Renck: If Nuggets don’t bring fight to punchable Thunder, they deserve what they get

OKLAHOMA CITY Loud City is not Fraud City Every Thunder had a basket Wednesday night save for the Broncos mascot We got punked Nuggets coach David Adelman admitted after the - drubbing We are not going to flush that We have to be better If the series opener was a referendum on the Thunder s inexperience Contest was validation of its season Oklahoma City is equipped with stars and a bench deeper than a Tolstoy novel This is a crew of spectacular opulence So why after demonstrated excellence do they have such a punchable face Racing out to points in the first half the majority ever in a playoff challenge the Thunder became increasingly annoying This was WWE disguised as the NBA And let s be clear Meeting will look a lot like Wednesday if the Nuggets don t put in a mouthpiece and lace up their gloves This series will be won in a ring not on a court The Thunder is not changing OKC s players relish this like pigs in mud Lu Dort turned the paint into a cagematch Isaiah Hartenstein yapped at a Nuggets assistant coach When isn t he complaining leading to a technical Alex Caruso nipped at Nikola Jokic s ankles like a chihuahua on a double espresso Even Rumble the Mascot looks like Teen Wolf on steroids This is the playoffs revealed Michael Porter Jr whose mind remains strong but his ailing left shoulder has made him a liability We have to be the enforcer And we did a bad job at that Listen the Thunder is bleeping good They had the Nuggets down bad And they refused to retreat to the farthest neutral corner Coach Mark Daigneault successfully challenged a foul call leading - with left in the third It fell under the guise of sticking up for his players but it tilted closer to rubbing noses in the carpet It is hard to blame them But it is also OK to loathe them Lots of teams act tough But OKC is throwing so various limbs in so multiple directions it s a wonder they don t hit an usher or the PA announcer Jokic downplayed the physicality after fouling out in the third quarter for the first time in his career Aaron Gordon did not They are calling the second foul almost all of the time They are fouling Joker first You know Jok is reactionary and they do get the second guy a lot of the time Gordon revealed But they are fouling him point blank Period There is a sobering truth in any rout If you don t like it stop it And the Nuggets could not They were embarrassed humiliated and throttled And that was just in the first nine minutes of the first quarter They trailed - the tournament a mess of turnovers open s and too much Shai Gilgeous-Alexander The effort was questionable The execution was awful It was like they knew they had a split And they could not wait to split to the nearest exit The thrashing left lingering questions Can anyone on the Nuggets besides Jokic and Russell Westbrook match Oklahoma s brute force moving forward Maybe is the uncomfortable answer Will MPJ ever make another meaningful basket MPJ is for from the floor in this series and for from -point range numbers that demand he be benched or sit out to heal for Championship He is the baseball equivalent of a DH When he s not hitting triples he has no purpose And nobody is picking up the slack Christian Braun is for from beyond the arc Denver s bench is Westbrook and the holograms save for sprinkles of Peyton Watson And ultimately what was Adelman thinking keeping his starters in down points a sparse possessions after intermission Jokic fouled out with remaining in the third quarter Adelman smiled a sarcastic response to questionable officiating but he should have removed the three-time MVP long before the hip check I felt like those guys needed to go back out there and play They needed to find a rhythm Adelman reported I think they thought we were trying to junk up the championship which we weren t It was already trash at that point Related Articles Nuggets Aaron Gordon comes to Nikola Jokic s defense after star fouls out They are fouling him PHOTOS Denver Nuggets routed by OKC Thunder - in Tournament of second-round NBA Playoffs series Nuggets destroyed by Thunder in Tournament as Nikola Jokic fouls out in third quarter Nuggets-Thunder Challenge -pointers Even Patrick Beverley thought Nuggets were wronged by refs Renck Russell Westbrook is an experience But Nuggets would be a mess without Playoff Russ So go ahead and put a Sharpie through the Nuggets if you are absolutely sure that the Thunder has scarred and scared Jokic and crew into the fetal position with their snarl and immense talent You can argue that now after Denver impersonated a speed bag But it s not convincing Not yet We have a series now And until the Thunder wins in Denver the credits will not start rolling The Nuggets rebounded after getting clocked in Meeting in Los Angeles in the opening round They have earned the benefit of the doubt They got dressed down and beat down They must make adjustments biting their tongues and returning to basics No rope-a-dope At the opening bell they must be prepared to fight Because if they aren t they ll deserve exactly what they get Want more Nuggets news Sign up for the Nuggets Insider to get all our NBA analysis