Are you loving this NBA season? (Don’t answer that, Pelicans fans.) Get the most out of your fandom by subscribing to Good Morning It’s Basketball. For just $5 per month or $50 per year, you’ll get reactions, video clips and links five days per week.

Nikola Jokic the hothead

Jokic responds to an unnecessary Markieff Morris foul with a dangerous shove in the back. It's not his first offense.

Nov 9

Good morning. Let’s basketball.

You may remember Nikola Jokic getting frustrated as the Phoenix Suns blew the doors off of the Denver Nuggets in the playoffs last season. After not getting a call, he wound up and struck Cameron Payne across the face while trying to make a point on a take foul. When Devin Booker took obvious exception, Jokic started trying to intimidate the smaller Booker.

After being named the NBA MVP, Jokic spent the end of the Nuggets’ playoff run in the locker room, having been ejected.

The circumstances were far different in Monday’s game between the Nuggets and Heat. First, Denver was winning handily. Second, Jokic was in pure retaliation mode — not frustrated like in the playoffs, but upset at Markieff Morris taking what he felt was a cheap shot. (It was.) So Jokic upped the ante with an even cheaper shot that turned out to be dangerous.

I’ve seen some Nuggets-slash-Jokic fans in the ~comments~ various places trying to defend this as “don’t cheap shot someone and turn around expecting no retaliation.” Which: true. If you hit a big dude like Jokic hard enough to move them, you should probably stay on your toes for a moment. That said, it doesn’t excuse the actual retaliation. It wasn’t as if Morris hit Jokic in the back: it was an obvious (hard!) take foul in the open court — take fouls in the open court are a scourge on this NBA season! — and Jokic’s hit on Morris was in the back on a dead ball. Big difference.

I can’t really tell if Jimmy Butler wants it with Jokic or if another Nuggets said something in the skirmish. But Jimmy Butler definitely wanted it with someone.

SportsCenter @SportsCenter

Jimmy Butler had words for Nikola Jokic after his foul on Markieff Morris.

No Heat players talked to the media after the game. Erik Spoelstra said that Morris was walking around in the locker room but needed some medical tests to ensure no damage was done. Jokic, for his part, acknowledged his bad decision.

"It's a stupid play," Jokic told reporters after the game. "I feel bad. I am not supposed to react that way. ... I thought it was going to be a take foul. ... I think it was a dirty play. And I just needed to protect myself. I felt bad. I am not supposed to react that way, but I need to protect myself."
Jokic later added: "I don't know who showed me the clip, and actually his head snapped back [after the shove], so I feel really bad. ... It's a bad move."

Jokic is not the only player in the NBA with a history of really aggressive non-basketball plays against players or teams that are aggravating him. But I dare say he’s the only MVP-level star out here doing stuff like this. Joel Embiid is the closest, though Embiid has decreased the beef frequency as he’s gotten more important whereas it seems to be accelerating for Jokic as he becomes more prominent. Maybe he feels like a bigger target? Or he feels greater responsibility to defend the honor of himself or the Nuggets given his new-found fame? I don’t know. I don’t like it.

Jokic’s nasty streak flies under the radar because Jokic is seen as a lovable goof, an idiosyncratic misfit toy that exists outside the normal paradigm of even modern NBA superstars. But between the Payne strike and the Morris shove, there’s no denying that the reigning MVP has hothead tendencies. It’s going to start impacting his persona, if it hasn’t already. For some, this will make them like Jokic more. (See: the cult of Jokic’s brothers.) But surely it sets a bad example for the impressionable young males watching the team.

Jokic apologized to Cam Payne, too. The next step here is to just stop lashing out on the court. I believe in you, Jokic! You can do it.

I hope Markieff Morris is OK and I also hope Markieff Morris stops doing this garbage, too. The Morris twins have well-earned reputations that reflect poorly on them and overshadow the fact that they have had really solid NBA careers. How differently would we look at the Morrii if each of them hadn’t ticked off a dozen fan bases each with plays similar to this?

Scores

Knicks 103, Sixers 96 — The GMIB curse is over! (Joel Embiid, Tobias Harris and Matisse Thybulle all sat.) (R.J. Barrett shot 6/20.)

Nets 95, Bulls 118 — Brooklyn could only get efficient offense from Kevin Durant and LaMarcus Aldridge — Chicago’s defense shut everything else down. The Bulls have the No. 4 defense in the NBA, by the way, which is WELL above preseason expectations.

Timberwolves 118, Grizzlies 125 (OT) — I feel like things just get really weird when the Wolves wear the highlighter uniforms. What Ja Morant and Karl-Anthony Towns did at the end of regulation — Ja with a dunk for the three and a three for the lead, KAT with a 35-foot bank shot for the tie — is unspeakably cool.

Pelicans 92, Mavericks 108 — New Orleans is 1-10. Season is basically over before Zion Williamson touches the court. Horrific.

Heat 96, Nuggets 113

Hawks 113, Warriors 127 — I was going to write a bit about Stephen Curry, but what much is there to say? He’s one of the greatest ever and his legacy is already in marble. He’s building a monument around the legacy now. Must-watch T.V. every time he steps on the court.

Suns 109, Kings 104 — Alert: we have a Cam Payne Game on our hands.

Hornets 123, Lakers 126 (OT) — For maybe the first time in recorded history, it’s OK to feel sorry for Lakers fans because this team is apparently going to continue to drive them absolutely nuts this season. L.A. was up 14 against a STRUGGLING Hornets team in the fourth quarter — and this wasn’t a case where the Lakers led all night and then it got whittled down. Charlotte led in the third, the Lakers flipped the table and ran it up … and then the Hornets just kept clawing back. (This included a 5-point play, all free throws, three of them techs, for LaMelo Ball.) But L.A. outlasted Charlotte in overtime for the win. Wacky stuff.