OKLAHOMA CITY >> Maybe Nikola Jokic insisted on playing because the immediate challenge represented his greater good. The Nuggets were 3-12 against other teams seeded in the top four of either conference, and Jokic was keenly aware of it. Their collective self-esteem needed first aid. Symptoms would only worsen with back-to-back losses to the first-place team in the West.

Maybe his defiance of Michael Malone’s suggestion was an act of pride. Jokic not only plays through injuries but regularly side-steps questions about them from reporters. When he developed a sudden and mysterious limp in Boston this month, he played dumb about its origin: “I’ve limped basically the past 14 years.”

Multiple team sources described the center’s bumps and bruises entering Monday’s back-to-back game as a “laundry list.” The ones officially detailed by the team: left ankle impingement and a right elbow contusion. “This guy is beat up with 18 games to go,” Malone said.

Maybe Jokic was actually telling the truth later when he wisecracked that he rebuked Malone because the alternative to playing against the Thunder was a rigorous workout with Felipe Eichenberger, the team’s strength and conditioning coach. “That’s much harder than playing,” Jokic said solemnly.

Or maybe Jokic had a taste for redemption — not just collectively but individually — after he struggled to score in Sunday’s final three quarters while Shai Gilgeous-Alexander dropped his third consecutive 40-point game on national television.

Maybe that’s partially why, when Malone approached him after Denver’s 24-point loss for “a conversation about ‘maybe we take tomorrow’s game off,’” Jokic emphatically pushed back.

“Hell no,” he told Malone, according to the coach.

Maybe, this year of all years, Jokic actually covets the trophy with Michael Jordan’s name on it. He’s at least compelled enough to recognize his magnum opus when he sees it.

His race against Gilgeous-Alexander for a fourth MVP crown might be hurtling toward a photo finish. If it is, Jokic is playing from behind, according to the betting odds and tea leaves. He was awfully comfortable playing from behind on Monday in Oklahoma City, where SGA and company punked Denver in the fourth quarter a day earlier. Jokic’s 35 points, 18 rebounds and eight assists helped ensure a season split between the Nuggets and Thunder and a head-to-head stalemate between MVP candidates.

“This is my third or fourth year in a row (in the discussion), so … I don’t know. I cannot control it,” Jokic said after Denver’s 140-127 win. “I will say that I think I’m playing the best basketball of my life. So if that’s enough, it’s enough. If not, the guy deserves it. He’s really amazing.”

Jokic has used that refrain once or twice this season, an admission of his renown that he typically ducks and dodges. Self-promotion is not his style. He has rather famously expressed discomfort, disinterest or even downright disdain for MVP chatter in past seasons, when he and Joel Embiid were held to the same microscope that Gilgeous-Alexander is being introduced to now. Jokic leaves the mythology to the media.