Nuggets' Nikola Jokic evaluates his season as 'inconsistent' as MVP hopes fade

Bennett Durando, The Denver Post on Mar 27, 2026

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Despite being on track to average a triple-double again, even Nikola Jokic admits his season has been tricky to evaluate.

In part because it’s been broken up into phases.

“I think for me, it was a little bit inconsistent,” the Nuggets big man said. “Just because injury, and then it was the first time I was coming back from (an) injury. So the turnovers and good games are gonna happen; bad games, bad missed shots are gonna happen. But it was just something new for me. I will say inconsistent.”

That’s in contrast to the pride with which Jokic assessed his 2024-25 season, when he didn’t hesitate to declare he was “playing the best basketball of my life” amid an MVP campaign that he ultimately lost to Oklahoma City’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. In a new season, Jokic’s consistent dominance seemed to carry over at first. He was averaging 29.9 points, 12.4 rebounds and 11.1 assists (3.09 per turnover) after 31 games, shooting 60.4% from the field and 44% from 3-point range. The Nuggets were 22-9.

Then he hyperextended his left knee on Dec. 29 in Miami. He missed a month with a bone bruise. Since returning from the longest absence of his career, his efficiency has been down as both a shooter (52.7%, 30.8%) and playmaker (2.56 assist-to-turnover ratio). The Nuggets have gone 14-12 with him back in the lineup.

“I think before injury, I played really, really high-level basketball,” Jokic said Wednesday night after one of the high points, a 23-point, 21-rebound, 19-assist game against Dallas. “And since injury, it’s so-so.”

The turnovers have been particularly shaky at times, but Jokic seemed to turn a corner this week. In one of the most impressive back-to-backs of his career, he combined for 36 assists and only three giveaways in a pair of wins.

“I can learn a lot from him and just the way he’s able to read the game, but I don’t know if I’ll ever be somebody that can get to that level,” Mavericks forward and 2025 No. 1 draft pick Cooper Flagg said. “I mean, it was incredible, just the way he was able to impact the game. At some points, it feels like he’s not even trying out there, and he ended up with 20, 20 and 20. So I mean, he’s incredible. It’s crazy to be a part of that out there.”

If Jokic plays in each of Denver’s eight remaining regular-season games, he needs only 29 more assists to secure the seventh season in NBA history in which a player has averaged a triple-double. (It would be his second such season.) The three-time MVP cannot miss two more games, or he’ll be disqualified for individual accolades such as MVP and All-NBA teams.

He has fallen significantly behind Gilgeous-Alexander in MVP odds, while Victor Wembanyama and Luka Doncic have also been playing catch-up in the runner-up race.

“I feel like sometimes if he doesn’t have one of these games like he has tonight, people say he had a bad game. And I just think that that’s wrong,” Nuggets wing Peyton Watson said Wednesday. “But at the end of the day, when you show excellence and signs of greatness, people are gonna hold you at that standard.

“… You see it with all the great ones. Watching people through their ascension and getting to where they want to go, that’s when people are the most supportive because they feel like they’re in early. They’re buying stock early. But when everybody knows you’re great, the only thing left to do is hate.”

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