When news broke that the Denver Nuggets had fired head coach Michael Malone and general manager Calvin Booth, it took the NBA by storm.

How could the future of a team widely expected to contend for a spot in the NBA Finals fall so low over the course of a season, with a playoff run likely having to come through a play-in berth if they make it at all? How could a team with Nikola Jokic leading the way fall into such dire straits?

Discussing the situation on ESPN, Brian Windhorst broke down the rough road ahead of the Nuggets, who he believes will have a tough time turning things around on the fly.

“Right now, the reality is they’re pretty much facing the play-in, which is stunning and not acceptable,” Windhorst said. “They have to go to the Kings tomorrow. That’s a team fighting for its playoff position; that’s a road game. Then on Friday they have a really huge game with the Memphis Grizzlies, which quite frankly, whoever wins that game may determine whether one of them is in the play-in and one of them is in the playoffs.”

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Turning his attention to new interim head coach David Adelman, Windhorst noted that while the Nuggets' new clipboard holder has drawn interest around the NBA as a head coaching candidate in the past, it's unclear how he will help Denver down the stretch.

“David Adelman has interviewed for other head coaching jobs,” Windhorst noted. “He is probably destined to be a head coach in the NBA whether he remains the head coach here or not. He actually has an opportunity here to lift this team up.”

Will Adelman be able to figure things out and get the Nuggets deep into the playoffs? Has the back-and-forth bickering between Malone and Booth over how to field a long-term contender been holding the team back from their full potential, with Adelman now able to cut through that uncertainty to spearhead a concise vision? While only time will tell, one thing is clear: the Nuggets don't have much time to figure it out, so whatever Adelman has up his sleeve, he'd better attack it with authority.