A Trade That Would Make the Denver Nuggets Champions

Unbeknownst to most, the Denver Nuggets have a $7.4 million dollar trade exception set to expire at midnight tomorrow night from the Allen Iverson trade. In addition, they also have a $3.6 million and a $3.3 million exception in their back pocket from the trades of Steven Hunter and Chucky Atkins, respectively.

For those of you who don’t know, a trade exception allows a team to acquire more in salaries than what they would send to another team in a trade scenario.

Normally, salaries would have to be within 125 percent of each other in order to be considered qualified trades, but this exception would give the Nuggets a way to circumvent that salary cap rule.

These exceptions would allow Denver additional flexibility in the types of deals they would be able to make since they wouldn’t have to match up salaries in a trade. It also creates a situation where it is easier to use draft picks as trade bait, since draft picks are worth no cash value.

While off to an amazing start, there are still some holes I see in this team that lead me to believe they are not quite of championship caliber. The most glaring weaknesses are the lack of quality rebounding, shallow frontcourt depth, and a shortage of outside shooting threats.

Their weaknesses could and should be addressed immediately in order to take this team to the next level.

Mark Warkentein, Nuggets Vice President of Basketball Operations and reigning NBA Executive of the Year, made a bold move last year at this same time to acquire Chauncey Billups, and we have all seen the impact that he has had on the Nuggets.

He has already stated publicly that he would not be shy about pulling the trigger on another deal if he felt it would make his team better.

Well, I have just the right deal that would address all their issues, and would immediately make the Nuggets a top three team.

It would be a three team deal involving the Denver Nuggets, Golden State Warriors, and the Toronto Raptors. In addition to simply making the Nuggets better, the moves would address concerns for both the Warriors and the Raptors as well.  

In this deal, Golden State would receive Kenyon Martin, J.R. Smith, and Malik Allen from the Nuggets and would ship Stephen Jackson and Anthony Morrow to Denver and Monta Ellis and Andris Biedrins to Toronto.

This would allow the Warriors to grant Jackson his trade demand and eliminate the possibility of that situation getting out of control.

The addition of Martin would immediately improve their defense in the frontcourt and would give them an additional big man capable of running the floor in Nellie's frantic offense. His substantial salary would also be coming off the books in two years.

This would open up the possibilities for Golden State to become serious players in the underrated 2011 free agent sweepstakes to make a play at players such as Tony Parker, Pau Gasol, Caron Butler, David West, and Yao Ming.

J.R. Smith would fit right into the Nellie system and would thrive in the fast break heavy offense. He would immediately compensate for the departure of Monta Ellis and would allow Stephen Curry to take ownership of the point.

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