NBA 2018-19 Power Rankings: Week 1 (Western Conference Edition)

#3 Denver Nuggets

The Nuggets' young core

If you'd told me that after four games of the regular season, the Nuggets would emerge out of the gate as one of the best defensive teams in the league while dropping points galore on every one of their opponents in dominant fashion, I'd have laid a tenner against this and lost.

The Nuggets' Achilles heel, for the past couple of seasons, has been their inability to maintain high levels of defense through the length of 48 minutes of game time.

They seem to have remedied at least the effort bit this season. In addition, having Jokic hedge screens in the pick-and-roll has made him less of a liability on defense, while he's playing MVP caliber offense when he's needed to, or when he feels like it.

The Nuggets have a top-5 starting lineup in the league. If you were sleeping on them up until this point, don't stay the same for long.