A lot of teams look good on paper, but the paper doesn’t win NBA championships, as we’ve learned over and over.
Pundits, fans, and even rival players can talk all they want to, but it doesn’t mean anything unless they prove it on the court.
Shawn Marion knows a thing or two about that, as he was a part of that ultimate underdog team, the 2011 Dallas Mavericks.
No one thought they could beat the Miami Heat and their Big 3, yet they got the job done.
Notably, Marion recently told Brandon ‘Scoop B’ Robinson that he thought of this year’s Denver Nuggets the same way, in the sense he didn’t pick them to win the whole thing when the playoffs started.
The Nuggets were the best team in the Western Conference throughout the course of the regular season, yet no one thought of them as legit NBA championship contenders.
Even when they were up 2-0 on the Los Angeles Lakers, people were talking about how Darvin Ham got them right where he wanted and how starting Rui Hachimura would turn the narrative around.
Still, Mike Malone’s team never got distracted by the outside noise, even if the coach was quick to call out the media for all the disrespect.
They continued to put in the hard work and do the very same thing they did throughout the season, and the results came.
Winning is the ultimate goal, but doing it when no one believes you have a shot to do it must make it even sweeter.
NEXT: Bruce Brown Sends Special Message To The Denver Nuggets
