SHINY NEW TEAM DENVER’S OFFICIAL ELEVATION OF 5,280 FEET OR 1 MILE VERIFIES ITS NICKNAME SHINY NEW TEAM 8
With a yearly average of approximately 300 days of sunshine Denver Colorado is indeed a city blessed with gleam But could it be that some of the bling comes from more than just sunlight Mining prospectors certainly believed so and they cased both mountain and stream for gold during the city’s population boom of the 1870s Even today half of the United States coins are still minted in Denver A fresh coat of shine descended upon the Mile High City starting in 1967 when the Denver Nuggets basketball franchise began league play as the Denver Rockets in the American Basketball Association ABA The ABA was founded to rival the National Basketball Association NBA which had been up and running for nearly 20 years at that point But with basketball’s DAVID THOMPSON 9
THE NUGGETS MADE THE MOVE TO MCNICHOLS SPORTS ARENA THEIR LAST YEAR IN THE ABA popularity on the rise the ABA promised a flashier brand of ball perfect for both the shiny new team and the city of Denver Coach Bob Bass who had previously enjoyed success in the college coaching ranks manned the bench for Denver’s inaugural squad The team’s top three players included a pair of NBA defectees speedy point guard Larry Jones who had played the prior season with the Philadelphia 76ers and lanky forward Wayne Hightower a former member of the Detroit Pistons Baltimore Bullets and San Francisco Warriors Together the duo averaged 40 2 points per game and led Denver to a winning season with a record of 45 33 Spencer Haywood a talented forward who had been raised among 10 poverty-stricken children in Silver City Mississippi came to 10
DAVID THOMPSON As the only basketball player ever to be drafted first overall in not one but two professional basketball leagues David Thompson had a choice to make In 1975 both the Atlanta Hawks of the NBA and the Virginia Squires of the ABA made Thompson the first pick of their respective collegiate drafts After weighing his options Thompson chose the ABA promptly joining the Nuggets via a trade a somewhat surprising decision considering that the NBA was more established and that the Hawks offered Thompson more guaranteed money But the Hawks had offended Thompson during a recruiting trip by taking him to McDonald’s for a meal rather than to a swankier restaurant Thompson was a dunking and scoring dynamo for the Nuggets in the ABA and then in the NBA which the Nuggets joined in 1976 The swingman nicknamed Skywalker once scored 73 points in a single game a Nuggets record but his extreme spring was his most memorable asset Chicago Bulls guard Michael Jordan once said The whole measure of vertical leap began I think with David Thompson He vaulted off the ground exploded off the ground INTRODUCING POSITION GUARD FORWARD HEIGHT 6-FOOT-4 NUGGETS SEASONS 1975 82 DAVID THOMPSON 11
