Nine-time NBA All-Star Russell Westbrook has been waived by the Utah Jazz following a trade from the LA Clippers. Once he clears waivers, Westbrook will sign with the 2023 NBA champion Denver Nuggets.

Westbrook projects to be a great fit in Denver, as the 2017 league MVP should improve their backcourt defense and transition play while relieving both Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray of some ball handling duties. Jokic was one of Denver’s players who co-signed the Westbrook move, as the three-time MVP is a big fan of Westbrook.

One former NBA star who is sold on Westbrook’s fit in Denver is Los Angeles Lakers champion Lamar Odom, who believes the Nuggets will get better after this free agency signing:

Still a Lakers fan after spending seven seasons with them, Odom knows there is a big gap between the Lakers and Nuggets. This has been especially evident in their head to head matchups, as Denver has eliminated the Lakers in each of the last two postseasons, losing just one game in the process.

Westbrook spent the last three seasons in Los Angeles between the Lakers and Clippers, playing 219 regular season games for one of his hometown teams. A native of Los Angeles, Westbrook played his college basketball at UCLA before beginning his historic NBA career with the Oklahoma City Thunder.

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Training camp week is here. The Denver Broncos kick things off on Friday, July 26 — and unless something has changed internally, the plan is still to hold an open competition for the starting quarterback job.

Broncos insider Woody Paige of the Denver Gazette is pounding the table for Sean Payton to dispense with the ‘competition’ farce, and anoint rookie first-round Bo Nix as the starter from “the jump.”

“The Broncos must stop playing games before beginning to play games.

“Jarrett Stidham didn’t participate in trips with the Patriots and the Raiders to the Great Northwest, and Zach Wilson was inactive for the Jets game there,” Paige wrote.

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Indeed, the Broncos know that Nix is the future. Payton is orchestrating this rebuild the old-fashioned way — with his handpicked first-rounder in tow.

And what credible NFL analyst believes Stidham is suddenly going to morph from the toad that he’s been since entering the league into a quarterback prince? To boot, the Broncos are still focused on rebuilding Zach Wilson’s confidence, so how can Payton plausibly expect the former No. 2 overall pick in the 2021 NFL draft to pull a 180 and lead this team to the promised land?

Paige goes on.

“Nix can fix the Broncos. Stidham and Wilson can’t.

“Why wait?

“Sean Payton already knows who he wants to start. It’s mind over matter. His mind is saying ‘Nix,’’ and the other two QBs don’t matter. The coach split the plays three ways in the off-season minicamps, but declined to reveal his plan for the full training camp, which starts in earnest in Dove Valley this week,” Paige wrote.

Any, and I mean any, first-team reps that Payton gives Stidham or Wilson deprive Nix of the precious opportunities to assimilate the offense, build chemistry with his receivers, and bond with the offensive line. I get it; Payton wants to maintain credibility in the locker room that the Broncos’ roster is a meritocracy.

But these players want to win sooner rather than later. Platitudes aside, the vets know what Stidham and Wilson are. The Broncos’ veterans know that the earlier Nix gets inserted as the starter, the sooner the team can get through his trial-and-error learning curve and get back to winning games.

“Both Wilsons and Stidham are problems. BoNix should be nicknamed ‘The Solution.’

“Start him from the very start,” Paige concludes.

Amen. The only way out is through for Payton and the Broncos. And by through, I mean Nix’s learning curve. Get through it, and everything becomes possible for a franchise that has listed shockingly for the past eight seasons.

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A Denver couple returned to their apartment early Sunday morning to find an intruder inside, according to Denver police. The man who lived there shot the intruder several times, killing him.

The shooting was first reported around 1 a.m. in the 2300 block of East Evans Avenue, just west of South University Boulevard near the University of Denver.

A police presence was seen at the One Observatory Park building at 2360 East Evans Avenue.

The couple was “surprised” by the man in their apartment, police said.

Few other details were immediately available but police say the resident who shot the intruder is cooperating with the investigation.

Colorado law allows someone to use deadly force to protect themselves or others from death, serious injury, sexual assault or kidnapping.

Zach Lyons, a resident in the building, got home around 8:30 or 9 a.m. after staying the night at his girlfriend’s house. He arrived to see police cars all over the place.

“It’s definitely pretty alarming,” he said. “I wasn’t here last night, I don’t have any first-hand accounts or anything but it’s definitely alarming to know something like this happened in your own community right down the hall.”

He described the apartment as “not cheap” but “a nice place to live,” and “fairly vacant right now with it being right across from DU.”

It’s scary,” he said. “I guess it would have been fortunate if it happened to me since I wasn’t home and it’s just property, but it’s definitely concerning, knowing there was a break-in down the hall and it resulted in a loss of life.”

He said he hasn’t heard anything from Denver police aside from its tweets and hasn’t heard anything from the building’s management.

CBS News Colorado reached out to the management company Sunday morning and has not yet heard back.

Another neighbor said he heard about five gunshots. He described the building as “fairly secure,” but said “there are definitely some weak points.” He described the neighborhood as safe too, and didn’t realize the gunshots came from inside the building. 

Police have not said whether the intruder was a resident of the building.

That neighbor also said he hasn’t heard anything from the building’s management company, something he hopes changes soon.