NBA Finals 2023 - Tales of Nikola Jokic's journey to a title - ESPN

DENVER — Long before Nikola Jokic won his first NBA championship, his first Finals MVP and his back-to-back league MVPs, there was «Jokmas.»

It was 10 days before Christmas in 2016, and Denver Nuggets coach Michael Malone was «racking» his brain for solutions to jump-start his team, which was sputtering to a 9-16 start to the 2016-17 season.

The Nuggets had been starting Jokic and fellow big man Jusuf Nurkic as the foundation of a gigantic lineup that wasn't working, spurring Jokic to ask Malone to bring him off the bench. But after the Nuggets lost by 20 points against the Dallas Mavericks, Malone returned home late that night deliberating his next move.

Malone had a revelation that changed the course of the franchise.

«I'm talking to myself,» Malone told ESPN. «This kid was All-Rookie as a center and here I am bringing him off the bench and playing him as a 4 and a 5. And I said, 'Screw everything.' Nikola's a center. He's our center. And the next game, I started him at center. From that point in time, our offense, our team, our winning, everything just went straight up.

»I made a decision that he would become the focal point of everything we do, every decision we make, every player we bring in has to be somebody that can play with and complement Nikola."

The next game, Jokic started and played just 19 minutes because of foul trouble, finishing with 13 points, 5 assists and 4 rebounds against the Portland Trail Blazers. But the Nuggets won by 12, the first victory in a three-game win streak.

Malone's decision set the Nuggets on their path to hoisting their first Larry O'Brien Trophy on Monday night. That night on Dec. 15, 2016, Jokmas was born and the big man from Sombor, Serbia, was on his way to becoming a playoff