Michael Porter Jr. Playing Within The Denver Nuggets’ Flow Is Helping Both Himself And His Team

“Yeah, Mike!”

Among the Denver Nuggets fanbase, this two-word meme has come to encompass a perception of Michael Porter Jr.’s game and mindset on the court, and everything it entails can be difficult to explain to those less initiated in the ways of MPJ.

“Yeah, Mike!” is used mostly affectionately, albeit with perhaps a touch of eye-rolling, and usually in moments when, if given even a sliver of a chance, Porter goes ahead and shoots his shot. It folds in the nuances of both his tendency at times to get a laser-focused tunnel vision on the basket, and a simultaneous defense of that where, as a career .404 three-point shooter with an elite .631 true shooting percentage, he arguably should have the green light to fire away, even if his shot selection can be less than optimal at times.

Porter himself may have explained it best in his postgame presser after Denver’s win over the Los Angeles Clippers in game five of the second round of the 2020 NBA playoffs, in which he drilled an incredibly clutch three-pointer that helped ice the victory. The Nuggets at that point were down three games to one in the series, and Porter’s big shot was a pivotal turning point in their securing a historic and improbable second-consecutive 3-1 playoff series comeback victory that carried them to the Western Conference Finals.

“Everybody knows it’s wasn’t the best shot selection,” Porter said with a big smile, “but something made me shoot it, so I shot it.”

“Something,” whether completely subconsciously, purely intentional, or somewhere in between, has tended to “make” Michael Porter Jr. shoot it at a high volume much of the time when the ball comes to him. And little epitomizes the “Yeah, Mike!” essence more than when he runs the court in transition and pulls up for the three-pointer early in the shot clock.

The results of these quick fast break threes are, of course, hit and miss, and range from, at best, igniting the home crowd at Ball Arena into a frenzy to, in worse cases, head coach Michael Malone calling a quick frustration timeout to leave Porter sitting on the bench a while to contemplate his choices.

But all of this establishment of the “Yeah, Mike!” experience which both highlights Porter’s superlative shooting skill while also raising eyebrows about his sometimes questionable decision-making is to lay the foundation for the case that, if early signs this season are any indication, he is actually showing marked improvement in learning how to better operate within the flow of Denver’s offense, and being more selective – and perhaps less impulsive – about taking those opportunistic shot attempts.

Before getting to some examples of this below, specifically with respect to assists, it needs to be acknowledged that Porter’s assist rate is actually down from 8.9% last season to 6.1% so far this time around, according to Basketball-Reference. He has, in fact made seven assists in six games, and it remains very early in the season, so this is all about early signs that should be taken with grains of salt.

So in making the case that Porter is improving his understanding and ability to better play within the flow of a Nuggets offense which revolves around back-to-back MVP Nikola Jokic, an adjustment which he has tended to struggle with early in his NBA career, the suggestion is not that Porter has become a dramatically better playmaker, and the argument relies more on the “eye test” than a trend that’s identifiable in his statistics.

But his willingness, and maybe even eagerness, to properly fit into Denver’s offensive schemes as they are conceived has been apparent at times this season with more frequency and consistency than he’s shown before.

Feeding Jokic in the post is an essential component of Denver’s offense when he’s on the court. In the first clip above, rather than jacking up a three-pointer when Jokic delivers him the ball at the perimeter (a tendency he’s shown before), Porter correctly reads the play and hits Jokic on the cut for the layup. And again on the second possession shown here, rather than shooting the contested three as Damian Lillard closes out on him, MPJ moves the ball along to Bruce Brown, who Lillard left to cover Porter, and Brown drains the triple. This play shows not only a willingness from Porter to pass up a worse shot for a better one, but also a better awareness of how his own gravity on the court can open up his teammates.

I categorized the two assists above as “unselfish” plays, as they are situations where Porter has in the past shown more of an inclination to fire at will as soon as the ball touches his hands, but here he shows not only the disposition to keep the ball moving, but a better court awareness in terms of how and where his teammates are moving.

In the first clip, Porter makes a great read as the defense moves to double-team him, dishing to Brown on the baseline cut for a nice reverse layup. Next, after receiving the ball from Kentavious Caldwell-Pope on the fast break, he passes up the floater attempt (you can almost visibly, tangibly seeing him wanting to shoot and deciding not to), instead flipping a crafty behind-the-back assist to Jamal Murray for the bucket. And while it is probably not a great idea for MPJ to attempt too many more behind-the-back dimes, the salient point here is, again, that he passed up a worse shot for a better one.

Often throughout his career, the ball has tended to be “sticky” when it reaches Porter’s hands, as given the option (even if it’s not the optimal one), he’s preferred to hang onto the rock and shoot his shot. In the first clip here, rather than running to the arc and pulling up for a transition three-pointer we saw many example of above, Porter scans the court and finds rookie teammate Christian Braun in great position on the run-out, sending the ball up the court his way for the layup and the foul. He similarly looks to make the quick lead pass on the next play to Bones Hyland, who drains the uncontested three-pointer.

Porter’s apparently increased understanding and willingness to play withing Denver’s prescribed flow benefits both himself, as the ball will inevitably keep coming back around to him, but with better looks and greater trust from his teammates, and the Nuggets, whose offense will function at a higher level with all parts working smoothly together.