The Denver Nuggets didn’t have a lot of options to improve a flawed roster this offseason, but a creative trade for Cam Johnson gives them the chance to reshape their team.
This NBA free agency period was unique in that it was never going to be about free agency.
Only the Brooklyn Nets had the means to open up meaningful cap space, so 29 other teams had to think creatively to improve. Most can use exceptions to sign players to deals above the veteran’s minimum, but improvement for most teams this offseason will come in the form of trades.
When teams have a lot of cap space, it’s easy to predict they’ll be aggressive. But when no teams have cap space, it’s a lot harder to predict who’ll dominate the early offseason headlines.
It was certainly a surprise to see the Denver Nuggets dramatically reshaping their roster during the first day of free agency. They traded Michael Porter Jr. and an unprotected 2032 first-round draft pick to the Brooklyn Nets for Cam Johnson, and also brought back Bruce Brown on a one-year deal.
The Nuggets had just one draft pick available for trade, and they cashed it in quickly, swapping sharpshooters and saving significant money. It’s a move that gives the Nuggets flexibility while also getting them a player who might be an even better fit in Porter Jr.’s role.
It came at a hefty price, but it’s one the Nuggets had to pay.
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The most important part of the Johnson-Porter Jr. swap for the Nuggets is how good Johnson is as a player. All of the financial implications and flexibility are bonuses, but the bonuses wouldn’t matter if Johnson wasn’t ready to be a major player in his first year with the team.
This is Nikola Jokic’s prime, so there’s no time for intentional steps backward.
It’s hard to imagine the Nuggets getting a better fit for Porter Jr.’s role with the capital they had available to trade. There aren’t many players on Porter Jr.’s level as a shooter, but Johnson is one of them. As an overall player, Johnson was a bit better on both sides of the ball than Porter Jr. last season.
Porter Jr. might still have untapped ability as an on-the-ball scorer, but if he was going to get that opportunity in Denver, it would’ve happened by now. The Nuggets aren’t on a timeline that can afford to give Porter Jr. large amounts of on-ball reps every game.
He’ll have a bigger opportunity for that in Brooklyn, while Johnson will slot into his role as a shooter, slasher and attacker of closeouts in Denver.
Johnson was asked to shoulder a heavier load on offense last season and impressed by averaging 5.4 more points than he did in 2023-24 while also improving his true shooting percentage from 58.2 to 63.2. He didn’t have to sacrifice any of his scoring efficiency in a higher volume role.
In Denver, he’ll be asked to do a lot of scoring as a tip-of-the-spear player, and that plays to his strength. He also improved as a passer last season and makes the right reads while moving the ball, which is a must when playing for the Nuggets.
Defensively, Johnson is not special, but he’s the better of the two players in the trade. Porter Jr. deserves a lot of credit for learning to use his size (6-foot-10) and the help of defenders around him to evolve from a terrible defender to a passable one. It’s the kind of improvement that goes unnoticed but is incredibly important. By the end of his Nuggets’ tenure, Porter Jr. was good enough to not get played off the floor defensively.
Johnson was at one point overrated on the defensive side of the ball because of his “3-and-D” archetype, but he was never a lockdown defender with the Nets. Now his reputation and skills align as an average defender who won’t make a defense worse, and he has the size (6-8) and quick-enough feet to guard multiple positions capably. His versatility is definitely his greatest asset on that side of the ball.
Combine that with his offense, and Johnson’s greatest strength is that he has no great weakness when he’s on the floor.
The Injury Bug
The qualification “when he’s on the floor” is important, because Porter Jr. and Johnson are similar in another more unfortunate way – they both miss a lot of games.
Porter Jr. has a reputation as an oft-injured player, so it might surprise most people to learn he’s only missed six games total over the last two seasons. But a Grade 2 shoulder sprain did render him ineffective for a good chunk of the playoffs, even if it was admirable that he was playing through it.
Nuggets fans may be distressed to learn they traded one injury risk for another, as Johnson hasn’t played more than 66 games in a season in his career and hasn’t hit 60 games in any of the last three seasons. Johnson has been a walking operation board in his NBA career, with injuries to his back, hip, ankle, knee and leg.
But it’s also been a few years since Johnson played for a team contending for a championship. It’s impossible to know without injecting some truth serum into the Nets’ doctors, but if the team was a title contender, it’s possible his back injury wouldn’t have prevented him from suiting up the final seven games of the season.
The Nuggets know they’ll have to manage Johnson’s various maladies and were already doing so with Porter Jr. While they’ll need Johnson to stay healthy for a portion of the regular season to get comfortable with the team, if he plays 55 games again, the team can stay afloat.
Newfound Flexibility
There are some added bonuses to this deal for the Nuggets. Both Johnson and Porter Jr. are signed for the next two seasons, but the Porter Jr. makes about $17.3 million more than Johnson in 2025-26 and about $17.8 million more in 2026-27, per Spotrac.
The savings in salary give the Nuggets options. They now have access to the non-taxpayer mid-level exception, which is an exception that allows them to sign a player to a contract with up to $14.1 million as the starting salary.
The Nuggets won’t be able to use the entire exception without shedding more money because they are too close to the first apron line, but they can use significantly more than the $5.7 million they would’ve had available for the taxpayer mid-level exception prior to the trade. The same is true for their $16.8 million trade exception. The Nuggets can use the amount they have up to the first apron but hard-cap their team at that line by using either exception.
If your eyes glaze over every time someone mentions the words “exception” or “apron,” just know the Nuggets have a lot more spending power to throw at another veteran and they can acquire a player by signing him as a free agent or trading for him. While a trade would be tough with their empty cupboard of assets, having different avenues available is always a good thing.
There are rumors that the Nuggets are looking into Al Horford, who would give them a big man they were missing last season. Even if the Nuggets are unable to sign him, it’s pretty clear they’ll get at least one more rotation upgrade. Add in Bruce Brown, who is reportedly signing for the minimum, and the Nuggets will get at least three new rotation players in, while only losing Porter Jr. and Russell Westbrook.
By the way, the Bruce Brown reunion is, per sources, on a vet minimum deal. The Nuggets' new front office of Ben Tenzer and Jon Wallace is putting in work today… t.co/EKIJmv9FRW
— Sam Amick (@sam_amick) June 30, 2025It’s hard not to see this as a clear upgrade for the Nuggets, and that makes it worth the heavy price of the 2032 unprotected pick. That pick is valuable for the same reason the Nuggets had to do this deal: Jokic is in his prime now, not in seven years.
The Nuggets have to try to build the best team possible around him while that is still the case, and this early offseason deal was likely their best chance to upgrade the roster while also giving them more optionality moving forward.
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NBA Free Agency: Why the Nuggets Made the Michael Porter Jr.-Cam Johnson Swap Opta Analyst.
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