Brooklyn Nets: Player grades from last-second win at Denver

Allen Crabbe showed signs of snapping out of his shooting funk Friday night, hitting 3-of-7 overall and knocking down two 3-pointers in five tries.

Those numbers certainly don’t jump off the page, but for a guy who came in shooting just 25.6 percent overall on the season, even an incremental step forward is a big one.

Crabbe spent more time at the guard spot Friday night with the return of DeMarre Carroll, whereas he had been playing more minutes at the 3 prior to that. In a position-less system such as the Nets run, it’s not a huge deal in any event.

What was big was that Crabbe seemed to be more balanced on his takeoff and release with his jumper Friday night. The last two games in particular, Crabbe appeared to be leaning heavily to the left on his release and was — shockingly — wide left on most of his attempts.

When the Brooklyn Nets began their three-game winning streak with a blowout of the Philadelphia 76ers on Sunday, it looked like Rondae Hollis-Jefferson was ready to break out after scoring 21 points, looking smooth and confident.

He’s looked anything but smooth or confident since the Nets hit the road. While he did hit his first 3-pointer of the season Friday night, the Nuggets were doing everything but sending a maitre’d with an engraved invitation when RHJ had the ball behind the arc, playing 10-12 feet off him.

Hollis-Jefferson is still a valuable defender, even spending some crucial moments at the 5 against Nikola Jokic in the fourth quarter when Jarrett Allen had to leave the game to have a cut on his finger attended to after Ed Davis had fouled out.

But his offensive game is very shaky at this point.