Nikola Jokic said a handful of words at Denver Nuggets media day that CBS Sports ranked as the most interesting moment of the entire league-wide media circuit. “I’m gonna sign next year,” he said, before adding, “If they want me.”
The second part was a joke. The first part is a business decision worth roughly $360 million, and Nuggets fans should treat it as very good news that arrives with a bill attached.
Why he did not sign this summer
Denver offered Jokic a four-year extension worth about $278 million this offseason and he passed on it. Waiting until next summer makes him eligible for a five-year supermax in the neighborhood of $360 million, which would be the richest contract in league history and pay north of $70 million per season.
He is currently in the final guaranteed year of his deal with a player option for 2027-28. That sounds scarier on paper than it is in practice. Every dollar of leverage points toward him re-signing in Denver next July, and he has now said so on the record more than once.
“For me, it’s legacy,” Jokic said. “You want to be remembered, so I think that’s the way how you do it.” He also described fighting alongside his friends against other teams as the fun part of staying put, which is about as sentimental as this man gets in public.
The part Denver should actually worry about
Turning down $278 million is not an act of blind loyalty. It is a bet on himself that also buys him a full season of evidence before he commits the rest of his prime to one building.
The evidence from last season was ugly where it counted. Denver went 54-28, grabbed the three seed, closed the regular season on a 12-game winning streak, then got bounced in six games by Minnesota in the first round. Local coverage described the ending as a complete disappointment, and that was the generous read.
Jokic is 31 and entering his 12th season. He averaged 27.7 points, 12.9 rebounds and 10.7 assists across 65 games and finished second in MVP voting. Wasting a year like that on a first-round exit should embarrass everyone in the organization who is not wearing number 15.
ESPN’s Dave McMenamin framed the risk plainly: if the Nuggets go off the rails, Jokic “could make money a lot of places.”
Eighty-two games to close the door
The front office is projecting calm. Ben Tenzer, Denver’s executive vice president of basketball operations, said the team has “no concerns” about Jokic’s commitment even if the season opens badly.
Tenzer is probably right, and he is also not the person who needs convincing. The Nuggets added DeMar DeRozan and moved on from Peyton Watson, swapping long-term upside for a scorer who helps immediately, which tells you precisely what timeline this franchise believes it is on.
I think Jokic signs. He has never once behaved like a man scanning for the exit, and Denver remains the only place where his strange, brilliant career makes complete sense. But he has built himself an off-ramp, and David Adelman’s team now has one season to make sure he never glances at it.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.