The Team that Law Forgot

I hereby move that the NBA team residing in Denver Colorado officially change their name to the Denver Thuggettes. I know what you’re saying out there. “But they’ve been the Nuggets for years! There’s history to their name!” Well, guess what? History no longer matters in a franchise. Want proof? Where are the Seattle Supersonics now? Yeah, that’s what I thought. And I don’t care that they used to mine for gold in Denver. I just don’t. There are no lakes in Los Angeles. Jazz is still illegal in Salt Lake City. I am yet to determine whether there is an inordinate amount of thunder in Oklahoma City. There’s no sanctity to a name anymore.

And now for the reasons why this name works for this team. It is largely a two part argument. Firstly, this team is clearly more than a little thugged out. Let’s face it, this isn’t an organization that has placed a lot of importance on the integrity of it’s players. If you gave me the over/under on whether half of the guys had criminal records, I’d take the over, especially given that a few of them have legal transgressions that have been well documented already. It I were to open up espn.com one of these days and read a headline that stated: “Nuggets Raptors game ends in heartache as Denver player stabs three Toronto players to death,” I honestly wouldn’t be all that surprised. Instead, my reaction would be something along the lines of slowly nodding my head and muttering: “just a matter of time.” Now, the team playing the victim in this example is pretty much interchangeable (although I chose the Raptors as they are largely a bunch of pushovers and I couldn’t picture one guy on that team fighting back if his teammate were suddenly being stabbed at midcourt). However, it really only works with Denver. Not only that, tell me, if you read that headline, is there one player on the Nuggets’ roster that would immediately leap to your mind. I’d say about half of their guys would leap to my mind.


(When this is just the fifth most publicly disreputable figure on your team, you're in trouble.)

But, as post-brawl David Stern would tell you, we can’t be encouraging the type of behavior and fashion choices that the Nuggets consistently display. That is where the suffix “ettes” comes into play. Adding this to the end of the name effectively emasculates the team, rather than lending them undeserved street-cred. Let’s face it, when your team leader’s go-to move in a fight is the sucker punch into the full-on backpedal across the length of the court, your team isn’t actually thug… you just wish it was. When that same player gets caught with pot and makes his buddy take the fall for him, then adds insult to injury by blaming his friends for being bad influences on him, you guys aren’t thug. When your two best big men trade time on the bench with a plethora of injuries, you aren’t thug. When your team’s best effort to start a huge fight with another team full of miscreants is still not considered “the brawl” of the past decade, you aren’t thug. Did I mention Carmelo’s sucker punch? The point is, Thuggettes is an appropriate nomenclature for a team that desperately wants to be considered thug, but consistently falls pathetically short of this goal.


(It's easy to look tough when you're yelling at a guy from the opposite end of the arena.)

It is important that the league act on this quickly, as time is running out. The Denver brass has already made their first smart move in years by trading away the beleaguered Iverson for the upstanding citizen and true team leader that is Chauncey Billups. A few more moves like that and this team will completely lose the identity it has worked so hard to achieve. The name-change must be enacted if only to inspire the front office to now turn around and trade Billups for Jamaal Tinsley.


(Tell me he wouldn't look good in a Denver Thuggettes uniform.)

Of course, we can’t overlook the fact that my proposed name corresponds with the original by way of similar phonetics. As you have heard it said, familiarity breeds contempt, and there is no roster in the NBA more deserving of contempt than your Denver Thuggettes (ok, that whole thing might be a reach, but it was at least a marginally clever one). Let’s make this change happen, folks. For the good of the league, let’s make this change happen together.



On another note: The Pistons have just completed their dismantling of the defending champion Boston Celtics. In Boston. Without Iverson. This makes it two consecutive victories against two of the best teams in the league, both on the opponents’ turf, both without The Answer. Are they a better team without AI? Too early to say but it certainly seems that way. Stay tuned for more on this.