| 03 September 2007
(Boulder-CO) The title of this post may be humorous, but the fact that Nene is hurt, again, and that it is more so than not a result of him coming into the FIBA competition overweight, again, and not ready to perform like the high salary player that he is must be pretty embarrassing. Even the AOL Fanhouse could tell that Nene was shamefully fat.
But what is really pertinent to the Nuggets fan in all of us is how these reoccurring injury/weight issues with Nene change the outlook of our season (at least initially). First off, the diagnosis of the calf injury is a 4-6 week recovery period. With that being known, Nene is not going to be ready for training camp, which at its bare minimum leaves the Nuggets with a chemistry issue to deal with within the first twenty games of the regular season as Nene has to be slowly brought back into the rotation. And it is from this starting point that the hypothetical situations can range from very advantageous for the Nuggets to down right agonizing.
So, with Nene slowly being worked into the Nuggets fold there is suddenly an opening for Kenyon Martin to seize. Optimistically speaking, this could be a good thing for Denver as they will be able to immediately see what Kenyon Martin’s return and overall impact is going to be. But from here it gets tricky because if Kenyon returns to anywhere near his former capabilities. Then all of a sudden the Nuggets not only have a power forward log jam (Eduardo, Evans, Nene, and Martin), but they also have a decision to make as to who is going to be the starter. This competitive scenario could inspire both men to raise their games to new levels; ultimately making the Nuggets a better team. Or the large egos in play could be too much to overcome; leaving the Nuggets with major personnel problems.
Like I said, this is a very tricky situation.
Furthermore and regardless of how all this plays out, Nene has displayed poor athletic professionalism not once, but now twice concerning his off-season work ethic and commitment to training. I may have been likely to grant him a free-pass for coming off such a serious knee injury and not being able to shed the extra girth before the start of last season, but after showing up to the FIBA games in “vacation” shape after having such a strong final two months of 2007. It is starting to become very clear that Nene doesn’t look at the off-season as a chance to raise his game. Which is too bad because all the great ones that have played this game, (Magic, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Hakeem Olajuwon, David Robinson etc), have always taken the off-season as a chance to improve their games and their conditioning. Maybe that’s why all of the aforementioned have rings?
Feelings?
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