NBA Rumors: Nuggets Eyed Paul George Trade; Discussions with Clippers yielded no progress | News, scores, highlights, stats and rumors

While it was already known that the Golden State Warriors were making an attempt to get Paul George this offseason, there was another Western Conference prospect who also tried to get the nine-time All-Star.

According to ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne, the Denver Nuggets investigated the Los Angeles Clippers about George before he opted out of his contract to become a free agent.

Shelburne noted that talks between the Nuggets and Clippers “never escalated” because Denver refused to discuss Christian Braun, Peyton Watson or Julian Strawther. The Clippers had no interest in a deal that would only take back the salaries Denver didn’t want to pay.

It’s unclear exactly what salaries the Nuggets would have offered, but Shelburne noted it was “probably” Michael Porter Jr. and Zeke Nnaji would have been had the talks gotten that far.

Another thing that’s unclear is whether George would have wanted to play in Denver. This scenario would have been dependent on him choosing his $48.8 million salary for 2024-2025.

We know this scenario played out if the Warriors had been able to make a deal with the Clippers, because George acknowledged that such a deal was “on the verge of getting done,” but it fell apart when Golden State refused to include Jonathan Kuminga in a package to take. .

George ultimately exercised his opt-out and signed a four-year, $211.6 million contract with the Philadelphia 76ers as a free agent.

The Nuggets’ decision to bet big on their young, unproven talent around Nikola Jokić has not yielded great results so far. They are off to a 2-2 start and are 13th in the offensive rankings despite the reigning NBA MVP averaging 31.5 points, 12.3 rebounds and 9.3 assists per game.

It’s not entirely the fault of struggling young players like Strawther and Watson. After a summer of worrying about how he finished last season and looked in the Olympics, Jamal Murray still doesn’t look good with a 37.9 field goal percentage. Porter is shooting 29.6 percent from three-point range.

Russell Westbrook is minus-38 in 79 minutes played off the bench. He has been better over the past two games as he was minus-37 for 41 minutes through his first two games.

George wouldn’t help matters right now as he’s on the shelf with a knee injury, but his ceiling when healthy is higher than anyone on the Nuggets roster after Jokić.

Instead, the Nuggets are staring at the possibility of wasting a year of Jokić’s prime because they wanted to try the two-timeline thing that almost derailed the Warriors.