Mark Kiszla: Grumpy Nikola Jokic getting tired trying to haul the deadweight of Nuggets and Serbia on his back

LILLE, France — Upon further review, maybe Nikola Jokic was dead serious about getting himself cloned.

Is there a doctor in the house?

Because Jokic looked sick and tired after Team USA beat him down with a 110-84 thrashing at the Summer Olympics.

"No interviews, guys," Jokic said Sunday, blowing off both Serbian journalists from his beloved homeland and hacks like me from around the world. "Sorry."

Sorry? Oh, no he wasn’t.

Jokic was too ticked to talk.

With his Sad Joker Face slack from fatigue and flush with anger, the MVP was PO’d.

As I watched a sullen Jokic blow through the maze of fences that serve as a zone for players to mix and chat with media after games, it brought back an uncomfortable feeling of déjà vu.

For all the magic he brings to a basketball court, one Joker is not enough.

Used and abused by U.S. superstars Kevin Durant and LeBron James, Serbia got taught a hard lesson that Nuggets Nation already knows all too well.

After Serbia rocked the Americans on their heels by taking an early 10-2 lead, coach Steve Kerr didn’t panic, because he understands. Sooner or later, Jokic must take a seat on the bench.

“Oh my gosh, he’s an impossible cover," said Kerr, when I asked what was the game plan against Jokic. “Our whole approach was (based on) the strength of our team is our depth. We have three guys that can guard him. Just rotate guys onto him and cross your fingers, because he’s a brilliant player.”

That’s more than a game plan. It has become a template on how to beat Joker: Cross your fingers and wear him out with numbers.

Maybe I needed to travel on planes, trains and automobiles nearly 5,000 miles from Colorado to France for the Olympics to see how clearly the Nuggets’ hope of being more than a one-and-done champ is in serious trouble, because the non-Joker minutes are a problem wherever he goes.

A day earlier, oft-injured guard Jamal Murray looked rickety, stiff and a step slow for the vast majority of Canada’s victory against Greece, much the same troubling way Murray appeared when the defending champs got rudely bounced from the NBA playoffs.

Maybe the lack of reliable help is starting to make Jokic irritable.

The non-Joker minutes are killing him, Smalls.

In the 31 minutes Jokic was on the floor, the best player on earth played Team USA to an 81-81 standstill.

During the 9 scant minutes he sat, Serbia got clobbered 29-3.

That was a revolting development for the vast majority of the 27,323 fans in attendance at Pierre Mauroy Stadium, a massive indoor arena that felt more like the teen spirit of the Final Four than the orchestrated ballet of an NBA game.

They booed every time Joel Embiid touched the basketball.

And when Jokic scored one of his team-high 20 points with a free throw in the first quarter, the crowd chanted “M-V-P! M-V-P!”

Let that be a lesson to you, Colorado.

If you were rooting for the U-S-A instead of Joker, you were doing it wrong. If you were too set in your ways to put Jokic before country, maybe your Nuggets Nation card should be suspended.

Here’s what Joker was up against during the opening game for both teams in the Olympic tournament.

Team USA had no fewer than five dead-lock cinches to be first-ballot Hall of Famers decked out in their red, white and blue uniforms. But that’s just my speculation.

For those of you keeping score at home, let’s stick to the facts, ma'am: There are 78 appearances in the NBA’s All-Star Game among the 12 righteous dudes on the American roster.

The USA had James and Steph Curry in the starting lineup, with KD and "Ant" Edwards coming off the bench. Back from injury, Durant canned eight of his nine shots like sweet strawberry jam and didn’t miss from beyond the 3-point arc on his way to a game-high 23 points.

Meanwhile, Serbia dressed guys named Marko, Aleksa and Ognjen.

As many of us recall, during the second round of the NBA playoffs in May, after a disheartening loss to Minnesota, Jokic suggested maybe what the Nuggets needed was “to have a duplicate clone of myself, and then I can be fresh.”

At the time, we laughed at Joker’s little joke.

But nearly 5,000 miles from where Jokic and the Nuggets got rudely bounced from the playoffs, it hit home for me.

Maybe he wasn’t kidding.

In an effort to get back to championship contention, all the Nuggets have given him is a past-his-prime Russell Westbrook, when what Joker actually lobbied for was a clone.