PORTLAND, Ore. – After nearly 19 months away from the game, Michael Malone had no reservations about making Michael Porter Jr. wait.
The Nuggets’ 2018 lottery pick sat patiently on the bench, healthy, waiting anxiously for his name to be called. Instead, it was training camp invitee Tyler Zeller and offseason acquisition Jerami Grant who checked in first off the bench. Porter stayed seated, the only Nugget with his warm-up jersey off.
After two quarters, eleven different Nuggets players had checked into their highly-anticipated preseason opener against the Trail Blazers on Tuesday night. None of them were Porter, who spent all of last season rehabbing his second back surgery and then had his debut delayed this summer after a knee sprain derailed his Summer League plans.