Spencer Jones of the Denver Nuggets
Getty
DENVER, COLORADO - JANUARY 01: Spencer Jones #21 of the Denver Nuggets plays the Atlanta Hawks in the fourth quarter at Ball Arena on January 01, 2025 in Denver, Colorado. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Matthew Stockman/Getty Images)
These days, every NBA player will have a social media presence of some description. Even if they as individuals are not particularly interested in them, their agents and business people will be. Brands matter.
Most players will regularly hit up Instagram. Many more will have a YouTube channel, TikTok, or both. Some might even still have an X account, having not yet gotten the message about the platform’s sharp decline. But Denver Nuggets rookie guard Spencer Jones has gone in a different direction.
Jones’s social media presence instead primarily utilizes the business-focused platform, LinkedIn. As opposed to most social media platforms that focus on social connections – hence the name – LinkedIn exists to create business communities.
LinkedIn is largely used by recruiters, job applicants, and insufferable wannabe influencers who like to tell stories of working 100 hour weeks – somehow including the 30 hours they spend on LinkedIn in that total – while finding reasons to share pictures of themselves sitting in front of laptops pretending not to pose and posting daily itineraries emphasizing the importance of waking up at 4am for some reason. Yet this is the soup in which Spencer Jones is choosing to swim.
Spencer Jones, The Next Mike Muscala
Jones is not the only NBA player on the LinkedIn platform. Several of the game’s superstars, such as Stephen Curry, have at least someone in their team maintaining a profile there to maximize off-court opportunities. Yet Jones’s profile is far more active, detailed and curated than most, featuring regular posts in which he equates NBA life to an entrepreneurial one. Indeed, it is almost as if he treats his playing career like an internship for his future career.
A recent retiree from the NBA, Mike Muscala, did something similar. Muscala, a journeyman in the second half of his career, would move around from NBA team to NBA team quite regularly in his final few playing seasons, and would dutifully update his LinkedIn profile’s “work experience” section accordingly. It was a fun change of pace from the norm (albeit a slightly redundant one for a professional athlete, whose professional whereabouts can be ascertained far more readily elsewhere than the common man).
Muscala – who has since deactivated his profile – is now retired and coaching for the Phoenix Suns, leaving an NBA/LinkedIn hole that Jones seems to be the one to fill. Jones graduated from Stanford in 2024 with an undergraduate degree in Management Science and Engineering, and it would appear that the value of LinkedIn was a part of that program.
Planning For The Future, Today
Last year, his first as a professional, Jones was with the Nuggets on a two-way contract which he signed after going undrafted. He was able to appear in 20 NBA games, albeit only in spot minutes, averaging 1.3 points and 0.9 rebounds per game in that time. Instead, Jones spent the majority of the season in the G League with the Nuggets’ affiliate, the Grand Rapids Gold, for whom he averaged 14.4 points, 6.8 rebounds, 1.9 assists, 1.2 blocks and 1.1 steals per game, shooting 51.8% from the field and 45.7% from three-point range in 21 contests.
Jones has re-signed for 2025 to another two-way deal, as his high-efficiency three-point shot, good physical profile, heady play and defensive range make for an intriguing three-and-D player. Having turned 24 in June, he is older than most players the NBA would consider prospects, and needs a big season in 2025-26 to cement his place for the future. Yet more so than many of those younger peers, Jones has planned for the future.
Even when basketball works out, it ends all too quickly, leaving an entire second half of a life for players to navigate. Jones, already, is preparing for that day. And at the time of writing, at least, he has not yet posted about the importance of taking three cold showers a day while responding to emails. So there is hope for him yet.