2023: Denver Nuggets
Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray had been teammates since the 2016-2017 NBA season. They were teammates seven years before finally breaking through on the biggest stage and winning the highly coveted, NBA Championship. That is the same amount of seasons Brown and Tatum played together before winning it all. Like the Celtics, the Jokic and Murray Nuggets showed promise early in their careers.
In their fourth season together, the Nuggets advanced to the Western Conference Finals, where they fell to the eventual champion, Los Angeles Lakers. Jamal Murray had a breakout in the first round of the playoffs, playing at a superstar level for the first time on a big stage. Then, they overcame a 3-1 deficit to the heavily favored, Los Angeles Clippers who had just signed their dynamic duo of Kawhi Leonard and Paul George.
The Nuggets showed out in the COVID Bubble playoffs, and the league expectation was that they would continue to contend deep in the playoffs. However, Jamal Murray would have a devastating ACL injury in the 2021 season that would sideline him for the rest of that season and the 2021-2022 season. Without Murray, the Nuggets weren't able to get back to the Conference Finals in either postseason
Denver's front office was faced with tough decisions. Do they think Jamal Murray can get back to being the player he was after an injury like that? Will he be too injury prone moving forward? Were they best off trading him for a more proven and durable player? Well, the Nuggets had complete faith in bringing back their core of Jokic, Murray, Aaron Gordon and Michael Porter, Jr. The Nuggets improved their team by trading for Kentavious Caldwell Pope and were off for their historic 2022-2023 season.
The Nuggets would earn the number one seed in the Western Conference and win the NBA Finals while only losing five games in the entire postseason. Jokic and Murray proved they were an NBA Championship duo after years of falling short.
If the Cavaliers believe Evan Mobley can make the jump to stardom like Jamal Murray did in the 2020 and 2023 playoffs, they should show the same patience with Mobley and Mitchell as the Nuggets did with their star duo.