David Adelman joined the Nuggets in the middle of a league-wide existential crisis in 2017.
Twenty-nine NBA teams were reckoning with the seemingly insurmountable threat of the 30th. Steph Curry’s Warriors had just steamrolled their way to the championship in their first year partnering with Kevin Durant, and they were about to do it again the following season. “Basically unbeatable,” as Adelman described them Wednesday.
Fortunately for the Nuggets, this all coincided with the earliest stages of their slow build to contender status. They didn’t need to preoccupy themselves with dethroning Golden State.