WITH A SECOND remaining in Sunday’s Game 4, Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic called for the ball after Jalen Williams hit a pair of free throws to push the Oklahoma City Thunder‘s lead to five points.
After receiving the inbounds pass from Michael Porter Jr., Jokic launched the longest shot of these NBA playoffs, literally and figuratively.
His football-style toss from 81 feet out sailed a bit short and wide, an air ball that Nuggets reserve center DeAndre Jordan dodged on the baseline after beginning his walk from the bench to the home locker room as the buzzer sounded.
It wouldn’t have mattered if Jokic had miraculously made the shot. It wasn’t even a one-possession game. But as Jokic later pointed out in a matter-of-fact tone, it wasn’t impossible for the Nuggets to force overtime. Just improbable to the nth degree.
“Maybe they’ll foul me and maybe they’ll get a tech,” Jokic told ESPN. “You never know what’s going to happen.”
This miss made Jokic’s three-game shooting slump appear a little uglier, putting another dent in his uncharacteristically low efficiency. He shot 33.3% from the floor (21-of-63) and 18.2% from 3-point range (4-of-22) in that span, one of the most prominent storylines of this series against the top-seeded Thunder and the NBA’s stingiest defense.
The heaves have become something of a habit. If there is even the slightest chance a shot could impact the outcome of the game, Jokic will let it fly, no matter how far he is from the hoop or how far-fetched the fling might be. Those prayers provide a glimpse into the competitive character of a three-time MVP, who has made historical production and efficiency seem routine, despite an approach that runs counter to the modern-day NBA’s numbers-conscious culture.
“I don’t care about the percentage,” Jokic said. “I think every guy should shoot it. Why not? It’s an opportunity to score, so I will shoot it anytime.”
Subtracting Jokic’s five end-of-quarter heaves from the backcourt during that span would have given his efficiency numbers a significant boost. He has had a total of six heaves in the series and seven this postseason. But Jokic couldn’t care less about protecting his shooting percentages.
“Nobody should care about that at this time of the year,” Jokic scoffed after scoring 44 points on 17-of-25 shooting in the Nuggets’ Game 5 loss Tuesday.
According to Basketball Reference, Jokic tied for the league lead in backcourt heaves attempted with eight in 2023-24, when he won his third MVP award.
Jokic’s policy to never turn down a long-distance shot to protect his shooting percentages — a common ritual throughout the league — turned into somewhat of an obsession this season. He hunts heave opportunities, attempting 22 in 2024-25, the most by any player in a regular season during the 29 years the website has records of the statistic. His seven playoff heaves so far are five more than any other player this postseason.
Jokic still shot a career-best 41.7% from 3-point range this season. There were significant stretches of the season where Jokic’s missed heaves were the reason he wasn’t leading the league in 3-point percentage.
“Most great shooters care about their stats. Bottom line,” Nuggets interim coach David Adelman told ESPN. “We’ve seen a lot of examples of guys taking shots just as the clock goes off or making that late pass to not take a bad shot. For Nikola to shoot the percentage he shoots and still shoot those shots — because, hey, there’s a chance it goes in and a chance it wins you the game — just shows how unselfish he is in all ways.”
JOKIC WAS READY when Monty McCutchen, the NBA’s senior vice president of referee operations, entered the Nuggets’ team meeting room at their Abu Dhabi hotel in October.
A representative from the league’s officiating department meets with each team every preseason about rule changes and emphases. They are typically pretty mundane meetings, aside from some chuckling among players when they see which of their counterparts are featured in video clips prepared by the league.
But Jokic had a bone to pick. He knew that the league intended to crack down on tactics that savvy players, when their teams are protecting a lead in the fourth quarter, would use to burn the clock before inbounding the ball after an opponent scores.
“I don’t think that’s the biggest problem we have in the league and especially with officiating,” Jokic later grumbled.
Jokic just happens to be a master of those dark arts. He has perhaps the best hands in the league, but he’d often pretend to fumble the ball in such instances. His basketball IQ is at a genius level, but figuring out whether he or a teammate would inbound the ball in these cases would occasionally burn several seconds. He boasts that he “stole 25 seconds” on one possession last season.
When McCutchen mentioned the league’s intention to eliminate those time-wasting tactics, Jokic pounced, peppering him with several hypothetical scenarios to see how referees would respond.
“He immediately had four other ways that were within the rules and within the spirit of the game and had questions,” Adelman said. “He already knew. He had already thought about this. It’s all about just winning the game with him, as good as he can, just finding a way to win a game.”
Those tactics can help squeeze out tight victories, but they are a terrible way to chase stats. Jokic, 30, already ranks third in NBA history with 164 career triple-doubles, trailing only teammate Russell Westbrook and Hall of Famer Oscar Robertson.
Jokic has finished one assist or rebound shy so frequently that those stat lines have been dubbed a “Sombor Double,” a nod to his Serbian hometown. He has 64 of those, 47 of which have occurred in Denver wins.
How many more triple-doubles could Jokic have had without his extraordinary time-wasting tactics?
“Who cares?” he replied.
“I think it’s funny, his stats are his stats and he doesn’t chase them,” Nuggets wing Christian Braun told ESPN. “It’s just how good he is. It truly is his impact. He gets 30, 20 and 20, and that’s literally his impact on the game.”
Jokic pays close attention to time and score during games. He pays no mind to individual numbers.
“At home, watching the stats, analyzing stats — that’s not for the players,” Nuggets assistant coach Ogi Stojakovic, a fellow Serbian, told ESPN. “That’s for your coaches. So never, ever. It’s forbidden for the players to look at the stats during the game.”
The Nuggets’ coaches track Jokic’s statistics for fun and entertainment, not just for possible strategic input. Denver assistant coach Popeye Jones has a large collection of box scores that have been signed by Jokic. The big man has produced several unprecedented box score lines and a lot of others that fall in the category of “Not Since Wilt Chamberlain.”
When Jokic has a historic outing, Jones usually brings his box score into the locker room and asks the big man to autograph it. Jokic occasionally expresses surprise before putting pen to paper. As Jones told ESPN, “Sometimes he’ll say to me, ‘What happened? What did I do tonight?'”
0:36
Nikola Jokic chucks one-handed buzzer-beater from past half court
Nikola Jokic nails a buzzer-beater before the half for the Nuggets vs. the Utah Jazz.
PEYTON WATSON LISTENED intently as Jokic barked out instructions across the lane between a pair of Anthony Davis free throws with 0.3 seconds left in the third quarter of a late November game.
That’s not enough time to catch and shoot, but Jokic wanted to make sure that he got an attempt up anyway, hoping to pad Denver’s 16-point lead. He ordered Watson to loft the inbounds pass up high toward the big man’s right hand, sort of like a post entry pass.
Except Jokic would be standing just above the block on the side of the Crypto.com Arena court opposite of the Nuggets’ basket.
“OK, I guess,” Watson thought to himself at the time. “What’s your plan?”
Jokic was still formulating his plan as Watson’s pass floated toward him.
“I don’t know, can I just punch the ball?” Jokic said. “I think you can do that. So I was kind of trying to push/punch in the same moment. Just like, why not? What if it goes in?”
It was officially recorded as a 71-foot jump shot, but it most closely resembled a volleyball serve. For a couple of seconds as the ball traveled in the air, it looked like it had a chance to actually go in, ending up missing the basket by mere inches.
“I’m thinking, ‘Bro, if this goes in, I’m part of one of the greatest plays in history,'” Watson told ESPN. “I’ve never seen a shot so outlandish get so close to the rim. It was crazy.”
Jokic wanted to give it another shot in an early March home game after the Phoenix Suns scored with 0.2 seconds remaining in the first quarter. He raised his right hand to indicate where he wanted the inbounds pass, but much to Jokic’s chagrin, Porter didn’t get the message.
Porter dropped the ball by Jokic’s feet, who disgustedly bent over to pick it up with both hands. Jokic chunked the ball to the other end of the court after the buzzer, slumped his shoulders and muttered to himself as he slowly walked to the bench, perturbed that he had been deprived of the opportunity at one of the lowest-possible-percentage shot attempts.
“I did, I did,” Jokic said, sheepishly admitting his moment of pouting. “I think it’s an opportunity. Why not? It’s three points. It can be a game changer.”
Jokic’s philosophy hasn’t borne much fruit. He’s 2-of-50 on heaves from the backcourt in his career — plus another 0-of-12 in the playoffs — although he has made several attempts in the 40-foot-plus range. Both of his backcourt buckets occurred on one-handed tosses this season: a 66-footer at the end of the third quarter to stretch the Nuggets’ lead over the Sacramento Kings to 25 — “I knew it was in,” Jokic said during his postgame interview with Altitude Sports — and a 63-footer to put Denver up by 10 at the half over the Utah Jazz.
According to ESPN Research, Jokic’s pair of successful heaves were the two longest made shots in the league this season. He’s one of only two players in the past 25 years to have a pair of 60-foot-plus buckets in a season, joining Hall of Famer Vince Carter in 2015-16.
Jokic also had 12 attempts during the regular season that were longer than his 66-footer, including four attempts from 80 feet or farther. On multiple occasions, Jokic grabbed a defensive rebound, swiftly pivoted and fired away. The possibility of three points, no matter how slim, means much more to Jokic than shooting percentage points.
“[Serbians] have something that we call basketball gods,” Stojakovic said. “If you play the game in the wrong way and if you don’t respect the game, basketball gods are going to punish. Same thing — if you play basketball in the right way, basketball gods are going to reward. So you try not to cheat the game. He’s trying to win every exact little margin.”
