Dispatch · August 27, 2026
Denver's offense is 49 years old
The thing Nikola Jokić does that looks new was the entire plan of the 1977 champion.
No games last night. The anchor is the 1977 Finals, and the center who ran Portland's offense from the high post.
The Echo
What last night rhymes with
Watch 4 minutes of the 1977 Finals and the Denver offense stops looking like an invention. Walton catches it above the free throw line, 2 players cut past him, and the shot arrives on the third pass from a man who never had the ball in a scoring position.
That is the same sequence Denver has run to a title. The difference is the shooting around it, not the idea, and the idea was a title-winning plan in 1977 against a Philadelphia team with more talent everywhere else.
Walton won the Finals MVP that June and the league MVP the following season. Those are the only 2 healthy seasons he had: 65 games, then 58.
He broke his left foot in the 1978 playoffs, played on it after a painkilling injection, and lost most of the next 4 years. Navicular fractures end careers in 1978 and get surgically repaired in 2026.
The reason to keep his name is not sympathy. It is that the most modern offense in basketball has a 49-year-old proof of concept, and 1 of the 2 people who ran it was a center who passed first.
Tomorrow: The only man to win all 3 trophies in one season.
New Dispatch every morning, 8am ET
One field, no password, no name. Free forever, and one tap to leave.
We send one email a day and nothing else.