Jimmy Butler Gives Honest Answer About Nikola Jokic's Defense
Whenever Nikola Jokic's name is mentioned, people tend to only bring up his offensive game - the Sombor Shuffle, the triple-doubles, and hail mary buzzer beaters. People forget about the defensive side to his game, like the game-saving blocks he's had the past seasons. One person who doesn't forget though is Jimmy Butler.
Butler spoke about Jokic's underrated defense during a press conference today.
“As much as people look at what he does on the offensive end, he’s a hellified defender as well," Butler said.
Coming from Butler, it should mean a lot to illustrate just how good Nikola Jokic's defense actually is. For years, many have knocked the Denver Nugget for not being a good enough team defensively, even as far back as the 2020 bubble. Since then, Jokic has improved tremendously as a defender, and the team also added great defenders in Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and Aaron Gordon.
The Denver Nuggets have transformed from being a team that's not known for playing defense, to holding the Miami Heat to their lowest-scoring playoff game during the NBA Finals. Defense is a very contagious aspect of an NBA game, and Jokic improving as a defender certainly helps that top-down mentality for the entire Denver Nuggets team.
Game 2 of the NBA Finals between the Denver Nuggets and Miami Heat is at 8:00 pm ET on Sunday night.
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