If you’re wondering if the Denver Nuggets championship odds are worth backing, you’re in the right place for NBA futures picks analysis!
While everyone’s busy crowning Oklahoma City as inevitable back-to-back champions or drooling over Houston’s Kevin Durant acquisition, I keep coming back to one simple fact: Denver just had the best offseason in basketball, and nobody’s talking about it.
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Denver Nuggets Championship Odds
Denver addressed every single weakness from last season’s collapse. Remember when they got bounced by the Thunder in seven games?
The bench couldn’t shoot, they had zero reliable backup center, and Michael Porter Jr. disappeared when it mattered most (6 PPG in that series, which is… not ideal).
So what did the new front office do? They went nuclear.
Cameron Johnson replaces MPJ, and this isn’t some lateral move—it’s an upgrade. Cam just posted career-highs across the board with Brooklyn: 18.8 PPG on 47.5 FG%, 39.0 3P%, and 89.3 FT%.
Johnson shot nearly 40% from three on almost three makes per game while being one of the primary options on a terrible Nets team. Now, imagine what he does playing off Nikola Jokic in wide-open catch-and-shoot situations?
Then they brought back Bruce Brown on a minimum deal—you know, the guy who was absolutely crucial to their 2023 championship run. Brown wanted to come back to Denver so badly that he took less money to be there.
Jonas Valanciunas gives them the first legitimate backup center Jokic has ever played with—a guy who can actually anchor second units and not get destroyed in the paint.
JV averaged double-doubles throughout his career and provides exactly what Denver desperately needed: competent non-Jokic minutes.
And Tim Hardaway Jr. on a veteran minimum? That’s legitimately absurd value for a career 36 percent three-point shooter who can get buckets when you need them.
Now, you can get them at +700 on multiple platforms.
Denver Nuggets Preview and Analysis
I’m not blind to the issues here. Let’s get real about what could go wrong.
- Jamal Murray’s health is the elephant in the room. He missed six straight games down the stretch last season with hamstring issues, and he’s averaged only 60 games over the past five years. If Murray goes down in the playoffs, Denver’s championship hopes probably go with him.
- The defense collapsed last season, from 8th to 22nd in defensive rating after losing KCP. Can Bruce Brown and Cameron Johnson replicate that perimeter defense Maybe, but it’s far from guaranteed. David Adelman’s already experimenting with zone concepts using Jokic and Valanciunas together, which is… creative, but unproven.
- Organizational chaos nearly derailed everything. They fired both their championship-winning coach and GM with three games left in the regular season because the relationship had become “toxic.”
- That’s not exactly stability. Sure, Adelman looked good in his small sample size, but he’s a first-time head coach going into the deep end against elite coaching.
- The Western Conference is absurd, and maybe that’s why the Denver Nuggets championship odds are fairly generous. OKC just won it all and looks even better. The Rockets added Kevin Durant. Minnesota has an elite defense anchored by Gobert and Anthony Edwards. The Lakers have LeBron and Luka. There’s no easy path here.
Why Denver Can Win The NBA Championship
Bottom line—Nikola Jokic just averaged a triple-double last season. The first center in NBA history to pull that off. 29.6 points, 12.7 rebounds, 10.2 assists per game with a 32.2 PER (second-highest ever recorded).
When people say “the best player in the world,” they’re talking about Joker. Not Giannis, not Luka, not SGA. Jokic is operating on a different level entirely, and he’s entering his age-30 season—still in his absolute prime.
The Nuggets were +10.5 net rating with him on the court last season. That’s a 19.8-point swing between Jokic minutes and non-Jokic minutes. When he controls the game, Denver doesn’t just compete—they steamroll elite competition.
Murray + Aaron Gordon are proven championship pieces. The Jokic-Murray pick-and-roll remains unstoppable. We’ve seen this duo win it all already—the blueprint exists.
Last season, Gordon hit buzzer-beaters in the playoffs like it’s his job, and Christian Braun broke out as a legitimate starting-caliber player (15.4 PPG, 58 FG%, nearly 40% from deep). This core already knows how to win when it matters.
And now they’ve got Johnson spacing the floor better than MPJ ever did, Brown providing the defensive versatility they lost when KCP left, and actual bench depth for the first time in years.
NBA Futures Picks
Here’s where the cold, hard betting analysis meets basketball reality: at +700, Denver offers the best risk-reward in the entire NBA futures picks landscape.
The market is overreacting to last season’s defensive struggles and organizational drama while completely underweighting the roster upgrades.
Johnson is legitimately better than Porter for this team—better shooter, better defender, more consistent. Brown solves half the defensive issues by himself. Valančiūnas transforms their bench from catastrophically bad to actually playable.
