Fourteen Denver players are spending the week at a player-driven camp organized before training camp even opens.
Fourteen Denver Nuggets players are spending this week on a basketball court in Loíza, Puerto Rico, a long way from Ball Arena and weeks before camp officially opens.
The trip runs from August 21 through August 26 at the JUMP Sports Development Center, the facility founded by Nuggets assistant coach JJ Barea and businessman Ricky Newman, according to reporting from Antolín Maldonado Ríos of El Nuevo Día.
Nikola Jokic and Julian Strawther are among the players making the trip, and the week is built around morning drills, weight training and scrimmages against players from Puerto Rico's professional league and national team, since league rules keep coaches from running formal team practices this time of year.
Barea revealed the plan in an interview with El Nuevo Día, in comments translated from Spanish.
"I hadn't mentioned it, but the Denver Nuggets are coming from the 21st to the 26th. Fourteen players are coming to train at JUMP," he said.
Barea explained that the whole thing depended on the players choosing to come, and that Aaron Gordon answered by telling him he would take care of it, take care of the players and get the group there.
Barea knows both sides of the game well, since the 2011 champion with Dallas spent 14 years playing in the league and joined David Adelman's staff as an assistant last summer, and the JUMP center is the development project he has been building back home in Puerto Rico with Newman.
Why This Week Matters for Denver
It is not hard to see why this group wanted the extra work.
Denver won 54 games and finished third in the West last season, then lost in six games to Minnesota in the first round, a result that stung for a team built around a top-three player in the sport.
Jokic averaged 27.7 points, 12.9 rebounds and 10.7 assists last season, and a three-time MVP in his prime does not have seasons to waste.
ESPN's Summer Forecast this week projected the Nuggets third in the West again at 51-31, with ESPN's Michael C. Wright writing that a team featuring Jokic can never be counted out.
The Roster Gets a Head Start
Getting most of the roster in one gym in August is the sort of thing that pays off in November.
The trip also matters for the younger players fighting for a role, and Strawther is the clearest example, since this is a big season for his future in Denver.
The front office spent its summer wrestling with the second apron math that limits how much help can be bought, and there are open questions about the back of the roster as well.
When the roster cannot change much, the group already in place growing closer becomes the real upgrade, and Gordon and Barea clearly figured that out before anyone asked them to.
