The Nuggets are one step closer to largely running it back next season.

Denver started and finished the two-day NBA Draft, which concluded with Tennessee guard Jahmai Mashack’s selection, without making a selection. Moments after the draft, Ben Tenzer, the franchise’s new executive vice president of basketball operations, made it abundantly clear the Nuggets are not trading Nikola Jokic.

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“You’ve got to remember, again, this team is kind of where they are,” new executive vice president of player personnel Jon Wallace said Thursday. “It doesn’t really make a lot of sense for us at this time to kind of jump in and get draft fever.”

Tenzer said there were moments in the first and second round that the team was close to trading into the draft but ultimately decided against it.

“We had our targets. We looked hard at those targets, had to evaluate where they would get to and could we get there?” Tenzer said. “It’s tricky. I would say we were moderately close in a couple of different scenarios.”

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After watching the draft, the Nuggets’ new front office doesn’t have much time before turning its attention to free agency. Teams can start negotiating with free agents on Monday. Unless something changes, Denver’s best asset in free agency will be the taxpayer mid-level exception, which is projected to be worth $5.7 million. Denver heads into free agency with 12 of the 15 full-time roster spots spoken for after Dario Saric picked up his player option and Russell Westbrook declined his, making him a free agent.

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Wallace added bench depth is the priority in free agency. The Nuggets will look to add more shooting, scoring and a stronger point-of-attack defender, if possible.

“We’re always going to be aggressive looking at everything, but I would say we’ll probably focus more on free agency than trades,” Tenzer said.

The most significant Nuggets news of the last two nights came minutes after the draft ended. Tamar Bates, a 6-foot-5 guard out of Missouri, agreed to a two-way contract with the Nuggets, he announced at his draft party. Bates scored more than 13 points per game in his last two seasons with the Tigers and shot better than 38% from 3 as a junior and senior.

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That leaves Denver with a pair of two-way spots left, meaning at least one of last year’s trio of two-way players – Trey Alexander, PJ Hall and Spencer Jones – will not be back.

“We’re still trying to work through the players that weren’t drafted and kind of where they’re at with our situation from a two-way standpoint,” Tenzer said.

“I do think there’s a good chance we’ll have some from last year back, and some of those guys will play Summer League.”

While Tenzer and Wallace’s first draft didn’t feature any picks, that doesn’t mean it wasn’t productive for the new partnership.

“We were able to learn a lot in the first round, just kind of what the value of certain picks are going for right now and kind of what the emphasis is around the league,” Wallace said. “Just kind of get an overall canvas, anticipate how we’re going to scout and how we’re going to evaluate talent this year to put us in a good position next season.”