Denver fans have been flocking to Nuggets games as an alternative to the Broncos

The Denver Nuggets have gone through an extended stretch where the team only played a handful of games in a couple weeks. Unusual to be sure in an NBA schedule that is usually filled with up to three games a week, even more. Before that, the Nuggets were on the road for 10 days. To be true December has been one of little face time with the public in Denver.

Whilst the Nuggets were quite sparing on the local scene, your Denver Broncos were busy losing four consecutive games; culminating in the dismissal of their head coach Vance Joseph on New Years Eve. The Broncos spiraled down the stretch which led to what appeared to be over 10,000 no shows in their final game against the San Diego Chargers.

Why do I bring up the Broncos?

It is well-known that Denver’s NFL team occupies 90% of the city’s heart. It’s one of those “is what it is” things. Despite the Nuggets residing in Denver only seven years fewer that the Broncos the success of the Nuggets can’t match that of the Broncos. Plain and simple.

Well, duh you say indignantly to me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I get it. I really do. This is why you have the major sports talk station in the city talk about there never being an offseason for Broncos football. It’s infuriating but … the Broncos are big business in Denver and occupy and near monopoly in media and, more importantly financially. The Broncos are big business in the city.

Over the course of this Denver Nuggets season — as the team has stayed remarkably in the top or near the top of the Western Conference — the city of Denver seemed to have recognized that their favorite NFL team wasn’t the team in Denver. At least … for 2018 and the beginning of 2019.

Beginning this change was (obviously) the Nuggets winning games at an impressive clip while the Broncos are mired in their worst stretch of football since the 1960’s. In the grand scheme of things, however, the Nuggets roster is filled with young home-grown talent that the city has seen (even if peripherally) grow before their eyes. I was a far cry from the disinterested rabble that inhabited Pepsi Center even two years ago.

The Nuggets (as of this writing) are 24–11 and sit atop the hyper-competitive NBA Western Conference. After 5 consecutive seasons of missing the playoffs the Nuggets seem well and truly ready to enter into a new era of success and Denver is responding. The Nuggets are now up to 14th in attendance in the NBA. To put this into perspective, last season the Nuggets were 20th, and the season before were dead last in attendance. 14th in league-wide attendance is actually quite impressive for the notoriously fickle Denver ticket buyers.

Maybe this should be a lesson for the Denver Broncos, who are stuck in a “we are always competitive” mindset when they should have hit the reset button after winning Super Bowl 50 in January 2016. If there is one thing that turns off fans its mediocrity and in a league (NFL) that encourages teams to be “even” (parity) it’s even more damning. The Broncos were hoisted by the same petard that many have accused the Nuggets (baselessly) of employing. While Tim Connelly and the Nuggets front office have quietly been building a roster full of young talent, the Broncos have trotted out mediocre quarterback because they felt they could still compete.

While the Broncos will always be #1 in the Denver public’s minds, even they have their breaking point. The Broncos hit that this year while Nuggets are ascending. For that matter the team that shares Pepsi Center with the Nuggets — the Colorado Avalanche — are coming off a playoff season and are undergoing a successful season themselves. The Broncos aren’t the sole kings of the Denver Sports landscape in 2018.

In this age of specialized media many podcasts — including the longest running and oldest Nuggets podcast in Denver, CSG Podcast — have carried the Nuggets torch through some tough times. Now there’s so much Nuggets-specific media available be it myself here or Denver Stiffs, Mile High Sports, Dig in Denver, The All Around or BSN Denver that provide outlets for media starved Nuggets fans. This created a groundswell that sustained itself while major media outlets in Denver went all-in on the Broncos.

Now … well, things are a bit different. Denver is turning up for the Nuggets while the business of Broncos drives (ratings and financially) the major media outlets still. The Broncos coaching search will — no doubt — drive ratings through the roof. The Nuggets, however, have proven they don’t need these outlets in order to be successful at the ticket counter. 24–11 and leading the Western Conference will do that.

What I saw at Pepsi Center against the lowly New York Knicks was a crowd that was ready to explode. Looking for that reason to cheer. They got it. They keep getting it. So, in the end, it doesn’t matter if there’s never an offseason … Denver gets it and that’s all that matters.