Dear Nuggets Nation,
I wish I was writing on happier terms, but this is sometimes(most of the time), what we sign up for as sports fans: Failure. Only one team and its fanbase will be truly happy at the end of the season. As you unfortunately know by now, the Nuggets wont be the last team standing, but with every negative post, article or tweet I kept thinking back to one thing: "At least we got one."
We have no idea how the Jokic era is going to play out. It looks as if the window is still open, but this article is not going to delve into the Nuggets offseason or look ahead to next season. If you want more thoughts on that I would recommend to go check out the pros at places like Denver Stiffs, Mile High Sports and DNVR.
For this article I would like to take a look at the big 4 American sports: Baseball, Basketball, Football and Hockey. I decided to come up with different tiers, 6 in total to separate the haves from the have nots. After all, what is sports fandom about? Bragging rights! If you've been a Nuggets fan for at least a year, you remember the euphoria that winning our first championship brought our wonderful fan base and city. I'll never forget being at the DNVR bar with Ray and Jarett to experience our first championship in franchise history. I don't think I've ever seen Ray happier in my life. After years of suffering through bad draft picks, awful coaching and players who didn't want to be here, we finally broke through. I cannot describe to you what it feels like to win a championship when you have follwed a team for 2 decades, hoping that your day would finally come. For our entire existence we were at the bottom of the barrel. Some might even call us a "poverty franchise." But we will never have to be that ever again as our core 4 of Jokic, Murray, Porter and Gordon delivered the first basketball championship to the Mile High City. Suns and Jazz fans used to say we are in the same boat, but they can't tell us to do pushups anymore. They not like us!
Without further ado, here are different tiers I put all of the pro American sports teams in. I didn't include defunct teams and if a team moved, for purposes of this exercise to make things easier their championship moved with them. But we all know there was no championship parade in Atlanta for the Hawks or in OKC for the Thunder. As soon as the Sonics come back, we can move OKC back down to the poverty franchise tier.
Tier 1: Flagship teams/All time champions with number of championships in parenthesis.
New York Yankees (27)
Montreal Canadiens (24)
Boston Celtics (17)
Los Angeles Lakers (17)
Pittsburgh Steelers(6)
New England Patriots(6)
Tier 2: This was a bit tricky. There are going to be some teams in tier 2 that have more championships than the Steelers or Patriots, but I wanted to keep tier 1 just teams that have the most rings in THEIR sport. These are the teams that are all time great franchises, but nobody would argue they are THE franchise in their sport(unless you live in Dallas of course).
Toronto Maple Leafs (13)
Detroit Red Wings (11)
St. Louis Cardinals (11)
Philly/KC/Oakland A's (9)
Boston Red Sox (9)
New York/San Fran Giants (8)
Brooklyn Los Angeles Dodgers (7)
Golden State Warriors (7)
Chicago Bulls (6)
Boston Bruins (6)
Chicago Blackhawks (6)
Dallas Cowboys (5)
Cincinnati Reds (5)
Pittsburgh Pirates (5)
San Antonio Spurs (5)
San Francisco 49ers (5)
Edmonton Oilers (5)
Pittsburgh Penguins (5)
New York Rangers (4)
New York Islanders (4)
Green Bay Packers (4)
Kansas City Chiefs (4)
New York Giants(4)
Detroit Tigers (4)
Atlanta Braves(4)
Tier 3: Three Titles. Tier 3 still has some all time great teams in here, but I thought it was important to put teams with no more than 3 titles at least 2 tiers below the top teams. They have at most half as many titles, and usually way less than half depending on the sport. No shame at all in this tier. Still a very good club, but purely in terms of titles these teams are just sort of middle of the pack, maybe slightly above average.
Chicago Cubs (3)
Baltimore Orioles (3)
Minnesota Twins (3)
Chicago White Sox (3)
New Jersey Devils (3)
Tampa Bay Lightning (3)
Colorado Avalanche (3)
Denver Broncos (3)
Las Vegas Raiders (3)
Washington Commanders (3)
Detroit Pistons (3)
Miami Heat (3)
Philadelphia 76ers (3)
Tier 4: Two Titles. I'm sorry, but if you only have 2 titles you can not consider yourself an all time great franchise. You can still have plenty of dignity though. Plenty of memorable teams in this group:
New York Knicks (2)
Houston Rockets (2)
Milwaukee Bucks (2)
LA Rams (2)
Miami Dolphins (2)
Indianapolis Colts (2)
Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2)
Baltimore Ravens (2)
Philadelphia Flyers (2)
Los Angeles Kings (2)
Philadelphia Phillies (2)
Cleveland Indians/Guardians (2)
Tier 5: One Title: Titles are special. If your team has won one during your lifetime, chances are you remember it well. Nothing quite compares to that FIRST one. Your team has finally gotten over the hump and you NEVER know if you'll get to the mountain top again.
Texas Rangers (1)
Arizona Diamondbacks (1)
Los Angeles Angels (1)
Washington Nationals (1)
Dallas Stars (1)
St. Louis Blues (1)
Carolina Hurricanes (1)
Calgary Flames (1)
Anaheim Ducks (1)
Washington Capitals (1)
Las Vegas Golden Knights (1)
Portland Trail Blazers (1)
Cleveland Cavaliers(1)
Atlanta Hawks (1*)
Washington Wizards (1)
Denver Nuggets (1)
OKC Thunder (1*)
Dallas Mavericks (1)
Sacramento Kings (1)
Toronto Raptors (1)
Philadelphia Eagles (1)
Seattle Seahawks (1)
Chicago Bears (1)
New Orleans Saints (1)
New York Jets (1)
Tier 6: No Titles. It goes without saying, but this is NOT where you want to be. There are still some franchises here that have had varying levels of success. For purposes of this exercise I am not counting ABA championships or NFL titles pre superbowl era(sorry Pacers, Lions and Browns).
Buffalo Bills
Minnesota Vikings
Cincinnati Bengals
Atlanta Falcons
Carolina Panthers
LA Clippers
Arizona Cardinals
Tennessee Titans
Cleveland Browns
Detroit Lions
Houston Texans
Jacksonville Jaguars
Phoenix Suns
Utah Jazz
Brooklyn Nets
Orlando Magic
Indiana Pacers
Charlotte Hornets
Memphis Grizzlies
Minnesota Timberwolves
New Orleans Pelicans
Vancouver Canucks
Buffalo Sabers
Florida Panthers
Ottawa Senators
San Jose Sharks
Nashville Predators
Seattle Mariners
Colorado Rockies
Milwaukee Brewers
Tampa Bay Rays
San Diego Padres
San Diego/Los Angeles Chargers
This exercise made me feel better knowing we are no longer a laughing stock franchise. There have been multiple franchises that have had a great player come in and lead their franchise from zero titles to having multiple titles. Guys like Isiah Thomas, Hakeem Olajuwon, and Dywane Wade. I can confidently say I feel like Jokic is on their level. If things go our way there is a good chance the Nuggets can continue to climb the tier list this decade. Go Nuggets!!
My name is Peter Plummer. Thanks for reading. You can find me on X @bucketsince88