There are good days. Good weeks, even. Like last week, when Antonio McDyess looked as golden as any Nugget ever seen. Like this will definitely be the season he ascends to All-Star status.

	Seattle couldn't stop McDyess, as he had 37 points and 17 boards in a win.

There are bad days, too. Bad nights, actually. Pretty much any road game qualifies, since McDyess' team never wins them.

When times are good, Dice is McRoasting the Houston Rockets for 40 points and 20 rebounds. Or, two nights later, torching Seattle for 37 and 17. That's just McDyess' last two outings, two seriously wicked lines straight out of the Doug Moe days. The only other numbers that gaudy, in the entire league, are Kobe Bryant's weekend totals -- not-so-bad-yourself showings of 43 and 38 points -- and the 14-2 record Philadelphia risks Monday night against McDyess at the Pepsi Center.

When things go bad? When he isn't feeling "unstoppable," as McDyess described it following Saturday's Sonics detonation? When the away-day blues hit, after the umpteenth road defeat in a row, McDyess can't help but retrace the path he took back to Denver. No fun being human, is it Dice?

Ask McDyess if he ever second-guesses his decision to bolt Phoenix and return to the Nuggets and he lets out a hearty chuckle. The kind of laugh that strongly hints to an affirmative response. "I ain't gonna answer that question," he says, still giggling politely.

Then he answers it.

"Once I made the decision to leave, I've tried not to look back," McDyess said. "But when times get tough, it might kind of make you [question] what you should have done. It's tough not to think about what you did in the past, after you were on a great team. To second-guess, sometimes when the adversity comes, I do."

McDyess made the admission after -- what else? -- a road defeat in Dallas. A 24-point hammering Nov. 25, after which Nuggets coach Dan Issel openly wondered if his players look at their uniforms, see home or road colors and "decide before the game starts whether you win or lose."

"We didn't even try," Issel said following that rout.

Fact is, the effort frequently isn't there away from Chez Pepsi. At sea level, the Nuggets are 2-5, which is only one more road victory than Vancouver, Golden State, Atlanta and Chicago can claim. A 10-31 road record last season is largely why Denver faded from surprise playoff contenders to a 35-47 finish.

It's a balance that has to be redressed, unless McDyess handles it himself by continuing to average 38.5 points and 18.5 rebounds every two games. The Nuggets have such a lack of confidence when they're not playing a mile high, they seem to feel guilty when they do sneak a road win.

Want proof? How else to explain the home giveaway, following Wednesday's rare 107-100 triumph at Minnesota, the very next evening. Denver wasted McDyess' 40-point, 20-rebound masterpiece to blow a late regulation lead in a 109-105 overtime loss to Houston.

"That's our downfall," McDyess said, speaking of the road woes and the maddening inconsistency.

	“	A lot of the guys look to me to the carry them to the playoffs, and I'm not a vocal leader. I'm a quiet leader. It's tough when you're not as vocal. ”
		— McDyess

Turns out that's just two of the downfalls. They have a $43.3 million shooting guard, Tariq Abdul-Wahad, who just lost his job to Voshon Lenard. They have a point guard, Nick Van Exel, whose close friendship with Dice can't obscure some blemishes. Once so fearless and fearsome as a young playoff upstart, Nicky has more detractors than admirers in spite of his obvious talent -- or did you miss the 20 assists vs. Gary Payton? Ask around and you'll hear the words undependable and untradeable, because Van Exel's got loads of skeletons in addition to that massive contract.

James Posey, Keon Clark and Raef LaFrentz are all interesting pieces, but Issel's future remains a daily topic for debate. New owner Stan Kroenke, meanwhile, is a mystery man whose silence adds to the uncertainty. Of greatest concern, perhaps, is that the Nuggets play in the unforgiving West, and they certainly don't have one of the best eight rosters in the conference.

The shining highlight is McDyess, who will surely halt his All-Star drought if he continues to overflow box scores. Denver can't seem to break into the upper half of the West standings, despite winning six of its past seven home games, but Dice is on an undeniable roll.

First he overcame the back trouble that developed in training camp, not long after his gold-medal summer with the Dream Team. "I'm pain-free," insists McDyess, who averaged just 9.4 points and 6.8 rebounds in 22.6 minutes in the five games he wasn't.

McDyess is also, at last, weeding needless fouls out of his game. He was disqualified a whopping 12 times in 81 games last season, averaging 3.9 fouls per contest. His minutes, as a result, dipped from a 38.7 average in 1999 to 33.3 in 1999-2000. This season, McDyess' minutes average of 31.7 is more related to the back ailment, which limited him to 24 minutes or less in five of Denver's first six games.

In the 37-and-17 shredding of Seattle, for example, McDyess made it to halftime without causing a single whistle. Against the Rockets, he was able to log 50 of a possible 53 minutes while accruing only one foul. "I think I've done everything I possibly could to not get stupid fouls -- even fouls I didn't commit," McDyess said with another chuckle.

So what's Dice's downfall? The two-fold answer, which Allen Iverson will be trying to exploit Monday: McDyess lacks the help he needs, and admittedly doesn't have the personality it takes to be a vocal leader.

"I wanted to be a part of something that surrounded my name," McDyess said when asked to identify the clincher, after all the recruiting on both sides, that convinced him to rejoin Denver rather than re-sign with Phoenix. "But a lot of the guys look to me to the carry them to the playoffs, and I'm not a vocal leader. I'm a quiet leader. It's tough when you're not as vocal."

Tougher still when you know of a sun-splashed valley that, desert or not, bubbles over with all-star talent and outspoken pressure-lovers.

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