A familiar trend resurfaced Friday night as the Nuggets let a home game slip away against the depleted Orlando Magic.
When Michael Porter Jr. drained his second 3-pointer in the first 90 seconds of the third quarter, Denver stretched its lead to a game-high 74-56. Porter led the team with 19 points on 8-of-11 shooting at that point.
The Nuggets went on to lose 122-120. The red-hot Porter attempted one shot in the last 18 minutes of game time, resting eight of those minutes. He was in the closing lineup but didn’t attempt a shot in the last seven minutes after draining one more three. The Nuggets scored 25 points in the fourth quarter on 36.4% shooting from the field and 14.3% shooting beyond the arc (0% excluding Porter’s three).
It continued a pattern of Porter tending to disappear from Denver’s offense after getting off to fast starts in games. When asked about it, Porter pondered the topic through not just the lens of his own involvement, though. He pointed out more broadly that shot distribution among Denver’s starters who play off-ball — himself, Aaron Gordon and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope — diminishes later in games.
“I think it’s something we’re collectively still trying to master. Like, continuing to find guys’ shots throughout the midst of the game,” Porter said. “Because sometimes we play different in the first quarter than we do in the fourth quarter. … And that’s a lot of teams. But Aaron for example: He got most of his shots probably in the first quarter. Didn’t really touch the ball in the third quarter or the fourth quarter much.
“.. It’s a tough balance. When you’ve got a lot of guys who are very capable, sometimes you go a long stretch without really touching the ball. So for me, I kind of realize if I’m gonna get some shot attempts up, it’s gonna have to come in the flow of the game, and I’m gonna have to really, at times, be aggressive and things like that.”
Gordon scored 10 points in the first quarter Friday on four shot attempts. He attempted four shots in the last three quarters combined, finishing the night with 16 points.
Porter has had more dramatic drops in scoring pace. In a loss against the Clippers last month, he amassed 11 points in the first quarter then barely touched the ball in the second. In earlier games against Phoenix and Golden State, he was in double figures after the first quarter but couldn’t double his point total in the last three quarters combined. Against San Antonio, he had 12 in the first and 13 the rest of the game.
In first quarters this season through 37 games, he is averaging four shot attempts, including two from 3-point range. He’s scoring 5.1 points per first quarter (second-most behind Nikola Jokic) on 51.7% shooting from the field and a 46.6% clip from 3-point range. In the second and third quarters, his shooting volume is down marginally. But in the fourth, he attempts only 2.5 field goals on average, and oftentimes, he’s not in the same rhythm by then. His 3-point percentage in particular drops to 36.2% in fourth quarters. He’s the team’s fifth-leading scorer in the final frame.
Some of that has to do with the fact that Porter has been in and out of Denver’s closing lineup. Sometimes, he staggers with the bench unit during Jokic’s rest minutes, and other times he doesn’t. His usage varies. But the loss to Orlando was an example of him being in the game for crunch time without making a scoring impact.
Jamal Murray led the Nuggets in shot attempts (23). He finished with 20 points, seven rebounds and nine assists, but he was 0-for-6 from three and turned it over three times as the better-rested Jalen Suggs hounded him all night.
The Nuggets, like many teams in the modern NBA, do often narrow their offense in clutch situations to rely more heavily on their most dependable action. In their case, that’s the two-man game between Jokic and Murray. On the last possession Friday, it didn’t work out. The Nuggets wanted to get Jokic the ball in the pocket, but the Magic blitzed the pick-and-roll attempt and Murray had to improvise his way to a difficult shot at the buzzer (which he almost made, miraculously).
After Porter’s initial comments after the loss, he was asked if the team collectively discusses the issue of maintaining shot distribution throughout games, or if it’s something players need to figure out individually.
“Yeah, I don’t know. It’s tough, just because we do got a lot of guys who, game to game, it could be a different hot hand,” Porter said. “And that’s a blessing and a curse sometimes. I don’t know. Maybe the answer is staggering a couple of starters with the bench unit. I don’t really know the answer. But I do feel like there are times in the game when, you know, Aaron doesn’t touch the ball for an extended period of time, or myself, or (Kentavious Caldwell-Pope) has some games when he’s getting two or three shots up, and he’s on the floor 35 minutes. So I think it’s definitely a tough balance to find. And that’s really up to the coaches. That’s their job. That’s not our job. So we just do what we’re told, try to space the floor the right way, play through the big fella, and that’s all we can do. I think as the season goes on, we’ll continue to get better and better at finding that balance.”