Then is he thrive and I be cast away/ the worst was this: my love was my decay

Scattered Ashes

Nuggets 108 - Mavericks 105
Friday night in Denver, following a raucous night of celebrating the Broncos comeback and struggling to survive most of the morning and afternoon on Friday, I found myself sitting at the Pepsi Center with a bunch of friends, some local, some not, watching the new-look Nugs attempt to wash the taste of their home-opener washout out of their mouths and save their season a scant four games into it. No one knew what to expect from a team that had just traded half of their identity for a guy who had to leave Colorado to begin the long path toward finding his. Some of the people at this game, in fact most of the middling crowd, were there merely to be out at the game to kick off their weekend (I heard one of the guys behind us ask his friend, "has your acid kicked in yet?").
But some of us were there on a mission. Especially Chauncey Billups.
Born and raised in Colorado, C-Billz spent his academic career moonlighting as the Hoops King of the Rockies from the Queen City of the Plains. Chauncey only left Colorado when he was drafted by the Boston Celtics in 1997, the first bounce on a long pinball shot around five teams in five years. In some cosmic alignment of integrity and infamy Chauncey led a castoff crew in clamping down on the Championship caliber Lakers in 2004. But after that he was merely the captain and chairman of a Pistons team that routinely bit off more than they could chew in the final rounds of the playoffs.
But Chauncey was not the only one with baggage in this game. The Mavs had brought plenty from Dallas, with Jason Kidd still struggling to sew himself into the mix of Dirk, Josh and JET. The Nugs themselves had the tall order of helping Melo integrate back into the fray while introducing Chauncey to the frantic frustration that comes from running the Rockies.
Because of these trades and the integration of fresh game plans, both squads stuttered and staggered for much of the game. Chauncey struggled to find his place and Melo would get left to his own devices too often when he got the ball. Ironically, many of the Denver struggles seemed to come from following the geometry of the play and actually getting into the supporting role positions that had never been necessary when it was Allen-one shot, Carmelo-the next, Allen-one shot, etc.
But ultimately, as proven by his coming last int he pre-game introductions, this is still Melo's team. Eventually everyone exerted effort to feed Melo and it emerged in the score to the evidence of 28 points. Whatever comes off this trade, in the eyes of the franchise Melo has been given in a clean slate, and on opportunity to ascend awesomer altitudes of American acceptance.
And maybe it was this advantage, delicate tranquility that flashed as a rare piece of peace in a perpetually panicked puzzle, or maybe it was the slapdash nature of the Nugs opponent (nothing like a game plan based around the J-Kidd 3!), or maybe it was the swirling vortex of unrealized potential that greeted the franchise when management burnt the barn down to save the horses.
Whatever it is, it's ours. Watching the Nugs now is like watching a particularly physical, prepared and big-play prone 90's CU football teams. There's no reason to this. There's no order or grace. But there is presence. These Nuggets showed self-assurance and aptitude. They got an actual when on a night that a moral one would have been a shameful sufficiency and on Saturday morning we were still alive and it was a new day, a new team, a new hope.