Nikola Jokic, an elusive superstar, has Denver in his grasp

About two miles from downtown Denver, the yellows, oranges, and reds of a spray-painted mural fill the cracked, gray cement wall of a building that houses an employment agency. Standing about 20 feet high, the mural depicts an expressionless Nikola Jokic next to a much more emotional Jamal Murray, his eyes squinted and arms outstretched as if wielding a bow and arrow.

Thomas Evans, a 38-year-old artist, recently completed the mural of the two Denver Nuggets stars as the team prepared for the NBA Finals. On Thursday afternoon, hours before Game 1 of the championship series against the Miami Heat, Damien Lucero blared his song “It’s Nuthin” while shooting a rap music video for the mural. Lucero, 21, goes by Dame$, pronounced “Dames” (not to be confused with Dame DOLLA, the rap name of Portland Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard). He said the mural inspired him and some collaborators to write the song as a tribute to Jokic.

He rattled off some of his favorite lines:

“Sweep it clean, yes, I am all of it.

Had to smoke him out like I was leafing trees.

Four mo’ dubs and then we pop rings.

Triple dub, no kidding, he’s the new king.

The old king — at least for those who want to describe him that way — is LeBron James, whose Los Angeles Lakers were swept by the Nuggets in the Western Conference Finals. James is the biggest star in the NBA, with four championship rings, stacks of endorsement deals and a constant presence on social media and television. Jokic has none of that.

“I recognize a lot of myself in him,” said Evans, who also mentions Detour.

“I’m in the studio all day working on my artwork, and I’m not as front-facing as other artists,” he said. “I don’t always want to be in front of the cameras. I don’t always want to be in magazines. I really just want to do my job and let it speak for itself.”

In the NBA, stars often adopt their city’s identity, or give the city their own. Magic Johnson’s love of luxury and glamor made him a perfect fit for Los Angeles; James’ embrace of the celebrity has made him the same. Patrick Ewing’s physicality screamed New York City. Jokic, a 28-year-old Serb who is arguably the best player in the NBA, is a bit of an enigma, as was Tim Duncan when he was in San Antonio. And that suits Denver and Colorado just fine, according to the people who live here.

“The kind of talent he is, you know, a humble talent, not someone who seeks the limelight, a team player, someone who’s down to earth,” said Colorado Senator Michael Bennet. “I think Denver and Colorado, we consider ourselves down to earth.”

On Thursday, Bennet wore one Nuggets warm up jersey in Washington, DC, on track to vote to raise the debt ceiling.

Stars like Jokic, who has won two Most Valuable Player Awards, can almost give a city a one-man boost. Denver Mayor Michael B. Hancock estimated that the Nuggets’ playoffs will run alone this year could bring in $25 million economic impulse.

Yet Jokic has almost no off-field cultural footprint as the Nuggets jockey for local attention with the NHL’s Avalanche and MLB’s Rockies (all of which are overshadowed by the NFL’s Broncos). But this obscurity is apparently by its own design. Talking about stardom seems to bore him. Asked if he was the best player on the Nuggets, Jokic told reporters on Wednesday, “Sometimes I am, sometimes not. I’m cool with that.”

Murray, who is nicknamed Blue Arrow for his basketball skills, seems more comfortable in the spotlight than Jokic. He is handsome, expressive and active on social media. If Jokic isn’t Denver’s best player, Murray almost certainly is. According to SponsorUnited, he has promoted at least 10 brands in the past year, compared to just two for Jokic. It is unusual for a top player like Jokic to be so elusive off the field.

“I don’t know how much influence he really has because he doesn’t put himself on the map,” said Vic Lombardi, a Denver-based sports talk host.

Jokic rarely does interviews outside of mandatory press conferences, where he usually gives anonymous answers. He has a deal with Nike, but doesn’t have a signature shoe. He doesn’t host a podcast and his politics are a mystery. He appeared in a handful of commercials in Serbia. Jokic recently said basketball was “not the most important thing” in his life and probably never would be.

“I would think he would be more connected just because it’s necessary when you’re a player of that caliber,” said Andre Miller, who played for the Nuggets in the early 2000s and a decade ago. He added: “I think he approaches it like I’m just a basketball player. Soft hearted. He goes and plays ball and he goes home. So it makes his job a little bit easier and keeps out all the distractions.”

Nuggets forward Jeff Green said ‘His job is to play basketball, not to meet everyone’s needs.”

Vlatko Cancar, another teammate, chuckled when asked about Jokic as a public figure.

“When you’re a star at that level, it’s so hard to please everyone,” he said. “I feel like he wants to sign autographs for everyone, shake hands and take pictures with everyone. But it’s just too hard because it’s one of him and it’s millions of others.

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis called Jokic “a rarity in the modern era of sports.” He said people in Colorado “admire him all the more because he’s not an off-court distraction like other so-called stars, you know, too often in both basketball and other sports.”

Senator John Hickenlooper, Democrat of Colorado, said Jokic was like a “big bear who can do ballet.”

“And that looks great for Colorado, because we’re a former cow town — a mining town,” Hickenlooper said. “We come from honest, hard-working roots. Denver is pretty athletic now, and I’m not sure we’re quite ready for ballet yet, but we’ll get there.

White NBA stars are often described in positive terms less commonly applied to black players, such as gritty and selfless. Still, discussions with those who know and follow Jokic suggest that his reputation as a willing passerby is deserved. Jokic has said he would rather pass than score.

His approach to stardom poses a challenge to the NBA, which is constantly looking to expand its reach. But the league doesn’t always help itself: The Nuggets, even with a two-time MVP, weren’t on national television as often as they were during the regular season. some less talented teams.

In addition, some Colorado residents have been unable to watch Nuggets games for the past four years due to a dispute over transportation costs between Altitude, the regional sports network, and Comcast. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said Thursday it was a “terrible situation.”

Hancock, the mayor, called it “a real shame.”

“That robs these great young players of the exposure they deserve, especially in this season where they’ve done phenomenal things,” he said.

Stan Kroenke, owner of the Nuggets and the Avalanche, also owns Altitude. Polis, the governor, said he had “called on both sides to work it out”.

In Serbia, Jokic’s home country, the NBA is popular. When he’s home in the off-season, he lives like in Denver: away from the public, according to Christopher R. Hill, the US ambassador to Serbia. But Jokic is someone “everyone is talking about right now,” he said.

“The games are usually at 2 a.m.,” says Hill, who lived in Denver for a decade before leaving for his post in 2020. “People stay up for that. It’s unbelievable. I’ll talk to someone from the Serbian government and they’ll start yawning, ‘Sorry, I was watching Jokic last night.’”

Serbian journalists Nenad Kostic and Edin Avdic have been reporting on Jokic since he was a teenager and now consider him a friend. They traveled to Denver to cover for him in the Finals, and had dinner with him the night before Game 1. They said celebrity makes him uncomfortable.

“It’s not about money,” Avdic said. “It’s not about fame. It’s – I think – too much hassle for him. No, it’s too heavy for him.”

Kostic said that Belgrade, Serbia’s great capital with a vibrant nightlife, often becomes home to famous Serbian athletes, even though, like Jokic, they come from smaller cities.

“Nikola is not like that,” Kostic said. “He likes to spend his days in Sombor, in the small town where he was born, where everyone knows him and they leave him alone.”

Twenty years ago, the Nuggets drafted a player who was almost the opposite of Jokic: Carmelo Anthony. He was a more traditional franchise star, doing commercials, selling sweaters and releasing signature shoes. From his studies at Syracuse University, he made waves in popular culture with his style and confidence. He spent more than seven seasons in Denver and happened to wear number 15, which Jokic now wears.

Kiki Vandeweghe, the Nuggets manager who drafted Anthony, said both players’ approach to stardom from a business perspective worked great for the franchise because of how well they performed on the court. He said Jokic “makes his team better.”

“He comes with it every night,” says Vandeweghe, who played for the Nuggets in the 1980s. “He represents in many ways what the city is all about and his team winning. And that is a successful franchise.”

Evans, the muralist, said he doesn’t typically paint celebrities, but felt Jokic’s growing relevance was worth the art. He completed his first mural of Jokic in February in Denver’s Five Points neighborhood. He added Murray in his second, which finished just shy of the NBA Finals.

Caroline Simonson, a 22-year-old Nuggets fan from Boulder, said she paid $810 to attend Thursday’s game and sit in the stands. She said Jokic’s public persona “limits his connection to maybe NBA fans across the country, but not the city of Denver.”

“We are proud. We know what Colorado is,” she said. “If other people don’t know what it’s worth, we know what we’ve got here. It’s special to us. Sometimes we want to keep it to ourselves. We can keep Jokic to ourselves.”