50 Fun Facts About Denver Nuggets

Under what name were the Nuggets founded in 1967, before a last-minute ownership change renamed the team?

Denver Larks honored Colorado's state bird, the lark bunting; a new owner bought control hours before a league deadline and renamed the team the Rockets before it had played a game.

The Nuggets were called the Rockets from 1967 to 1974 after what kind of business owned by Bill Ringsby?

A trucking company: Ringsby's long-haul rigs were known as Rockets, and the team's first logo and its orange-and-black colors were borrowed straight from the trucks.

Why did Denver's Rockets become the Nuggets in 1974?

An NBA team in Houston already used it, and Denver was angling to switch leagues, so a fan contest picked Nuggets, the name of the city's short-lived NBA club of the late 1940s.

Which team beat the Nuggets in the ABA's final championship series?

New York Nets, led by Julius Erving, trailed by 22 in the third quarter of Game 6, then outscored Denver 34-14 in the fourth to win the last title the ABA ever awarded.

Which team joined the NBA with the Nuggets in the 1976 ABA merger?

San Antonio Spurs were one of four ABA clubs let in, and on hard terms: no share of the NBA's television money for three seasons and no part in that summer's college draft.

Which team did the Nuggets defeat to win their first NBA championship in 2023?

Miami Heat had lost their first play-in game and squeezed into the playoffs as the East's No. 8 seed, then went all the way to the Finals, where Denver needed only five games.

Which All-Star Weekend staple was first staged at halftime of the 1976 ABA All-Star Game, hosted by the Nuggets?

The slam dunk contest was invented to sell tickets for a league in desperate shape; Julius Erving won it by taking off from the free-throw line, beating a field that included Denver's David Thompson.

The Nuggets share Ball Arena with the NHL's Avalanche and which National Lacrosse League team?

Colorado Mammoth arrived when the Washington Power franchise was sold and moved to Denver in 2002; their first home game drew 16,121 fans, then a league record for a debut.

Before it became Ball Arena in 2020, what was the Nuggets' home arena called?

Pepsi Center was the name for 21 years, until aluminum-can maker Ball Corporation took over in 2020 with a plan to swap the arena's plastic cups for recyclable aluminum ones.

Which venue did the Nuggets and Avalanche leave behind when Ball Arena opened in 1999?

McNichols Sports Arena was only 24 years old when it was demolished to clear space for the Broncos' new stadium complex; ZZ Top played both its first rock concert and its last.

What is the name of the Nuggets' mountain lion mascot?

Rocky made his debut in December 1990 and has feuded with Charles Barkley for decades, ever since, by the mascot's own account, Barkley punched him in the face during a game.

Jokić's 2014 draft pick was shown during an ad for which fast-food chain?

Taco Bell was advertising its new Quesarito when the 41st pick slid by at the bottom of the screen; the future MVP was asleep at the time.

Jokić's 'Shuffle' fadeaway is named after which Serbian city, his birthplace?

Sombor gave the Sombor Shuffle its name; Jokić came up with the shot while an ankle injury forced him to find a new way to get it off.

Away from basketball, Jokić's great passion is which sport, one he grew up around as a teenage stable hand?

Harness racing has been his first love since he worked as a stable boy at 13; he now owns a racing stable in Serbia and was filmed in tears when one of his horses won.

When Jokić won his first MVP in 2020-21, he became the first center to win the award since which player?

Shaquille O'Neal won in 2000, a single vote short of unanimous because one ballot went to Allen Iverson; no center took the award again until Jokić, 21 years later.

Which two players were the other finalists for Jokić's third MVP award in 2024?

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Luka Dončić finished second and third; a year later the top two swapped places, with Gilgeous-Alexander taking the award and Jokić the runner-up.

Jokić averaged a triple-double across the 2024-25 season, a feat previously managed only by Oscar Robertson and which other player?

Russell Westbrook, who did it four times, had signed with Denver that summer, so the only two active members of the club shared a locker room; that March Jokić also posted the NBA's first 30-point, 20-rebound, 20-assist game.

Which medal did Jokić win with Serbia at the 2016 Summer Olympics?

Silver: Serbia reached the Rio final but lost it 96-66 to the United States; eight years later in Paris he added a bronze by beating Germany in the third-place game.

Jamal Murray was born and raised in which Ontario city, also the boyhood home of boxer Lennox Lewis?

Kitchener is where his father Roger, a lifelong Bruce Lee fan, raised him on kung fu exercises and meditation alongside his basketball drills.

Where did Jamal Murray play his one college season before Denver drafted him seventh in 2016?

Kentucky got him a year early: he reclassified to the class of 2015, averaged 20.0 points as a freshman and was drafted almost exactly a year after committing.

In the 2020 bubble, Jamal Murray scored 50 points twice in a first-round series against which team?

Utah Jazz guard Donovan Mitchell scored 51 to Murray's 50 in Game 4, the first playoff game in which two opponents reached 50; Murray's second 50 came in Game 6 and forced a decider.

Jamal Murray scored 50 against Cleveland in 2021 and became the first NBA player to do so without what?

Attempting a free throw was the one thing he never did, so all 50 had to come from the field; he got there on just 25 shots, making 21, eight of them three-pointers.

Which injury caused Jamal Murray to miss the entire 2021-22 season?

A torn ACL in his left knee, suffered against Golden State in April 2021, cost him 18 months; he came back in October 2022 and was an NBA champion by the end of that season.

Which team traded Alex English to Denver in 1980 to reclaim its former ABA star George McGinnis?

Indiana Pacers got the worse of it: McGinnis, once an ABA MVP for them, was out of the league by 1982, while English went on to score more points in the 1980s than any other NBA player.

Beyond basketball, which art form is Alex English especially known for pursuing?

Poetry was one of two artistic sidelines: he also acted, making his debut as a Boston Celtics star in the 1987 film Amazing Grace and Chuck while still the Nuggets' leading scorer.

What was David Thompson's nickname during his Nuggets years?

Skywalker was a tribute to his leaping; Michael Jordan, who said the whole meaning of vertical leap began with David Thompson, chose him as presenter at his own Hall of Fame induction in 2009.

David Thompson scored 73 on the last day of 1977-78 but lost the scoring title to whom?

George Gervin answered with 63 points in just 33 minutes of a game played later that same day, and took the title by less than a tenth of a point per game.

Dan Issel came to Denver after winning the 1975 ABA title with which team?

Kentucky Colonels sold him that autumn to the Baltimore Claws, a team that folded without ever playing a regular-season game, and Denver traded for him weeks later.

Dikembe Mutombo was drafted fourth overall by Denver in 1991 out of which university?

Georgetown enrolled him in 1987 on a USAID scholarship, a would-be doctor from Kinshasa who was still learning English; he left four years later with degrees in linguistics and diplomacy.

Why did Mutombo, early in his Nuggets career, invent his finger wag?

To become more marketable for endorsements: he had only shaken his head after blocks and wanted a signature move. When referees began calling technical fouls for it, he wagged at the crowd instead.

Which top seed did the Nuggets stun in 1994, the first time an eighth seed won an NBA playoff series?

Seattle SuperSonics won the first two games of the best-of-five, then lost three straight; the last went to overtime and ended with Dikembe Mutombo flat on his back, clutching the ball in joy.

What was on the chest of the Nuggets' uniforms for most of the 1980s?

A rainbow city skyline was dropped for navy and gold in 1993; the team has since revived the rainbow again and again on alternate and City Edition uniforms.

Which team outlasted the Nuggets 186-184 in triple overtime in 1983?

Detroit Pistons got 47 points from Isiah Thomas, though Denver's Kiki Vandeweghe topped everyone with 51 in defeat; for all 370 points, each team made exactly one three-pointer.

Which NBA single-season record, still standing, did the Nuggets set in 1981-82?

Highest scoring average: 126.5 points a game. The defense handed nearly all of it back, as opponents averaged 126.0, and in every one of the 82 games both teams reached 100.

Which coach led the Nuggets through the 1980s with a freewheeling motion offense he called the passing game?

Doug Moe won 432 games in Denver, a total the team hung in the rafters beside its retired numbers; he summed up his system as doing whatever the hell you want.

Which player was drafted No. 2 in 2003, one pick before the Nuggets took Carmelo Anthony?

Darko Miličić played only 34 games as a rookie and averaged 1.4 points; Anthony, who had led Syracuse to the national title weeks before the draft, averaged 21.0 for Denver.

In December 2006 the Nuggets acquired Allen Iverson from which team?

Philadelphia 76ers took Andre Miller, Joe Smith and two first-round picks, and Denver suddenly had the league's top two scorers at the time, Iverson and Carmelo Anthony, on one roster.

Which top seed swept the Nuggets in 2008 after Denver won 50 games and still landed only the West's No. 8 seed?

Los Angeles Lakers, led by that season's MVP Kobe Bryant, won all four games; the West was so tightly packed that only seven wins separated the first seed from the eighth.

Whom did the Nuggets receive in November 2008 when they traded away Allen Iverson?

Chauncey Billups, who grew up in Denver and starred at the University of Colorado, steered his hometown team to 54 wins and its first Western Conference Finals since 1985.

Carmelo Anthony was traded in February 2011 to which team?

New York Knicks sent back Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Danilo Gallinari and Timofey Mozgov, and Denver got better without its star, winning that same night and going 18-7 the rest of the season.

The Nuggets fired George Karl after the 2012-13 season despite what?

Winning that year's Coach of the Year award did not save him: his 57-win team lost in the first round to Golden State, the eighth first-round exit of his nine seasons in Denver.

Who bought the Nuggets, the Avalanche and their arena in a $450 million deal in July 2000?

Stan Kroenke won out after a richer offer from Denver billionaire Donald Sturm fell apart over a promise to keep the teams in town; Kroenke guaranteed the city he would not move them for 25 years.

Michael Malone was head coach of which team before Denver hired him in June 2015?

Sacramento Kings fired him just 24 games into his second season; Denver hired him six months later and kept him for a decade, in which he became the winningest coach in franchise history and the first to bring it an NBA title.

Who replaced Michael Malone as the Nuggets' head coach in 2025?

David Adelman took over with three games left in the regular season, won all three and then a first-round playoff series as interim coach, and was given the job for good that May.

The 2020 Nuggets became the first NBA team to overcome which series deficit twice in one postseason?

3-1 was the hole both times: Denver won three straight elimination games in the first round inside the Orlando bubble, then did it again to the Clippers in the second.

Which Denver Rockets rookie was named ABA MVP and Rookie of the Year in 1969-70 before jumping to the NBA?

Spencer Haywood averaged 30 points and 19.5 rebounds in his only ABA season; his jump to the NBA set off the court fight that opened the pros to players who had not finished college.

Lonnie Wright, an early guard for the Nuggets' ABA forerunners, was at the same time a pro in which other sport?

Football: Wright was a Denver Broncos safety who signed with the Rockets in January 1968, weeks after the AFL season ended, then gave up the gridiron for five seasons in the ABA.

The Nuggets' 2023-24 City Edition uniform carried the number 5280 to symbolize what?

Denver's elevation in feet is 5,280, exactly one mile, and the design celebrated the Nuggets as the only NBA team that plays its home games a mile above sea level.

From which team did the Nuggets acquire Aaron Gordon during the 2020-21 season?

Orlando Magic got Gary Harris, R.J. Hampton and a first-round pick for him; four years later Gordon won a playoff game against the Clippers with a dunk as the buzzer sounded.

Which Nuggets player did the NBA suspend in 1996 for refusing to stand for the national anthem?

Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, Denver's leading scorer, called the flag a symbol of oppression and was docked $31,707 a game; within days he agreed to stand and pray silently during the anthem.