(Denver-CO) We now know two things about the Denver Nuggets. First, they can’t win without Kenyon Martin. The second is they can’t win without Chauncey Billups. The Nuggets completely bombed out this weekend by dropping both their games, on the road and without Chauncey Billups, to teams that have losing records. Denver botched a 15-point first half lead against the Hornets before Chris Paul finished with 30 points and 19 assists as NOLA emerged victorious, 98-92, and the Memphis Grizzlies were able to enjoy a big lead for most of the game before Denver cut it to two, twice, in the fourth quarter before losing, 102-96. And if you look at the Denver Nuggets Schedule they have now dropped seven of their nine losses to teams with sub .500 records. Make it three things we now know about the Denver Nuggets! They can’t beat a bad team on the road. What’s so maddening about the loss to the Hornets is how Denver allowed Chris Paul to single handedly beat them. At the half, CP3 was having an easy time setting up his teammates (he had eleven assist at the break), but for the most part Denver was doing a good job of keeping him from scoring. However, in the second half, Denver couldn’t stop him from distributing or scoring as Paul notched another eight assists and 26 points which proved to be too much for Denver to overcome. At one point, you just have to send the double team and live with someone else beating you. Denver didn’t, and Chris Paul, a legitimate superstar, took advantage of a team without a starting point guard. Anthony Carter was and has always played atrocious against Paul and the rookie Ty Lawson was way out of his league. Combine what CP3 did to the Nuggets with Carmelo having a 17-point outing and I don’t think I need to go much deeper into the box score for the Nuggets Nation to figure out it was anything but in the Big Easy.
And if the loss to NOLA was maddening, the loss to the Grizzlies was infuriating. It’s one thing to have a top tier player like Paul have a night to remember against you when your starting point guard is out, but when you let a washed up Zach Randolph have 32 points and a career-high 24 FUCKING rebounds (nine offensive) against your healthy front line something has got to give! I apologize for cursing, but c’mon man.
The Denver Nuggets should be appalled at their rebounding effort against the Grizzlies. I’ve been hounding and harping on the rebounding situation for awhile now and if you don’t agree with me after last night’s game that the Nuggets are one of the worst fundamentally sound rebounding teams in the NBA today then you must be watching a different team play on Altitude Sports and Entertainment. Denver was dominated 56-38 overall on the boards with Randolph’s 24 rebounds alone outmatching the entire starting five of the Nuggets by two rebounds and had it not been for the Birdman grabbing a season-high 14 rebounds who knows how badly the Nuggets could have been abused on the glass. Will somebody put an ass on the guys in the other colored shirts and THEN go get the basketball? Please, I beg you!
Still need more proof as to how badly the Nuggets’ uber-soft interior is? How about if I pointed out that Memphis scored 64 of their eventual 102 points in the paint. It’s all true, Nuggets Nation, and the Grizzlies didn’t even have to play two of their four seven-footers to do so.
Randolph’s career night overshadowed Carmelo Anthony’s fifth night of 40 or more points. ‘Melo finished with 41 points overall, scoring 25 of those in the second half after the Nuggets were down by as many as 23 points in the first. And even though Denver was shooting below 40% overall from the field through the first three quarters of play they still had their chance to escape embarrassment in Memphis. The Nuggets cut the Grizzlies’ lead down to two, twice, in the fourth quarter, but two ill-timed jump shots (one from 15 feet by Nene, and a 25-footer from J.R. Smith) that didn’t fall translated into points on the other end and were enough for Memphis to hold on for a, 102-96, win.
I’ll be honest with you, Nuggets Nation… There was a time quite recently that I would have thought the Nuggets were capable of winning 60 games, but with the alarming trend of not being able to beat shit for nothing teams on the road, the tremendous hemorrhaging that is the rebounding situation, and the inability to win a game without Kenyon Martin or Chauncey Billups has me starting to seriously rethink things. 
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To call the loss against Memphis 'embarrassing' is an excuse. This is Memphis' third win this season over a division leader. Stop making excuses and start rationalizing.