It’s the offseason, which means it’s rumor season—both informed and reckless in nature— and time to throw some fuel on the proverbial fires that light the way for the media during the summer. Former Nugget and infamously normal-sized person, Earl Boykins, took to the airwaves today with Julie Browman and Scott Hastings of Altitude radio to set Nuggets twitter ablaze with the juciest rumor of them all:
“if they sign Jokic (their chances of signing LeBron) goes up to 35, 40%.”
Woah mama, now that is how you generate some offseason #content. I’m not a math major, but given that there are 29 other teams in the league, this gives every other team roughly a two percent chance at signing LeBron. (So I guess Magic fans are actually stoked by this news).
To listen to the segment in its entirety, check out the link below:
To be fair to Boykins, he was asked to put a number on this, and that almost never goes well for the guest or co-host in question. Boykins is plugged in and speaks to other players and shakers around the league but I think it’s fair to meet “40%” with some skepticism. Where LeBron James signs next year is the single biggest scoop available in the sports media world at the moment. It’s hard to imagine a scenario in which a LeBron signing is that likely and only Boykins knows, but then again, no one seems to know anything about LeBron’s true intentions next season.
The Nuggets are young, the Nuggets possess shooters, and the Nuggets best player, Nikola Jokic, is not one whose ego would be bruised by relinquishing his throne to the league’s true king. There are myriad reasons why LeBron should consider Denver, but it seems virtually impossible to imagine him in those new threads that the Nuggets revealed last week. At least until the very moment he puts pen to paper.
Denver is in desperate need of a capable wing, and obviously, the addition of the world’s best player would vault them into Western Conference contention. Anything is possible, and Boykins may very well just be reporting what he’s hearing, but I’d take this latest LeBron to Denver news with an entire shaker of salt.
