community service. In 2009 Smith pled guilty to the manslaughter charges.

Also, recently, J.R. Smith was forced to close his Twitter account because he was accused of being connected with the Bloods gang. His text, apparently, was coded much in the way a member of the infamous gang would write. Now, I’m not going to tell anyone who to hang out with when they’re not at work, but if you’re hanging with some questionable company as a professional athlete, then you might want to keep it private.

Smith is entering a contract year, and with the Nuggets at a modest $68 million this coming season in total payroll, and Smith is a cap hit between $5.5 and $6 million through 2011. People in management have a certain threshold for stupidity in the NBA. Smith is testing it vehemently. The problem is that no team would touch Smith regardless of potential. Taking on bad contracts is not in the interest of any team right now, especially if it will also come with a PR nightmare attached.

This is where Chauncey Billups comes in.

Billups has elected to fly to Las Vegas, Smith’s summer home, and “have a talk”. Essentially, Billups is going there to beat some maturity in to the punk kid who is throwing his life away one idiot move at a time. Excuse me for being harsh. I understand that it’s hard to take the “trailer park out of the girl” but sometimes you have to justify your old school ties with your new school earnings. Smith is due to make in excess of $11 million over the next two years. Who in their right mind would jeopardize that? I mean, besides Latrell Spreewell.

It’s not just that the Nuggets, and Chauncey’s, NBA Championship hopes hang in the balance that’s the big story here. The bigger story is how much of a leap a guy like Chauncey is willing to take for a teammate and a friend. A mentoring move like this will only galvanize a team that understands hardship. Kenyon Martin, Carmelo Anthony and Chris “The Birdman” Anderson can all tell you that.
And a strong, tightly knit team concept is going to be imperative for the Nuggets. The Spurs, Lakers and Mavericks have all made big moves in the Western Conference, but the Nuggets have remained static. They’ve already lost Kleiza to Europe and aren’t in a position to really acquire anyone else out there, unless they blow up their team in a trade.
This is the kind of news that deserves bigger press, only because it reaffirms my belief that Denver can return to the glory stage of the Western Conference Finals if J.R. Smith can get his act together. If any mentor can knock some sense in to the kid, it’s Chauncey Billups. And you guys wonder why I lobby so hard for Billups during the MVP discussion last year…


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