Denver Nuggets Working Hard to Re-Sign Nene


The brass in the Mile High City continues to sound positive about their chances of retaining Nene, who will likely become an unrestricted free agent this summer. From the Denver Post: “Nuggets executives Josh Kroenke and Masai Ujiri, however, reported good news on that front, saying they’ve had good meetings and positive feedback from the Brazilian big man since the end of the season. ‘We’ve been having good talks,’ Ujiri said late Thursday night after all of the draft day picks and trades were made. ‘We’re making good progress, I think. And I think Nene is excited. We’ve met a few times with him and a few times with his agent.’ Nene averaged career highs in points (14.5) and field-goal percentage (.615) last season, and was near career highs in free-throw percentage (.711) and rebounding (7.6). There was a component of appreciation Nene initially said was missing, and that it was as important as dollars and cents. Since then, the Nuggets have bent over backward showing him the love. ‘It’s been great,’ Kroenke said. ‘We had one meeting with Nene, Masai and I did together. Masai has met with his people several times. I’ve had on-going dialogue with his agent. We’re going to continue dialogue into next week. I can’t comment any further at this point in time, but Nene is a player that we want to have here for a long time. He’s been a backbone of ours for the last several years, and he’s a big part of our future.’ Nene is currently in Brazil. He is expected to be in Denver sometime next week.”