Former Broncos star wide receiver Rod Smith won’t be able to attend Monday’s Game 5 of the NBA Finals at Ball Arena due to a business trip he is taking to Florida, but at least he will save a bunch of money.

He considers that little consolation.

Smith, who is a huge fan of the Nuggets, attended Games 1 and 2 of the Finals at home against the Miami Heat. He sat in the third row with his 13-year-old grandson Kaiden Stewart and wore a T-shirt that reads, “Nikola Jokic is the best basketball player in the world.”

“I was looking at my credit card statement, which I paid (Saturday), and I was like, ‘Why is my credit card bill so high this month?’’’ Smith told The Denver Gazette. “I spent $9,000 on four Nuggets tickets (for the two games). But I would do it all over again. I was waving towels. I was high-fiving everybody. I was at the Finals for the first time and I was literally losing my mind.”

Smith knows ticket prices will be much higher Monday with the Nuggets, leading the series 3-1, having a chance to clinch the first championship in team history.

“I would be going to the game if I were here,’’ said Smith, who has continued to live in the Denver area after his 1994-2006 Broncos stint. “I don’t care what it would have cost.”

Instead, Smith will be in Tampa. He plans to wear his Jokic T-shirt and a Nuggets hat while watching the game on television and talking smack to any Heat fans he might see.

Smith got the T-shirt about two years ago from someone who reached out on the internet. He greatly admires the Nuggets star center and hopes one day to meet him.

“I saw (former Denver star linebacker) Von Miller trading jerseys with him and I was pissed, I’m not going to lie,’’ said Smith, who won Super Bowls with the Broncos in the 1997 and 1998 seasons before Miller won one with them in 2015. “Von is a new star, but the old guys did pretty well with the Broncos, too.”

If the Nuggets win the title, Smith figures it would be a sports moment topped by only one other in Colorado history.

“Honestly, I would put it at number two,’’ he said. “When the Broncos won their first-ever Super Bowl, the city, the whole state and the whole region went crazy, and the Broncos are kind of royalty around here. But if the Nuggets win this title, it would be absolutely phenomenal.’’

Yes, Smith, the all-time leading receiver in Broncos history with 849 catches. said a Nuggets championship would rank ahead of Denver’s other two Super Bowl wins.

Before joining the Broncos, Smith starred in football at Missouri Southern State, but also played one season on the basketball team, being a perimeter defensive specialist who came off the bench. He has become such a big Nuggets fan that he watches all the press conferences he can of coach Michael Malone.

“I root for all the local teams,’’ Smith said. “When the Rockies were in the World Series against Boston (in 2007), I was there. I was cheering for the Avalanche when they just won (the Stanley Cup last year). I just root for our teams because everybody is nicer here when we win. The food tastes better wherever you go. The traffic is better. Everything is better when we win.”

If the Nuggets wrap up the title Monday, Smith would be in Florida and not Colorado. But one gets the feeling his food still would taste pretty good.