April 11, 2013

The extraordinary success of George Karl’s nameless Nuggets

By Dave Krieger

The play is called 3-chest. It’s a variation on the oldest play in basketball, the pick and roll. But in this case, the pick and roll is basically a decoy to draw the defense, opening the door to a kick-out pass to an open man on the perimeter.

For most NBA teams, this would be a means of setting up an open jump shot. For the Denver Nuggets, who score more points at the rim than any team in basketball, it’s a way of opening a lane to the basket.

After Wilson Chandler put up 29 points to lead the Nuggets to their 21st consecutive home victory Wednesday night, over the four-time champion San Antonio Spurs, I asked what got him going. After all, the team had struggled through the first half, scoring only 38 points. For the Nuggets, that’s enough to order medical exams all around.

Chandler’s 19-point second-half explosion got his team going and put the Nuggets one step closer to locking up the fourth-best record in the NBA despite playing without their two leading scorers.

“Just picking the right time to go attack the rim, and coach calling a 3-chest,” Chandler replied, with his usual brevity.

The Spurs converged on the pick-and-roll action and Chandler, playing the big forward role in which he presents the most difficult matchup to the defense, caught the kick-out and took the ball to the rim in a flash.

“He has a lot of opportunity, especially when he plays four (big forward), to do what we want done — attacking to the gap, try to get to the rim,” coach George Karl said. “And I thought putting him at four very early in the third quarter was kind of how the pendulum swung.”

Without Ty Lawson or Danilo Gallinari, their two leading scorers, the Nuggets won their 54th game of the season. One more win in their last four games will make this the best regular-season Nuggets team since they joined the NBA in 1976.

It is the most remarkable coaching job of Karl’s remarkable career, which now spans four decades and 1,128 wins, sixth-most in NBA history.

“I hope we can win 57 or 58,” he said. “The team has a resilient attitude towards whatever has to happen in a game to win it.”

What the Nuggets are doing makes no sense in the context of the conventional wisdom that has been built into an NBA fortress over the past 33 years, or since Magic Johnson and Larry Bird arrived on the scene:

Stars win championships.

Johnson’s Lakers and Bird’s Celtics dominated the 1980s. Michael Jordan’s Bulls dominated the ’90s, except for his two-year foray into minor league baseball, when Hakeem Olajuwon’s Rockets took over.

The glory was spread around in the aughts, but it was still reserved for the megastars: Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal in L.A., Tim Duncan in San Antonio, Dirk Nowitzki in Dallas, Dwyane Wade and LeBron James in Miami.

The Nuggets didn’t have an all-star this season even when Lawson and Gallinari were healthy. Without them, they find themselves leaning on players who are or were coming off the bench, including Chandler and Corey Brewer, their leading scorers against the Spurs.

And yet, they keep on winning. They have the best home record in the NBA at 36-3. Their overall mark of 54-24 with four games to play trails only Miami (James, Wade), San Antonio (Duncan, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili) and Oklahoma City (Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook).

“I think the team is a great example of executing the strategy and the system that the coach wants to employ,” said Spurs coach Gregg Popovich.

“I think more than any other team, they exemplify a group of guys accepting roles, whether it be minutes or their roles on the court and how they play in relation to the other players, on a consistent, game after game after game basis. He’s done a great job in keeping that together.

“In my mind, it’s hard to think of anybody who’s done a better job. And, at the same time, you don’t find quote unquote superstars on the team. He’s gotten them  to play for each other, be responsible to each other and understand that they’re better as a unit than they are with one guy doing his thing.”

Popovich ought to know. He is that rare, fortunate coach who has on his roster an unselfish, team-oriented superstar. Duncan enforces the team concept with teammates, which helps to explain the Spurs’ four titles during his career.

The Nuggets used to be pretty much the opposite, of course. When Carmelo Anthony was their headliner, they were the prototype of one guy doing his thing and a lot of other guys watching. It worked to a point, just as it’s working now for the Knicks, Anthony’s current team. The Nuggets made the playoffs every year. They just didn’t go very far once they got there.

It might not ever have changed if Anthony hadn’t forced his way out, yearning for the bright lights of Broadway and discouraged by the Nuggets’ apparent determination to rebuild with youth after the cast led by Anthony, Kenyon Martin and J.R. Smith — the Knicks’ current nucleus — managed to get out of the first round of the playoffs only once.

But Karl, who has battled willful superstars for much of his coaching career, trying to get them to play within what he calls “teamness,” embraced the opportunity to coach an ensemble cast without having to tiptoe around big egos. In the absence of Lawson and Gallinari, an emerging leader on the floor is former Olympian Andre Iguodala, who had his first triple-double of the season Wednesday night.

Talk to Iguodala about the game and he sounds a lot like Duncan. Somebody gave him a chance to crow about the Nuggets’ progress this season in matching up with the Spurs, and he declined.

“I feel like they’ve got the edge on us mentally,” he said. “They’ve been there before. They know what it takes. They’re never out of it. I think Tim Duncan has done a great job of setting the tone throughout the rest of the guys on how to play basketball. That’s something we’re going to have to continue to grow on. They’re solid, and nothing really changes from one through 14. We’re starting to get there as far as our depth goes, but we can go a little deeper when we have those blowouts and then our young guys get in and they can continue to be hungry and not just play to play, but play to improve and become a better basketball player.”

With Gallinari having blown out an anterior cruciate ligament, he’s gone until next season. That means Chandler has to fill his role on the Nuggets’ marquee after being a bit player for much of the season.

“Defensively, he can cover any position on the court,” Karl said. “He can cover one through five. We haven’t put him on point guards a lot because we give that responsibility to Andre Iguodala a lot. And his team defense is first class. He covers up. He knows when to come off his man and I think he really does a great job of running and making defensive plays. And he’s a solid to good rebounder. Tonight, when they zoned up, he made two or three cuts that got easy baskets against their zone which I think took them out of it.

“I never expected him, after the way he played early in the season and not feeling comfortable, now to become one of our top three or four players. It’s pretty impressive.”

Karl hopes Lawson will be back on the court as soon as Friday night in Dallas, but there’s no telling if or when his starting point guard’s plantar fascia issues will allow him to resume playing at his previous high level.

In the meantime, Karl continues to mix and match among the players available, from 37-year-old point guard Andre Miller to solid center Kosta Koufos, from exuberant Kenneth Faried to freakishly athletic JaVale McGee, from 20-year-old Evan Fournier to the irrepressible Brewer, once stereotyped as a one-way defensive player. Brewer took 25 shots against the Spurs — “He took about five I want to kill him for,” Karl said — and scored 28 points.

“He has no conscience,” Chandler said. “He gambles on defense, he takes bad shots, but it works.”

“Nah, I don’t have no conscience,” Brewer agreed cheerfully. “If I see the basket, I’m going to shoot it. But it works out for us.”

If you get the impression that these guys enjoy playing with one another, you’re getting the picture of what’s going on in that locker room.

Given their dominant record at home, the Nuggets are focused on earning home-court advantage in the first round of the playoffs to give themselves the best chance of eradicating their hard-earned reputation for early postseason flame-outs. Wednesday’s win brought them one step closer to locking up the No. 3 seed in the West, but the job still isn’t done.

Karl has little use for the NBA’s coach of the year award, in part because he’s built the sixth-most wins in association history without ever winning it. He’s been passed over countless times for coaching flavors of the moment you may not even remember. All you need to know about the legitimacy of the award is that Hubie Brown has won it more times than Phil Jackson.

Maybe the media types who vote will stumble on to a correct verdict this year. Blind squirrels and all that. It doesn’t really matter. People inside the game understand what an extraordinary job Karl has done this season. He’s never been better.

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April 8, 2013

Rockies raking, rolling in early going

By Dave Krieger

So let’s review the stats after the first week of the 2013 baseball season. The Colorado Rockies rank:

— 1st in the major leagues in runs scored with 39.

— 1st in the major leagues in home runs with 13.

— 1st in the major leagues in total bases with 121.

— 1st in the major leagues in RBI with 38.

— 1st in the major leagues in batting average at .333.

— 1st in the major leagues in on-base percentage at .377.

— 1st in the major leagues in slugging percentage at .588.

— And, therefore, 1st in the major leagues in OPS at .945.

Well, sure, you say, when they’re healthy, they can rake. What about the pitching?

Maybe most remarkable of all, the Rocks rank fifth in the major leagues in earned-run average at 2.80 after playing three games in the top offensive park in baseball last year (Coors Field) and three in the No. 7 offensive park (Miller Park in Milwaukee).

Individually, Michael Cuddyer ranks second in the National League in batting, at .450; Troy Tulowitzki ranks fifth, at .421. Dexter Fowler ranks second in home runs, with four; Wilin Rosario is tied for third with three. Cuddyer and Tulo are tied for third in RBI with seven.

As a result, the Rocks are 5-1 and tied for first place in the National League West.

Can all this last? Of course not. In fact, the hitting numbers should begin to moderate this week as the Rockies play six games in the pitcher-friendly ballparks of San Francisco (the No. 29 offensive park in 2012) and San Diego (No. 26).

Still, through six games a year ago, the Rocks were 2-4 and already 3 1/2 games out of first place. So you’ll forgive Carlos Gonzalez, batting .360, which ranks eighth on the team, a little smile.

“The things that we’ve been working on since spring training are working,” he said after Sunday’s 9-1 victory over the Padres completed a series sweep and extended the Rocks’ winning streak to five. “Our confidence level is good. Obviously, we have a lot of games left, but it’s always good to start this way.”

What, specifically, was he referring to?

“Well, pitchers are throwing strikes,” he said. “They have that confidence. They know if they throw strikes they’re going to go deep in the game. Pitchers, all they want to do is get a ‘W.’ That’s why they pitch every four or five days. Right now, they’re throwing strikes, they believe in the guys playing defensively behind them, and we all know if they do their job we’re going to be able to score some runs and win ballgames.”

In other words, while last year’s 75-pitch limit for starters is gone, Rockies pitchers know that given the organizational data on pitching injuries, they cannot nibble around the strike zone early in the game and expect to be on the mound long enough to get credit for a victory.

In the first six games, the Rocks’ starter has pitched at least six innings five times. The highest pitch count so far is Jhoulys Chacin’s 99 on Sunday, but the starter has thrown at least 94 pitches in four of the six games.

In four spring training starts this year, Chacin gave up 15 runs and 25 hits in 16 innings, an ERA of 8.44. In two starts since the season began, he’s given up two runs and nine hits in 13 1/3 innings, an ERA of 1.35.

Following Sunday’s win, I asked him what the main difference was.

“I think my focus,” he said. “I’ve been more focused. Just don’t worry about anything and just make my pitch. That’s something I’ve really been working on with (pitching coach) Jimmy Wright. Just try to get my rhythm when I’m pitching and make my pitches down and just get ground balls.”

Indeed, 15 of the 20 outs Chacin recorded against the Padres came on ground balls. Overall, according to baseballreference.com, of the balls hit in fair territory off Chacin, 16 were on the ground and only seven in the air.

Despite the unimpressive spring numbers, first-year manager Walt Weiss never wavered in making Chacin his Opening Day starter.

“I try not to put too much stock into spring training,” Weiss said. “It’s important to get your work in and all that stuff, find a rhythm to the game, but you don’t want to put too much stock in it. I know Jhoulys; he’s a good pitcher. He’s got a great change-up. He’s another one of those guys that seems like he’s always in control of the at-bat. It never really gets too far away from him. I have confidence in his ability.”

The Rocks have emphasized various elements of pitching over the years as they’ve tried to figure out a formula suited to Coors Field. They’ve tried big breaking balls, they’ve tried power arms, they’ve tried to emphasize lateral movement over the downward breaks that can disappear at elevation. In spring training this year, they kept it simple.

“I think they’re doing the things that we talked about this spring,” Weiss said. “Guys are less concerned about east and west and are really thinking about pitching to the bottom of the zone and putting the ball on the ground. You saw (Jon) Garland do it (Saturday) night. That’s kind of who he is, but being able to minimize damage like that with a bases-loaded, no-out situation, to give up one run, that’s really impressive. Jeff (Francis) was able to do it to a lesser extent the other day, minimize some damage. I think these guys are buying in that when you’re at the bottom of the zone and you stay in decent counts, you can be very effective.”

Oddly, the pitch count edicts from the front office that may have contributed to Jim Tracy’s resignation as manager at the end of last season have been relaxed for Weiss. Still, he hasn’t let any starter reach 100 pitches yet.

“I’m aware of it, particularly early on,” Weiss said. “And we’ve got, what, four of our starters missed a lot of time last year. So I certainly am aware of it and it’s a factor. But I haven’t had to push that button early or anything. Some of these guys have been in the 90s and I think that’s a good place to be, particularly for the guys that had some issues last year physically.”

Of the five starters, only Jorge De La Rosa, who makes his second start tonight in San Francisco, has an ERA above 3.00. Three relievers — Matt Belisle, Rafael Betancourt and Edgmer Escalona — have combined to throw 9 2/3 innings in nine appearances without giving up a run.

“And the other thing is, pretty much everybody who was out last year, they’re playing again,” CarGo pointed out. “Tulowitzki, Cuddyer, (Todd) Helton, guys who can do a lot of things offensively. We’re going to score runs. Everybody knows that. Everybody understands that this team will score runs. That’s what we’ve been doing, and the pitchers are doing a great job and that’s why we’re getting good results every day.”

Even the Rocks’ “B” lineup, which produced a 5-22 record on Sundays a year ago, is raking. Four starters — Tulowitzki, Cuddyer, Helton and Josh Rutledge — got the day off in Colorado’s first Sunday game this year. The team still produced nine runs and 15 hits, including seven hits by substitutes Eric Young Jr., (two), Jordan Pacheco (one), Reid Brignac (one) and Jonny Herrera (three).

“They’re all capable of that,” Weiss said. “A couple lineups we’ve thrown out there like that, one in Milwaukee, guys have produced. It’s a good roster. You kill two birds with one stone. You can give some guys a break and you keep the other guys involved. Regardless of who we throw out there, I think it’s a tough lineup to get through.”

It’s way too early to say much more than the Rocks have given Colorado reason for hope, but that’s a pretty good gift from a team written off before the season even began by many “experts,” both locally and nationally.

“It’s nice to get off to a good start, especially, you know, last year was a tough year,” Weiss said. “So it’s nice to put some of those demons behind us right away. We felt all spring like we have a good club. I don’t think a lot of people feel the same way on the outside, but we’re very confident in the fact that we have a good club.”

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April 7, 2013

Nuggets find life after Gallo

By Dave Krieger

It is in the nature of media types to be slightly more prone to hysteria in both directions than your average fan, given the modern fact of life that hysteria gets a lot more attention than moderation.

So it was that several tweeted their condolences for the Nuggets’ marvelous season the other night, all hope clearly at an end after forward Danilo Gallinari blew out an anterior cruciate ligament.

The Nuggets responded Saturday night by declaring reports of their demise premature. Playing without Gallinari and Ty Lawson, their two leading scorers, they scored more points than they have all season, 132, in a blowout of the Houston Rockets that kept them ahead of the Memphis Grizzlies and Los Angeles Clippers in the race for the No. 3 playoff seed in the NBA’s Western Conference.

They also extended their home winning streak to 20, tying a record set in 1985.

Most remarkable was the effect on Andre Iguodala, who dominated the game at both ends, looking like an Olympian among mortals, which, of course, he was. He suffocated Rockets star James Harden, who finished with 14 points on 2-of-10 shooting. He orchestrated the offense with a game-high 14 assists. He even made jump shots, including two from long distance, on his way to 18 points. He came out with nine minutes of garbage time remaining three rebounds shy of a triple-double.

“I’ll get one,” he promised afterward. “If not in the couple of last games, I’ll get one in the playoffs.”

Coach George Karl inserted Wilson Chandler into the starting lineup for Gallo. It took a little while for the new starting group, still adjusting to Andre Miller for Lawson, to settle in. Of the 15 shots the starters took in the first quarter, the two Andres took 10. Chandler took one and failed to score. The Nuggets trailed 35-25.

I asked Chandler afterward if he felt as though he needed to adjust his game when he moved in with the starters.

“Yeah, probably a little less shots and more defense,” he said. “That’s not a big deal.”

In fact, that’s the skill Karl cited in selecting Chandler to take Gallo’s place in the starting lineup. He said before the game that the Nuggets’ identity will have to skew further to the defensive end without Gallo.

In quarters two through four, Chandler scored 21 points, finishing second only to Corey Brewer’s 22 off the bench among seven Nuggets in double figures. Without their two leading scorers, the Nuggets set season highs in points, assists (40), fast break points (35) and made field goals (54).

I asked Iguodala the same question about adjustments to his game in the absence of Gallinari and Lawson, to whom he has largely deferred at the offensive end this season, and for apparently good reason, given his difficulty making jump shots. He’s shooting .441 from the floor this season, 18 percentage points below his career average, and .308 from three-point territory, 20 points below his average.

“I’ve tried to do that all year: How can I fit in and be the most effective I can be without taking from the other guys, really making them better?” he said.

“And I felt like I’ve been able to do that, whether it shows up on the stat sheet or not. But when we have guys go down, you change some things up to try to make up for the loss, not by myself, but by making the other guys better — getting a few extra assists, a few extra points, a few extra rebounds. So it kind of worked out tonight. Going forward, we’re going to have to continue to do that as a unit.”

It’s probably a good idea not to go from manic depression over Gallinari’s injury to manic elation over a single performance in its wake. The Rockets were playing the second night of a back-to-back coming in from the west coast, the circumstance that provoked San Antonio coach Gregg Popovich’s scheduling protest four years ago in which he sat his three best players in Denver (and still nearly won). It’s extremely rare that the visitor wins in that situation. Iguodala was well aware.

“They got in really late last night, so I’m pretty sure they were kind of tired, and the altitude always seems to work in our favor, so all those things kind of play a factor in the game,” he said.

In the absence of Lawson (and third-string point guard Julyan Stone), 20-year-old rookie Evan Fournier has moved into the playing rotation, nominally as Miller’s backup at point guard. He’s really more of an off guard, but he and Iguodala provide enough ball-handling to allow the 37-year-old Miller adequate rest.

In fact, Fournier provides the closest thing to Gallinari’s offensive style, bringing a similar European skill set in a smaller package. He had 17 points Saturday. After scoring no more than 10 in any of the Nuggets’ first 73 games, he is averaging 14.3 in the four games he has served as Miller’s relief. It is beginning to look as if general manager Masai Ujiri has mined the uncertain lower portion of the NBA draft’s first round for another hidden gem. Kenneth Faried was the 22nd pick in 2011. Fournier was No. 20 last year.

In the absence of Gallinari, 23-year-old Anthony Randolph moved into the playing rotation, essentially replacing Chandler in the bench crew.

“I just like his defense,” Karl explained. “The first thing I wrote in my notes this morning was, ‘We can’t be a goof-around defensive team anymore.’ I’m not saying we’re going to be worse offensively, but our defense now has got to create offense. We have too many quarters that we kind of cruise-control our defense on the court when we’re shooting well and we’re scoring well, moving it well. I don’t think we can do that.”

Randolph rewarded Karl with seven rebounds and four steals (as well as 14 points) in 22 minutes. No Nugget had more than seven boards, but eleven of them contributed to a total of 46. Iguodala and Miller combined for 26 of the 40 assists.

“Dre Miller and I, we played together in Philly, and we had a few games like that, where we both had double-figure assists,” Iguodala said. “You’ve just got two guys who know how to find the open man, know how to move the ball a little bit. We’re trying to make the passing contagious because when we’re moving that ball and it’s not sticking, we’re really a good team, and George Karl, he’ll back that up.”

Karl admits he’s nervous about losing one of the best shooters, in Gallinari, from a team for which shooting — especially from long distance and the free-throw line — is the most obvious weakness.

“There’s no question it can’t be one guy,” he said before the game. “We can’t do that. Gallo is Gallo and everybody has his personality. I think because we’ve played a lot of different rotations and a lot of different ways, the comfort zone of finding a rhythm is what we need to do in the next six games. I think it’s do-able, but, you know, there could be a game or two that it might not look very good.”

Other than the first quarter, it didn’t look bad in the first game since Gallinari’s season ended. More than ever, it will need to be an ensemble effort. But in the absence of their two leading scorers, Iguodala demonstrated he’s capable of conducting the orchestra.

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April 6, 2013

Yorvit Torrealba as an omen

By Dave Krieger

At the far end of the Rockies’ clubhouse, where a cacophony of laughter and allegation roll around a wall and out of the showers, sits a familiar figure. Yorvit Torrealba is back.

And, in the very early going, the Rocks are winning again.

Torrealba’s previous four-year stint in Colorado encompassed the two best seasons in franchise history — the 90-win campaign in 2007 that catapulted the Rocks to the World Series and the 92-win season in 2009 that took them to another promising postseason berth, this one aborted by Huston Street’s allergy to the Philadelphia Phillies.

Chris Iannetta, the catcher of the future at the time, was supposed to be the starting catcher both years. In ’07, Iannetta hit .218 and Torrealba ultimately took over, playing in 113 games to Iannetta’s 67 and starting all four games in the World Series loss to Boston.

In ’09, Iannetta nominally kept the starting job, appearing in 93 games to Torrealba’s 64, but Torrealba out-hit him by 63 points (.291 to .228).

His emergence in ’07 earned him his biggest contract to that point, a two-year, $6.75 million deal. But when he sought a similar deal following the ’09 season, the Rocks thought that was too much for a backup — Iannetta was still the nominal starter, although he would lose the job again, this time to Miguel Olivo, in 2010.

The negotiations lasted so long that when the Rocks finally abandoned them and signed Olivo to a one-year, $2 million deal to replace him, Torrealba was left scrambling for a job. Ultimately, he signed a one-year, $750,000 offer from the lowly San Diego Padres. Expected to do little, the Padres surprisingly won 90 games, earning Torrealba the contract he had sought a year before from the Rocks — a two-year, $6.25 million deal from the Texas Rangers.

In his first year there, he matched his career-high for games played with 113 and the Rangers went to the World Series. Last year, Torrealba’s batting average slumped from .273 in 2011 to .236. Mike Napoli, who had split time between catching, first base and designated hitter in ’11, took over as the main catcher and Torrealba was released in August. He was picked up briefly by the Blue Jays, then traded to the Brewers, but didn’t play much for either. At the end of last season, he was again a free agent.

In the meantime, the Rockies had finally lost patience with the Iannetta waiting game, trading him to the Angels for pitcher Tyler Chatwood following the 2011 season. They were also less than enamored with Olivo and let him walk following a single season.

Ramon Hernandez was their next veteran signal-caller, signed along with two other veterans — Michael Cuddyer and Marco Scutaro — in the misguided belief Colorado would contend in 2012. A starter for years, Hernandez required the kind of money the Rocks had refused to pay Torrealba. They gave him a two-year, $6.4 million contract.

But at least two things became clear as the Rocks’ 2012 season imploded:

— Despite being young, raw and defensively awful as a rookie, Wilin Rosario was an offensive force and the Rocks’ latest catcher of the future if he could only learn to catch and call a game.

— At 35, Hernandez was injury-prone, in rapid decline and didn’t seem all that interested in mentoring Rosario.

Re-enter Torrealba, whom the Rocks signed to a one-year contract that would pay him $1 million if he could make the team out of spring training. Management hoped Torrealba’s extroverted personality would make him a better mentor. They also remembered the effect that personality had in the clubhouse, and realized it had been missing since he left.

At the end of spring training, Torrealba made the team and Hernandez was designated for assignment. Hoping not to have to eat all of Hernandez’s $3.2 million salary for 2013, the Rocks tried to find a trade.

Today, they finally did, shipping Hernandez to the Dodgers, who could use some insurance for A.J. Ellis, in exchange for pitcher Aaron Harang “and cash considerations.” If this saves money for the Rocks — which would be the only reason to make the deal since they immediately designated Harang for assignment as well — the Dodgers must be eating most of Harang’s contract, which called for a $7 million salary this year. After all, he’s already included in their record $216 million payroll. The Rocks are now looking for a trade for him, too.

In any case, Torrealba is back, Rosario has looked better behind the plate in this season’s small sample so far, and the Rocks have won three of their first four games.

“So far, so good,” Torrealba told me following Friday’s home opener, a 5-2 win over the Padres. “It’s been awesome. I’m very happy to be back here. A lot of good memories in here. The best years of my career so far has been with this team. It’s a great feeling.

“I didn’t even want to leave in the beginning and when I got a chance to come back like I did this year, I didn’t hesitate to sign a contract and come back, try to make the team out of spring training, and I did, so I’m happy to be here.”

I asked him about his new role as a mentor to a younger player.

“They tell me flat out,” he said. “I mean, I know what my role is since I signed here. That doesn’t mean that I won’t be playing much, that just means I’m going to try to help as much as I can, and so far, so good. I mean, he’s a young, talented guy. Not only offensively, but I’m seeing defensively he’s getting way better. He showed the last couple games. I’m just in the dugout watching everything he does and then I try to help him. So far, so good on blocking balls, calling games. It’s good to see the guy already progress like you would want him to.”

When you ask him about Rosario, Torrealba sounds as much like a coach as a fellow player.

“He showed last year he can hit at this level. I’m seeing every year for him he’s going to feel more comfortable at the plate. But behind the plate I don’t think he was feeling too comfortable. I watched some tapes of him last year and then a lot of stuff I hear from the different guys, different coaches. That’s what we’ve been working on — blocking balls, especially. I guess that was a big issue for him last year. Like I said, this year, so far, so good.

“And at the same time I’m pushing him to talk to the pitcher, get to know the pitcher, where they can be on the same page. Instead of just trying to call the game, he can just actually talk to the pitcher and figure out what they want to do together as a team, as a battery. So far, so good, like I said. It’s not only winning the couple games that we won, I think overall he look really good behind the plate.”

It doesn’t seem that long since Torrealba was here last, but in modern media time, it’s been forever. If you believe most of the national analysts, the Rocks are who they were last year — terrible. One ESPN analyst predicted they would lose more than 100 games.

“I see a talented ball club, but to me last year they put so much pressure on themselves when Tulo went down, when CarGo was out for a little bit, when Ramon Hernandez was catching and went down, they started putting pressure on themselves,” Torrealba said.

“To me, and this is something they said from the first day of spring training, it’s all about having fun. That’s one of the things a lot of guys watch me already in the dugout talking stuff, talking crap to the guys, just keeping it loose. I think with the talent that we have in here, if we can all play loose and play comfortable, we’re going to win a lot of games.”

I asked him if he thought his personality was part of why the Rocks wanted him back.

“Probably,” he said. “Probably, yes. I think the best three years they have as an organization, I was part of it.”

A lot has changed in the Rockies clubhouse since 2009, of course. The starting lineup that year included Iannetta, Clint Barmes, Ian Stewart, Seth Smith and Brad Hawpe. Only Troy Tulowitzki, Dexter Fowler and Todd Helton remain, although Carlos Gonzalez, at 23, was in his first year with the club.

The ’09 pitching rotation included Ubaldo Jimenez, Jason Marquis, Jason Hammel and Aaron Cook. Only Jorge De La Rosa remains. In the bullpen, the only holdovers are Matt Belisle and Rafael Betancourt.

So I asked Torrealba if all those new faces create a different clubhouse atmosphere.

“It’s about the same to me,” he said. “A lot of new faces, but they’re all nice guys. I remember 2007 and 2009, all the guys we have, they nice guys. Even in hard times, it’s easy for me to go up there and have fun and play around and joke around and keep everybody loose. And the same with this team this year. Even if there is a lot of young guys, still, it feels like there is the same thing in 2009, same thing in 2007, when it comes to attitude.”

I mentioned the national predictions of a last-place finish, losing more than 100 games. I asked Torrealba how good he thought the 2013 Rocks could be.

“I tell you what — we’re definitely better than losing 100 games in a year,” he said with a smile. “I like the fact that a lot of people think that way because through my career, personally, I love to prove people wrong. I think I did it all my life almost, all my career. Talking about myself, in 2007 I wasn’t even a starting catcher and ended up playing every day. 2009, same way. 2010, when I was with the Padres, they said we were going to be in last place and we were one game short of making it to the playoffs.

“So they can say whatever they want to say. I mean, I really see my teammates and myself as a good ball club, talented ball club. If we just keep playing the way we’re playing, a lot of people are going to be surprised.”

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April 2, 2013

Post fax faux pas, Broncos taking their time

By Dave Krieger

The Broncos have already been accused by one national analyst of “steamrolling” Elvis Dumervil’s former agent, Marty Magid, so John Elway would rather not get into the details of the most famous fax faux pas since . . . well, since fax machines became functionally obsolete about twenty-five years ago.

But Elway wants it known that the heart of the matter is pretty simple: The Broncos gave Dumervil a deadline of March 15 at 1 p.m. mountain time to accept their final offer to restructure his existing contract. When that deadline arrived, Dumervil’s answer was no. In Elway’s mind, the comedy of errors that followed only confirmed why that deadline existed in the first place.

Elway joined the Dave Logan Show on Monday for a wide-ranging interview about free agency and the draft, and we spent the first few minutes discussing the Dumervil episode.

I started by asking whether the Broncos remain interested in veteran pass rushers Dwight Freeney and John Abraham, free agents they’ve looked into as possible replacements for Dumervil, who had eleven quarterback sacks last season and 63.5 in six seasons with the Broncos (seven if you count 2010, which he sat out with an injury).

“We’re still looking into that,” Elway said. “We haven’t made any decisions on what we’re going to do. As I’ve said, those guys out there are options, but the bottom line is we also feel very comfortable with Robert Ayers. He’s going to be at the right end — as of right now he’s our starter at right end. We’re not pressed into doing anything. We feel like we can go to bat with the guys that we’ve got if that’s where it ends up, or, if other things shake out, we’ll go that direction.”

I mentioned the report KOA got from a source close to the situation that Magid, Dumervil’s former agent, had an old fax number for the Broncos, so when he tried to fax a signed contract back to the club at the last minute following Dumervil’s change of heart, he couldn’t get through in time.

“The thing that I’m going to tell you is we had a deadline at one o’clock, and I’m not going to take it any further,” Elway said. “We needed a decision at one o’clock. We got that decision that was a ‘no’ and they were not going to accept it, so therefore we started moving on.

“From that point on, we knew that there was always going to be a difficult time to get everything and all the pieces together to be able to get the contract in. That’s why there was a one o’clock deadline put on that. What happened after that, whatever it was, who knows. But the bottom line is there was not enough time to be able to get it done.”

Last week, Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk and NBC Sports came on the program and criticized the Broncos for allowing the negotiations to drag on so long that the deadline for guaranteeing Dumervil’s original deal even came into play. The 1 p.m. March 15 deadline was one hour before the Broncos had to file a revised contract with the NFL office or be liable for a fully-guaranteed 2013 salary of $12 million under Dumervil’s old contract. I asked Elway why it all came down to the last minute.

“Because . . . nothing comes down unless there’s a deadline,” he said. “Especially in this situation. We had a deadline. That’s why it took the whole week. . . . Until the deadline, a lot of times you can’t get that decision. The sad thing is it took a while to get that decision and by the time we got it, it was too late.”

Florio’s suggestion on his web site that the Broncos steamrolled Magid and now face trust issues from other agents — he based the latter claim on quotes from a single, unidentified agent — is not supported by the facts. Florio’s chief complaint is that the counterproposal the Broncos sent to Magid at about 10 a.m. mountain time on March 15 converted a $3 million guarantee for 2014 to an injury-only guarantee.

But there’s no evidence the Broncos were trying to pull a fast one. Rather, that counterproposal was the result of a Magid counterproposal increasing the 2013 salary in the restructured deal from $6.5 million, the Broncos’ proposal, to $8 million. In their final offer that morning, the Broncos essentially said, “OK, we’ll give you the $8 million in 2013, but in exchange for that concession we’re going to restrict the guarantee we had offered for 2014.”

Dumervil had three hours to mull that over before the deadline. His answer, as Elway related it, was no. Then, after the Broncos’ deadline had passed, with the league deadline looming, Dumervil had a change of heart and decided to accept the restructured deal after all. But Magid was unable to engineer the logistics in time and the Broncos, without a signed contract in hand by the NFL deadline, were forced to release Dumervil to avoid guaranteeing the $12 million salary in the only contract the NFL had on file.

Even after that, with Dumervil on the free-agent market, the Broncos made a new offer of a three-year deal, reportedly worth $18 million — $8 million the first year and $5 million each of the next two, with a total of $10 million guaranteed. Dumervil chose instead to sign the Ravens’ offer of a five-year deal with $8.5 million the first year and a total of $12 million guaranteed.

Logan asked Elway if, after everything that had happened, he still thought the Broncos had a chance of retaining the defensive end after releasing him.

“I thought there was a chance, there’s no question,” Elway said. “When we looked at it, once the Cinderella slipper came off and we had to release Elvis, it was free game and he was a free agent. He was out on the market. We thought we could be competitive there, and obviously Elvis made the decision that he thought was best for Elvis. We wish him luck there and we’ll move on, too.”

In retrospect, what happened seems clear enough. The Broncos decided that Dumervil’s original contract, offered by a previous regime headed by coach Josh McDaniels, was too rich. With the advent of Von Miller, Dumervil was no longer the Broncos’ best pass rusher. The Broncos thought his value was roughly half the salary he was scheduled to make this season.

Dumervil had a hard time accepting this, but with the free agent market not yet open, he had no way of judging the market for pass rushers. As it turned out, it was only slightly higher than the Broncos’ initial offer. In any case, he seems ultimately to have reconciled himself to a pay cut, but wanted it to be less than the 46 percent cut for 2013 the Broncos had proposed. He got the Broncos up to $8 million, a 33 percent cut, but in exchange was asked to accept the injury limitation on the 2014 partial guarantee.

The fact that he turned down this compromise initially indicates his lack of enthusiasm for the revised deal. The fact that the Broncos’ three-year offer after he became a free agent was worth less in the aggregate than the restructured contract Dumervil originally turned down indicates the Broncos weren’t that enthused about the restructured deal either, thinking it still overpaid Dumvervil in the out years.

In short, the two sides never agreed on Dumervil’s current value, so it may well be better for both that the deal fell apart. But one lesson from the affair became indisputable when Dumervil fired Magid the day after the fax faux pas:

If you’re transmitting legal documents on a deadline, and you’re doing it by fax for some reason, check in advance to make sure you have the right fax number.

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March 28, 2013

Rockies sign a pitcher not freaked out by Coors Field

By Dave Krieger

In their never-ending quest for a veteran starter who can eat innings and provide leadership, the Rockies traded for Jeremy Guthrie a little more than a year ago. The move was a disaster on many levels.

Guthrie went 3-9 with a 6.35 earned-run average before being unceremoniously shipped off to Kansas City at mid-season. The Rockies paid a reported $7.1 million of his $8.2 million salary for this embarrassing performance.

Worse, Guthrie visibly freaked out trying to pitch at Coors Field, doffing his cap to the crowd sarcastically after one brutal outing and suggesting to the outside world that the Rocks’ home ballpark can drive a normal pitcher crazy. Or, at least semi-normal in Guthrie’s case.

In effect, the Rockies traded Jason Hammel and Matt Lindstrom, whom they shipped to Baltimore for Guthrie, for broken-down Jonathan Sanchez, whom they received from Kansas City as a consolation prize when they got rid of him. Hammel was good, if fragile, for the Orioles, starting 20 games and going 8-6 with a 3.43 ERA. Sanchez was even worse than Guthrie for the Rocks, going 0-3 with a 9.53 ERA.

So when the Rocks went back out on the market a year later still looking for a veteran starter, they were a bit hamstrung. To pay major dollars to a starter who had never pitched in Colorado was now a verb. They did not want to be Guthried again. When I asked reliever Matt Belisle, who has thrived at Coors Field, how you can tell if a pitcher has what it takes mentally to pitch there, he said candidly that there’s no way to know until he does it. Not very comforting in a game in which every contract is fully guaranteed.

So the Rocks passed on the expensive free agent pitchers and seemed prepared to enter the season with what they had until Seattle obligingly released Jon Garland near the end of spring training. It was a little puzzling considering that in four spring starts for the Mariners, he’d given up three runs and 10 hits in 12 innings for a 2.25 ERA. If those results weren’t good enough, it’s not exactly clear why Seattle signed him in the first place.

“I was actually a little surprised, but then again, there’s more than just baseball, there is a business going on and they have to value certain things and certain moves that they’re going to make,” Garland said on the Dave Logan Show. “You know what, it came down to them making that decision and there’s no hard feelings there. Things work out for a reason and Colorado was able to pick me up and give me an opportunity.”

A first-round draft pick by the Cubs (tenth overall) in 1997, Garland is a 6-foot-6-inch, 210-pound horse who has taken the ball every fifth day for most of his career. He has made at least 32 starts in a season nine times.

In eight seasons with the White Sox — this just in: the Cubs made a bad trade — he won 92 games, including back-to-back 18-win seasons. Since then, he’s bounced around, always earning double-digit wins — 14 for the Angels in 2008, 11 for the Diamondbacks and Dodgers in 2009, 14 for the Padres in 2010 — before suffering a shoulder injury in 2011. He had surgery and was out of baseball in 2012, which is why he had to begin the tryout process all over again this spring. Still, he certainly looked healthy in his spring work for Seattle.

“The arm’s doing good,” he said. “I had the surgery in 2011 and took all of 2012 off to rehab and get it stronger. Being in the position I was in, pretty much already throwing a career, that was kind of a luxury that some guys don’t have. But so far this spring, everything’s been really good. It’s been responding well. It’s been bouncing back really well after games. To me, that was the biggest key coming in. I knew it was strong and I knew we were going to be fine, it was just how would it respond after a game, after throwing four, five, six innings and being ready for the next bullpen and the next game. And it’s done really well.”

Garland has thrown at least 190 innings in nine seasons, 200 or more in six. In his lone start for the Rocks in Scottsdale, he threw six innings and gave up one run. At 33, if his shoulder is sound, he should have plenty left in the tank.

“I want to make all my starts and I want to give the team a chance to win every time I’m on the field,” he said. “If I can get to the 200-inning mark, I think that would be a good accomplishment because that means you’re staying out on the field and the manager thinks you’re pitching well enough to give the team a chance to win.”

OK, fine, but what about the elephant in the room? What about Coors Field?

“I think that’s the biggest problem starting pitchers (have) coming in there, is they start to worry about it,” he said. “Is the ball going to carry? What’s going to happen here? My overall feeling is if you keep the ball down and you throw strikes and you work quick, you’re going to get outs regardless of what stadium you’re in.

“I think the biggest thing is just try and maintain that hydration there in Colorado because you don’t really bounce back as strong. But I think overall just the fact that people go in there and they hear so many bad things, I mean, I’ve played in parks that played smaller than that and the ball’s carried just as good. So, like I said, if you keep the ball down and you throw strikes, it doesn’t matter where you’re at, you’re going to get outs.”

Unlike Guthrie, who had never started a game at Coors Field until the Rockies acquired him, Garland actually has a little experience with the barnyard on Blake Street. He’s started three games there — one in 2009 as a member of the Diamondbacks and two in 2010 as a member of the Padres. In the first, he pitched seven innings and gave up three runs. In the second, he pitched six innings and gave up four runs. In the third, he pitched seven innings and gave up three runs, two of them earned. Overall, that’s an ERA of 4.05, very respectable for the ballpark sometimes mistaken for a pinball machine.

If it weren’t for the shoulder issue, you might question whether Garland should be subjected to the pitch counts the Rocks imposed last season in an effort to keep their pitchers healthy. Reportedly, last year’s 75-pitch count will be relaxed to 90 or thereabouts this season. Garland threw 102 in each of his first two starts at Coors, 86 in the third.

On the other hand, he wasn’t pitching there regularly in those days and there is the matter of recovery he mentioned — starters don’t tend to bounce back quite as quickly at high elevation. Coming off major shoulder surgery, Garland is a health risk, which is probably why he was available to Colorado in the first place.

Familiar with Rockies personnel from his stints pitching for Arizona, Los Angeles and San Diego, Garland believes the club will be formidable offensively so long as its two cornerstones, Carlos Gonzalez and Troy Tulowitzki, stay healthy.

“As an opposing pitcher coming in and facing a lot of these guys, when they’re healthy and they’re right, it’s a damaging lineup,” he said.

“You have to be careful up and down that lineup and you have to makes sure to get the guys at the top of the lineup out. Otherwise, you can be in big trouble each and every inning. But I think the biggest key for this lineup is keeping Carlos Gonzalez and Tulo healthy. You keep those two guys healthy, everybody around them becomes better players. They start seeing better pitches, they start getting a little more selective, getting on base a little bit more and it all kind of gets rolling from there.”

However it works out, the Garland acquisition is thoroughly low-risk for the Rocks. His one-year deal is worth $500,000, so if he flames out, it’s not a big financial hit. A younger former first-round pick, Drew Pomeranz, is waiting in the wings just in case.

Garland’s experience pitching at Coors Field means it won’t be a complete shock to his system, as it was to Guthrie’s. And his history as a volume innings-eater suggests that if his repaired shoulder holds up, he just might be that stable veteran the Rocks have been looking for.

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March 17, 2013

Wes Welker and the NFL’s triangular blind spot

By Dave Krieger

Here’s a list of NFL receivers, most of them now out of the league. See if you can find the one that doesn’t belong.

  • WR                              Ht.       Wt.       Draft    Recep.     Yards      TDs
  • Reidel Anthony        5-11   178           1         144          1,846       16
  • Kevin Dyson              6-1      208           1        178           2,325       18
  • Rod Gardner             6-2      213           1         242          3,165       23
  • Bryant Johnson        6-2      214           1        314           3,938        16
  • Matt Jones                 6-6      242           1         166           2,153       15
  • Charles Rogers         6-3      202           1           36               440         4
  • Travis Taylor             6-1      210            1         312          4,017       22
  • David Terrell             6-3       215           1         128          1,602         9
  • Peter Warrick           5-11    192            1         275          2,991       18
  • Wes Welker               5-9      190        None    768          8,580        38
  • Mike Williams           6-5      229            1         127          1,526         5
  • Troy Williamson      6-1      203            1           87           1,131         4

Not that hard, was it?

It’s no secret that NFL scouts, personnel executives and general managers are in love with the triangle, the three measurables that ostensibly tell them about a prospect’s ceiling as an NFL player. They are height, weight and speed, the numbers even many fans now follow rigorously during the NFL scouting combine. The triangle has become so important in scouting evaluations that the combine, once considered a boring set of drills and tests, is suddenly must-see TV for true football fanatics.

As the above list indicates, it is not unusual for a college wide receiver with great measurables — big, strong, fast — to be selected in the first round of the draft and then produce an underwhelming pro career. Nor is Wes Welker alone among those who have been overlooked and gone on to produce big pro numbers. Rod Smith was an undrafted free agent who turned into the best Broncos receiver of all time.

So the fact that the triangle is far from an infallible predictor is not breaking news. But Welker is one of the most obvious examples of why. At 5-9, 185 pounds, he was decidedly small. Repeatedly clocked in the 40-yard dash at 4.6 seconds and above, he was not exceptionally fast. “Small and slow” will get you crossed off a lot of lists. And frankly, when you see Welker in street clothes, “football player” is not the first thought that comes to mind.

All Welker had going for him was a history of making big plays.

During his junior and senior years at Texas Tech, he gave NFL scouts plenty of notice of what was to come. His uncanny ability to get open produced 86 catches for 1,054 yards as a junior and 97 catches for 1,099 yards as a senior. He scored 31 touchdowns in his college career — 21 as a receiver, eight as a punt returner and two as a rusher.

Nevertheless, Welker was generally viewed by NFL scouts as a college player without the size or athletic ability to make it at the next level.

This is pretty much what college coaches thought four years before. A native of Oklahoma City, Welker attended Heritage Hall High School, where he was named Oklahoma high school player of the year by USA Today and the Daily Oklahoman in 1999. He scored 90 touchdowns in high school playing offense, defense and special teams. Oh, he also kicked field goals.

Nevertheless, he was viewed as just another high school kid without the size or athletic ability to play major college football. It didn’t help that Heritage Hall competed in Class 2A — the second lowest — in a state with six high school football classifications. He thought he’d get a scholarship offer from Tulsa, but it never came. On National Signing Day, he had no offers.

“I was thinking I’d get a scholarship offer somewhere,” Welker told USA Today. “When it didn’t happen when it was supposed to, on signing day, I was pretty hurt by it.”

A week later, Lenny Walls walked away from his scholarship at Texas Tech, choosing Boston College instead. A week after signing day, Mike Leach, the new coach at Texas Tech, offered it to Welker.

“When you saw him, he was slow and not really big,” Leach told USA Today. “But he just had a great sense of the field and how to play football.”

Welker thrived in Leach’s spread offense, but the NFL scouting report was familiar. In fact, he was so far off the league’s radar he didn’t even get an invite to the combine, where they collect the measurables that were working against him anyway.

As an undrafted free agent, his background as a kick returner helped him find work. The Chargers signed him as a returner, then released him after one game when somebody else they liked became available on the waiver wire. Marty Schottenheimer later called it one of his biggest personnel mistakes.

Miami picked him up and kept him for three seasons. The Dolphins used him as a returner and slowly opened up opportunities for him to get on the field as a receiver. In his third season he had 67 catches for 687 yards, offering a glimpse of the production he would make routine in New England.

Welker caught Patriots coach Bill Belichick’s eye with nine catches for 77 yards in a Patriots 20-10 victory over the Dolphins in 2006. Belichick reportedly considered giving him an offer sheet as a restricted free agent that offseason. Instead, he offered Miami a second-round draft pick (and, ultimately, a seventh) for Welker and acquired him that way.

In his first season in New England, Welker teamed with Tom Brady to lead the NFL in catches with 112 for 1,175 yards and eight touchdowns. The Patriots went to the Super Bowl.

In six seasons in New England, Welker caught 672 passes (an average of 112 per) for 7,459 yards (1,243 average) and 37 touchdowns. He blew out a knee in the final game of the 2009 season, tearing both his anterior cruciate and medial collateral ligaments. He came back in 2010 as if it had never happened, catching eight passes for 64 yards and two touchdowns in the season opener.

After all this proof that expert talent scouts have been wrong repeatedly about Welker, not that much changed when he became a free agent this season. He was far from the most prized receiver on the market.

Mike Wallace, a third-round draft pick by the Steelers in 2009, got a five-year, $60 million free agent contract from Miami, a reported $30 million of it guaranteed. Greg Jennings, a second-round pick by the Packers in 2006, got a five-year deal worth a maximum of $47.5 million from Minnesota.

Welker got a two-year deal worth $12 million from the Broncos. The $6 million annual average puts him behind more than 20 NFL receivers, even though he’s had more catches than any of them over the past six seasons.

So last week I asked him if all these skeptics and doubters over all these years have fueled him.

“They get me out of the bed every morning,” he said.

I’m told they’re trying to come up with a new test at the combine that will somehow capture intangibles that the scouts keep missing in the lengthening list of NFL stars passed over when the blue-chip athletes are selected at the top of the draft. Of course, such a test wouldn’t have helped scouts discover Welker because he wasn’t even invited to the combine.

Now 31 (he’ll turn 32 in May), Welker will never be the league’s highest-paid or most highly-valued receiver. But for a guy who fails every test of the sacred triangle, he’s having a pretty nice career.

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March 14, 2013

New Nuggets or old Nuggets? You decide

By Dave Krieger

Before garbage time set in, which was just after Carmelo Anthony trudged off barely two minutes into the second half, last night’s game at the Pepsi Center looked less like the Nuggets vs. the Knicks than the new Nuggets vs. the old Nuggets.

For significant stretches — including to start the third quarter — Knicks coach Mike Woodson deployed Anthony, J.R. Smith and Kenyon Martin together. This was the nucleus of a Nuggets team that George Karl’s detractors blamed him for failing to get to a championship. Last night, that suggestion looked laughable.

Owing to last year’s lockout, it took slightly more than two years for Anthony to return to the verdict of the people after forcing the trade that seemed so discouraging at the time. If Denver, like Cleveland, could not even keep a star dropped in its lap by the benevolence of the draft (and Joe Dumars), and if a star was required to win a championship, maybe the Nuggets’ failure to win a championship throughout their existence is no accident.

Two years after the demolition, the picture looks vastly different. A few hours before tipoff, I asked Walt Frazier, the Hall of Fame player and tell-it-like-it-is analyst for the Madison Square Garden network, which is now the better team.

“I think your team because you’re a younger team and these players have yet to peak,” Frazier said.

“(Wilson) Chandler is still becoming a good player. Gallo (Danilo Gallinari) is a good player. I think you have a better nucleus than the Knicks. We have the superstar in Melo, but the thing is, with New York, I think sometimes that’s why we’re in the predicament that we’re in, because they’re always looking for star quality, whether it be a coach or a player. So they did not have the patience to wait for Gallo, to wait for Chandler and those guys to mature in order to try to get them to the next level. So once they saw that they could get a superstar like Melo, it created a lot of hoopla.

“Say if Gallo and Chandler had remained in New York and they were winning, they still would not have brought the hoopla that Melo brought in, which is what New York is kind of all about. It’s entertainment. It’s having that name, that pizzazz. New York had that when Melo came in, but now the team is kind of languishing. They have not moved up to that next level.

“You look at Denver, you don’t have that star quality, but your nucleus is team-oriented. These guys move the ball. To me, sharing means caring. And when you look at your guys’ play, man, 23 assists, 25 assists a game? That means that these guys like each other. They don’t care who scores. They’re just moving the ball around the perimeter to that open man. Being a former player, that means a lot to me. That tells me a lot about the character of the players on the team and how they relate to each other.”

During player introductions, Melo was greeted loudly but incoherently. More boos than cheers, but far from the distinct, extended syllable Nuggets fans have used to serenade Kobe Bryant ever since a certain incident in Eagle, Colorado. Once the game began, whenever Melo touched the ball, which was often, the crowd settled into the Kobe treatment.

Slowed by a sore knee — he left the Knicks after the game to return to New York and have it drained — Melo was a caricature of himself. A star is always a star in his head, so Melo handled the ball as much as ever, briefly surveyed his repertoire of one-on-one moves, and settled for long bombs too often, particularly because he couldn’t make one.

In just under 22 minutes on his old home floor, he scored nine points on 3-for-12 shooting, including 0-for-5 from long distance. When he walked off the floor for the final time just 2:15 into the second half, his team trailed by 26. The Nuggets outscored the Knicks by 18 while he was on the floor.

“I just didn’t have it,” he said afterward. “I tried, but I think it was time to give it some time and get to the bottom of it as soon as possible. It started tightening up, started stiffening up, there were some movements I couldn’t make. Moving laterally, I felt like I didn’t have any pop, any power. So I tried it in the second half, coming back out after halftime, and I couldn’t move out there. I’m going to go get it drained, get the fluid out, get to the bottom of it quickly, so I can get back on the court.”

This is basically the story of the Knicks’ devolving season, as Frazier explained:

“My concern is their age. I was excited with the acquisitions of (Tyson) Chandler and Rasheed (Wallace) and (Jason) Kidd, but all of those guys are near 40 years of age, so it was always crucial to me that they had to stay healthy. And that has been the problem — they have not been able to stay healthy, those three guys. And now you add in Melo, who’s also hurting, and now the loss of (Amare) Stoudemire, so it’s been very devastating for the team.”

For the record, Tyson Chandler is only 30, although he has a lot of mileage on him. Like Melo, he exited last night’s game early, with a knee bruise.

The Knicks’ main problem against the Nuggets was the same as most teams’ main problem against the Nuggets, especially in Denver: They couldn’t keep up. Although lots of people, including Frazier, say Melo is a better defensive player in New York than he was in Denver, there was little sign of it in his return. The Nuggets went small, as Karl likes to do, and put up a transition highlight reel, outscoring the Knicks in the paint 62-24.

“They were really good in pushing it and we were terrible in getting back,” was Woodson’s succinct summation.

The consensus that you need a superstar, and maybe two superstars, to win an NBA championship has been in place for so long that it is now considered to be something like a fact. General manager Masai Ujiri’s work sculpting a new Nuggets team out of ashes from the old is an attempt to challenge that conventional wisdom.

It’s not just the Melo trade. Ujiri convinced an interim GM in Portland to trade Andre Miller for Raymond Felton, which was just short of theft. And his trade of Arron Afflalo and Al Harrington for Andre Iguodala has improved the Nuggets’ defense immeasurably.

The Nuggets have won 10 in a row and are now 44-22, but none of it matters until they do something in the postseason. The same conventional wisdom that says you need a star or two says it shows up in the playoffs, when an ensemble cast can’t run and gun anymore.

After his new team’s evisceration of his old team — 117-94 was the final damage — Karl considered the star vs. ensemble meme for the one millionth time this season.

“I think we make a superstar as the game goes on,” he said. “We have a superstar in every game. Sometimes it’s the team, which I think is the best superstar, when it’s an unselfish, 30-assist night, finding the open man. Or a night where defensively we’re just creating so much energy by playing defense. But Ty (Lawson) plays as a stud some nights. Gallo plays as a stud some nights. AI is a hell of a defender almost every night. Our big guys get a lot of things done that they don’t get enough respect for.

“So, you know, OK, we don’t have that going into the game, but we manufacture it because we play well. Like tonight, we were looking at a stat sheet in the middle of the third quarter and nobody had more than five field goals. But we had like eight guys that had three or four or five field goals.

“I just don’t understand. I like my team and I’m proud of them from the standpoint of they would not allow those guys, you know, (with) the drama that went on here . . .  to play with that much pride tonight I thought was first class.”

Most NBA fans in Denver are well past the Melodrama by now. After all, it’s been two years, and frankly, the Nuggets are more fun to watch than they used to be. Last night’s game was a reminder as to why that is. When healthy, Melo is a great individual scorer. Always has been. Whether his career amounts to anything more than that remains to be seen.

“I think it’s time to let everything go,” Karl said. “It was probably too long getting it here and now that it’s over, there’s always going to be the base of both sides. There’s a portion that’s going to dislike Melo and there’s a portion that’s going to love Melo. But the majority of people, I think right now, hopefully, are getting excited about the team that we have at hand. I know we can’t win in the playoffs, but we’ll try very hard to prove some people wrong when the playoffs come.”

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March 3, 2013

Ryan O’Reilly versus the Keystone Kops

By Dave Krieger

Ryan O’Reilly’s gap-toothed grin made him look like a kid . . .

a) . . . in a candy store.

b) . . . on Christmas morning.

c) . . . who had just spanked an accountant in a numbers game.

d) all of the above.

Take your pick. There is no wrong answer.

“Is he the happiest man on Planet Earth currently?” Altitude TV analyst Mark Rycroft asked after O’Reilly took a minute between the first two periods of today’s game at Columbus, his first in the NHL this season, to do a quick TV interview with game analyst Peter McNab.

“It feels great,” O’Reilly said. “It’s a little quick right now. It definitely takes some adjustment.”

As an organization, the Avalanche clearly believes in accounting. Its two general managers since godfather Pierre Lacroix gave up the title — Francois Giguere and Greg Sherman — are both accountants by trade. So the team’s difficulty competing in the salary cap era is not for lack of ability to do the math.

And yet the Avs utterly misjudged the state of financial play in the O’Reilly contract dispute. They seemed to relish making a power play that gave O’Reilly two choices: sign for their number or sit out the season.

A month and a half into the season, along comes Calgary with a two-year, $10 million offer sheet. The Avs were clearly miffed that another franchise handed power back to O’Reilly. In a league where one owner awarded two 13-year contracts simultaneously, the notion that owners will do things contrary to their collective business interests in order to win is not exactly novel.

“If that’s the way they want to do their business, that’s their right,” Sherman sniffed at a rare media availability to confirm Colorado had matched Calgary’s offer.

The Avs could have signed O’Reilly for that number anytime. It was the O’Reilly camp’s proposal for a $5 million annual average that Avalanche management found so objectionable. Its surrogates in the media pointed to Matt Duchene’s two-year, $7 million deal and said paying O’Reilly more than his 2009 draft classmate would turn the team’s salary structure upside down. While it’s true that O’Reilly was the better player last season, when Duchene was hurt, it’s not likely to be true very often.

And yet, confronted by a Calgary offer sheet with terms slightly more onerous than O’Reilly had requested — the $6.5 million second-year salary makes that the qualifying offer to keep O’Reilly’s rights after next season — the Avs took only a few hours of the seven-day window to match the offer.

So the net effect of the Avs’ strategy was to drive a wedge between O’Reilly and the front office, remove him from 40 percent of the lockout-shortened season — and then give him everything he was asking for months ago.

The Avs’ only excuse for this bungle is their disappointment that the Flames would breach owner etiquette by making an offer to a restricted free agent and ruining Colorado’s financial power play. This would suggest an informal agreement among owners not to exercise their rights under the collective bargaining agreement to make such offers. That, in turn, sounds a bit like collusion among the owners.

It would behoove Avalanche management to read up on the collusion cases between baseball and its players’ union in the 1980s. Donald Fehr, then president of the Major League Baseball Players Association and now executive director of the National Hockey League Players Association, surely remembers them quite well.

During a five-minute media availability at his locker after reporting to the Avs on Saturday, O’Reilly mentioned several times how happy he was to be back on the ice and back with the fellas. He did not mention the organization.

“I was just sitting at home, got a call from an agent that an offer sheet was available,” he said. “And I wanted to play hockey. So, obviously, I signed it. I didn’t know what was going to happen. I thought it would probably take a week or so, but for me it was over quickly. I’m just so excited now to be playing hockey and be back with these guys.”

As if the episode didn’t already have a Keystone Kops feel, Chris Johnston of Rogers SportsNet reported that because O’Reilly had played two pro games in Russia after the NHL season finally began, he would be subject to waivers if any team other than Colorado signed him. In other words, had the Avs elected not to match, Calgary might have surrendered first- and third-round draft picks and then watched Columbus, the NHL’s worst team, snatch O’Reilly off the waiver wire.

Amid much behind-covering over the weekend, Calgary general manager Jay Feaster insisted the Flames had done their due diligence on the applicable provision in the new collective bargaining agreement and insisted they had a case. He also acknowledged that the club’s interpretation was “different than the NHL’s current interpretation,” meaning the doomsday scenario could very well have been the league ruling.

Evidently trying to help prevent one of its GMs from looking sillier than he already did, NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly declared the question moot after the Avs matched and added the league would have nothing further to say about it.

When I asked O’Reilly about Johnston’s report, he artfully skated around the question.

“I had no idea, and in that situation, I didn’t know,” he said. “I just accepted the offer sheet. I can’t control the past. I don’t know what would have happened. But I’m just glad to be back here with these guys.”

Calgary’s decision to hit Colorado with the offer sheet the day of a game between the teams added yet another subject for the most common question of the day: “Did they do that on purpose?”

Sherman would not be specific about the source of his pique, other than the vague suggestion that making an offer to another team’s restricted free agent is bad form. When I asked coach Joe Sacco if it made the game a little strange — the Avs came back from a 3-0 deficit to beat the Flames 5-4 with three third-period goals — he replied carefully.

“I guess a little bit, yeah,” he said. “You look at it and they’re your opponent that night and a team that you’re battling with. I would have thought maybe that would give us a little bit extra incentive to play even harder, to play even better. But that’s business. That’s the way it goes in this league here.

“I knew the news (about the Avs matching) right before the puck dropped. Our players didn’t. They weren’t aware of that before the puck dropped. So our focus was strictly on that Calgary game. But it did seem a little odd that you were playing a team that, that day they made that offer to him and you could lose him in the next seven days. But lucky for us, he’s not. He’s here with us.”

Equally strange, it’s possible that O’Reilly and Calgary just saved Sherman’s job. Before the offer sheet, the Avs sat near the bottom of the Western Conference standings. Injuries, especially to captain Gabe Landeskog, had hurt, but so had the absence of O’Reilly, the club’s leading scorer with 55 points last season.

If the Avs miss the playoffs for a third consecutive season, a watch would commence on the status of both Sherman and Sacco, especially with Joe Sakic currently in training in the front office. The Avs cannot have missed the success that fellow Denver playing legend John Elway has enjoyed while running the Broncos. Elway had considerably more experience, having run an arena league team, but one playoff appearance in five years for the once-proud Avs might be enough to hasten Sakic’s learning curve.

Now, O’Reilly returns just as Landeskog does. With injured defensemen Erik Johnson and Ryan Wilson accompanying the team on its current trip, their return could be imminent as well. If this injection of talent allows the Avs to sneak into the playoff bracket, it might buy Sherman some more time.

The NHL’s official stats will not reflect O’Reilly’s first goal upon his return. It went into his own net in the third period at Columbus today. He was trying to cut off a pass through the crease; instead replays appeared to show that he deflected the puck past Semyon Varlamov into the Colorado net. It was the Blue Jackets’ only goal of regulation and sent the game into overtime, where they scored again and won, 2-1. McNab called it the Avs’ worst effort of the season.

Both the Avs and Flames manage to come out of the O’Reilly episode looking vaguely incompetent. The qualifying offer now required of the Avs to keep their rights to O’Reilly 16 months from now will be especially problematic because they’ll be negotiating new deals with Duchene and Landeskog at the same time.

Of course, if the Avs don’t get better in a hurry, they may be represented by new front office executives by then.

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March 2, 2013

A chess match against a protege

By Dave Krieger

If the Denver Nuggets wanted to dispute the notion that sure, they’re entertaining and fun and everything, but nowhere near ready for prime time, Friday night at a packed Pepsi Center was a good opportunity.

The Oklahoma City Thunder, last season’s Western Conference champions, came in with a record of 42-15. If they’re not going back to the NBA Finals, according to most experts, it’s only because the San Antonio Spurs are.

They brought with them two of the game’s transcendent stars — Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook. And they’re coached by Scott Brooks, a former George Karl assistant who knows all his tricks.

Well, most of them.

The Nuggets entered the game with considerable confidence of their own. They’d gone 20-7 since the first of the year. Point guard Ty Lawson, 25, and forward Danilo Gallinari, 24, seemed on the verge of turning potential into consistent performance. And the Nuggets’ depth, the other side of the no-star coin, was giving them a clear advantage during those periods in every NBA game when reserves take over.

So they came out for the late ESPN tip and immediately dozed off. Andre Iguodala and Kenneth Faried turned the ball over before the crowd, which is instructed to stand until the home team scores, was permitted to sit down.

Barely two minutes in, Oklahoma City led 9-2 and Karl had seen enough. He removed Faried, his starting power forward and burgeoning media star, 2:28 in. He replaced him with Wilson Chandler, the first move in a chess match with his former protege that went on all night.

“I think it’s a combination of I’m a little tired of the first unit not being defensively responsible early in games,” Karl said afterward. “It’s not only Kenneth; there’s a few other guys on that list. And wanting to be small, wanting to play small against their big. I didn’t think they would take (Serge) Ibaka or (Kendrick) Perkins out of the game three minutes into the quarter. As I substitute later in the quarter, they always can go small and they go small, they like to play small.  We just got lucky on him being especially hot tonight.”

There was that. Chandler did his best Kevin Durant impression, leading the Nuggets with 35 points, including an unconscious six of seven from long distance, one of the Nuggets’ main weaknesses. He also outscored Durant by 10. Westbrook led all scorers with 38.

The move pretty much guaranteed the Nuggets a mismatch somewhere on the perimeter, whether on Chandler or Gallinari, because Ibaka, a shot-blocker, and Perkins, a rebounder, neutralize their main talents when they’re that far from the basket.

“It’s just easier to get a shooting four (big forward) open in basketball than anything else,” Karl said. “Most coaches protect the paint and Wilson is very clever and very aware of how to slip and how to space. I think we add another piece of nine or 10 guys that can help us win a basketball game and Wilson has helped us win two or three already this year.”

This selection among relative equals is both a blessing and a curse. Karl went nine deep Friday night, making spectators out of another handful of capable players — Anthony Randolph, Timofey Mozgov, Jordan Hamilton and Evan Fournier. The four he did bring off the bench — Chandler, Corey Brewer, Andre Miller and JaVale McGee — outscored their Oklahoma City counterparts (Kevin Martin, Nick Collison, Reggie Jackson and Derek Fisher) — by an amazing count of 71-11.

“That’s a great asset to have,” Brooks said of Chandler. “That’s one of the strengths of their team. They’re deep. They have a lot of good players that play, a lot of skill players that can do multiple things and guard multiple players. Thirty-five points, you don’t expect that. Give him credit. He stepped up when the moment was needed and made big shots.”

The Nuggets’ bench dominated the second quarter and carried a 56-47 lead into the locker room at intermission. The starters came out in the third quarter pretty much the way they had come out in the first. Less than two minutes in, the lead was down to two.

Karl substituted even more quickly than he had in the first half, replacing Faried and Gallinari with Chandler and Brewer just 2:04 into the third quarter. The Nuggets took a 10-point lead into the fourth.

Of course, the flip side of depth is too many choices. Up 10, Karl decided to defend the paint with more size, so he reinserted big man Kosta Koufos. He also went to his veteran point guard, Andre Miller, whom he trusts during crunch time.

Focusing on defense sometimes produces runouts, which is what Karl was hoping would happen. It sometimes just produces conservative, halfcourt basketball, in which a team deploying Koufos and Iguodala at the same time is going to have trouble scoring. Which is what happened.

“I thought with the lead, I was hoping to be defensive-minded and I thought if we just make them miss shots, we would run,” Karl said. “And our running game was the reason we were probably somewhat in control of the game.

“We didn’t make them miss enough shots. That’s when I went more offensive-minded . . . I just have so much faith in Andre, but Corey probably played better than Andre down the stretch. I just didn’t feel ready for that one.”

So the lead disappeared. By the last possession of the game, the score was tied at 103. Karl called timeout with 17.6 seconds remaining. The play called for Lawson to dribble out most of the clock, then make a decision.

“When we give Oklahoma City any time to shoot, (Durant and Westbrook) are big shot-makers,” Lawson explained. “We didn’t want to give them a chance. We either wanted overtime or just win the game right there at the end of regulation.”

“Ty had an option,” Karl said. “We were trying to get a matchup maybe for Ty or Gallo. They switched well, they switched everything and then Ty had the space to play and he did.”

The Thunder switched out ace perimeter defender Thabo Sefolosha onto Lawson, who dribbled just outside the three-point line until the final seconds. Sefolosha gave him enough room to make sure he couldn’t dart around him. That was all Lawson needed.

He used the room to step just inside the arc and launch what was officially recorded as a 23-foot jumper over Sefolosha’s outstretched hand. It slipped through the net like a soft breeze. The game clock showed two-tenths of a second remaining. Lawson did a back-pedaling Mark Jackson shimmy.

“We switched and he made a tough shot,” Brooks said. “He made a contested shot over one of our best defenders. Sometimes that’s the way it goes. A lot of times we’ve made that stop. Give them credit. He stepped up and made a shot and it was a tough shot.”

The Nuggets pulled within a game and a half of the Memphis Grizzlies for the fourth playoff seed in the West and home-court advantage in the first round. That would be nice considering Karl’s team has won 10 in a row and 25 of 28 overall at the Pepsi Center.

The Nuggets are now 2-1 against both the Thunder and Grizzlies, two of the four teams ahead of them in the Western Conference standings. They are 1-1 against the Spurs and Clippers, the other two.

Yes, those are regular season results. And yes, the Nuggets’ fast-paced, take-it-to-the-rim style — they lead the NBA with more than 57 points a game in the paint — is harder to sustain in the postseason. The fourth quarter Friday was an illustration of how their offense sometimes stalls when forced to play out of half-court sets.

Nevertheless, they found a way to match up with a team considered their superior and they found a guy to make the big shot at the end, a guy their critics say they don’t have.

They’re now 38-22 with the confidence that they can play with anybody. All Karl has to do is figure out who’s playing well and who’s not — and do it before the game gets out of hand. For the third-youngest roster in the NBA, that’s not too bad.

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