Nuggets fire head coach Michael Malone, general manager Calvin Booth

DENVER — The Denver Nuggets fired coach Michael Malone on Tuesday, the team announced.

The Nuggets will also not be extending the contract of general manager Calvin Booth.

The stunning announcement came down Tuesday morning, days before the end of the NBA regular season.

Malone coached the Nuggets to the NBA title in 2023 and led the team to eight consecutive winning seasons. He had the fourth-longest tenure of any active NBA coach, behind only San Antonio’s Gregg Popovich, Miami’s Erik Spoelstra and Golden State’s Steve Kerr.

“It is with no pleasure that we announce that we have relieved Michael Malone of his head coaching duties, effectively immediately. David Adelman will assume our head coaching role for the remainder of the 2024-25 season,” said Josh Kroenke, vice chairman of Kroenke Sports and Entertainment.

“This decision was not made lightly and was evaluated very carefully, and we do it only with the intention of giving our group the best chance at competing for the 2025 NBA Championship and delivering another title to Denver and our fans everywhere,” Kroenke said.

“While the timing of this decision is unfortunate, as Coach Malone helped build the foundation of our now championship level program, it is a necessary step to allow us to compete at the highest level right now,” Kroenke said. “Championship level standards and expectations remain in place for the current season, and as we look to the future, we look forward to building on the foundations laid by Coach Malone over his record-breaking 10-year career in Denver.

“There is no amount of gratitude that we can properly convey to his contributions since he joined our franchise in 2015. It is with our utmost respect that we would like to thank Coach Malone for the most successful decade in Nuggets history, setting the all-time wins record and helping deliver Denver our first championship.”

“I want to thank Calvin Booth for leading our front office for the past three years and most importantly for helping put the final pieces in place for the roster that delivered Denver and our fans their first NBA Championship,” Kroenke said.

“Calvin’s knowledge of the game, his passion for scouting, and his long history as a player and executive in the NBA helped lift our organization to new heights which we will continue moving forward. We are grateful to Calvin for his eight years with the Nuggets and know his place in Nuggets history as our first championship winning GM will be honored for years to come.”

The Nuggets are 47-32 this season with three games left but have dropped four consecutive games and are in a logjam of teams fighting for home-court advantage in Round 1 of the playoffs. Denver won the title in 2023 and lost a Game 7 at home in the Western Conference semifinals a year ago to Minnesota.

The four-game slide comes despite Nuggets star Nikola Jokic — a winner of three of the last four NBA MVP awards — having a historic season, averaging 30 points, 12.8 rebounds and 10.2 assists per game. But even that wasn’t good enough for Denver to enter the final week of the season certain of even having home court in Round 1.

After the most recent loss, a 125-120 defeat to Indiana on Sunday, Jokic was asked his biggest concern with the team right now.

“I don’t know. Maybe we just, maybe we just … I don’t know, actually,” Jokic said.

The Nuggets are hoping a shakeup might provide the answer.

Malone had consistent success in Denver. The Nuggets finished with losing records in his first two seasons and posted winning records in his next eight years with the club.

This season’s postseason appearance will be the team’s seventh in a row; it has not clinched a playoff berth yet this season but is assured of finishing no worse than in the play-in tournament.

Starting with the first playoff appearance under Malone in 2019, the Nuggets got out of the first round six times in seven chances. They made the Western Conference finals in the Walt Disney World bubble in 2020 and then rolled to the championship by winning 16 of 20 playoff games in 2023.

It is the second time a postseason-bound team has fired a coach in the last two weeks. Memphis parted ways with Taylor Jenkins late last month, replacing him with Tuomas Iisalo on an interim basis.

Booth came to the Nuggets in 2017 as an assistant general manager and was promoted to GM in July 2020. He signed his most recent contract with the club in 2022.

The Nuggets play Wednesday at Sacramento.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.