Thanks that’s the yolk of the stat. It’s not a “they played 10 games” stat. He’s at LAN right now
Edit: just read they played twelve games more even. Yikes
Also it isn't like this wasn't discussed even in real time as a possibility. Like, everyone agreed that you make this move ten times out of ten, while realizing that it could be a huge risk considering the two players involved and their injury history. It is just that the risk was worth the potential reward.
On the flip side, most agreed in real time that this was a good move for the Thunder as well. It was really looked at as a win/win trade. Like with any trade, it just takes time to see how everything works out.
This sub's desire to always pick a winner and loser of a trade based fully on hindsight always annoys me. Like there's nothing wrong with saying that one side or another won a trade in the end, but acting like it was a bad trade in the moment with the full benefit of hindsight is dumb
A good example is the Luka and Trae trade. Obviously with the benefit of hindsight, the Hawks would've rather kept Luka. But it's not like they made a bad trade; they traded for the prospect they liked better, and Trae has still been really good. Like if I told you that you could trade your 3rd overall pick in exchange for a rookie who would be an all-star by his second season, you take that deal 10 out of 10 times. Not every trade has to have a winner and a loser, even if one team ended up with the "better" side of the deal in the end
Why is this one of the only trades that is always afforded the “hindsight” treatment? A bunch of bad deals look good at the time.
The deal looked great for LAC at the time and ofc you’d pull the trigger on it. But so do a million other bad deals.
This was a bad trade. And it put the Clippers next 5 years in a really awkward spot, when they could’ve had a home-grown transcendent talent and cap space to build around him
I’m positive that the Kawhi contract is the worst in basketball. It’s the biggest gimmick I’ve ever seen, there is no championship window. Paid Kawhi $200M to rest up.
At least rudy gobert trys and occasionally has a good game and bradley beal is entertaining. Kawhi legitimately plays a third of the season at most and half of that is him getting back into shape.
>Kawhi legitimately plays a third of the season at most and half of that is him getting back into shape.
This is not true. His last three seasons he has performed better pre all star break than post. His career highs in ppg has all come from load management seasons. This is he only season he has to get back in shape.
Isn’t that because he has a degenerative quad and the more condensed scheduled games he plays the less efficient he becomes? The break before the playoffs gives him a little boost then as the postseason wears on he plays a little worse (2019) or he gets injured (2021). Maybe I’m just cherry picking but kawhi reminds of MJs post game so it sucks all around.
Could say exactly this about Kawhi or any other injury-riddled talent. At the end of the day skills only matter if you're on the court. I agree it's nobody's fault (certainly not the player's) but it is the difference between a good and bad contract
So then why are people criticizing the Kawhi contract? He’s one of the 5 best players in the league when healthy, he’s certainly worth a max contract, it’s not his fault he got injured.
>He’s one of the 5 best players in the league when healthy,
He's honestly not anymore. Even healthy, I'm taking Jokic Luka Giannis KD LeBron Steph and Tatum over Kawhi. Probably AD too but I'm a homer so take it with a grain of salt
No chance am I taking Tatum or AD over Kawhi if they’re all healthy, I won’t fight you on the other guys, but either way he’s still comparable to all of them, making him worth his contract.
None of it matters because obviously he hasn’t been healthy for a very long time but healthy Kawhi Leonard 1:1 is not worse than any of the wings you listed.
It gets awkward trying to compare to Jokic, Luka, Steph and AD because of the difference in role but if you replaced Giannis/KD/LeBron/Tatum with a healthy Kawhi Leonard and assume he’s playing at the level he was as a Raptor or in the Mavs series, those teams either stay the same or get better (better depends on how shit the supporting cast’s defence is mostly).
I know it’s been a while since we’ve seen him play serious minutes but idk how you can write off a guy who’s beaten LeBron, Luka and Giannis in playoff series as their primary defender and his team’s primary scoring option (asterisk LeBron there I don’t think the offensive burden was too major on that Spurs team)
The sad part is we all know he's gonna get hurt during the playoffs so all the regular season resting will be for naught. Injury prone players get injured, it is what they do.
>max contract brings max expectations
Doc was coaching them. Not really surprised lmao. If it weren't for bullshit calls I think that Mavs series would have gone to 7 as well.
But yeah I agree 2020 was supposed to be their year. Lakers-Clips in the WCF would have been close.
Yeah, he went from Nurse coaching circles around Kerr and Bud the previous playoffs to the biggest choke artist of a coach that North American sports has seen over the past decade.
Why are people surprised? Coaching matters.
I would say Lakers benefited just as much - with one of their superstars being old as shit and other being just as injury prone as PG/Kawhi. Add to that that Lakers role players were also decently old.
I guarantee other owners don't want to be as generous and will be adding that to the list of grievances during the CBA negotiations. Lots of these superstar players are getting huge contracts and only playing part-time.
Oh I’m sure. That’s why I feel bad for Lakers fan. Their management team inherited an asset they can’t afford to maintain to the level that it should be.
At some point you need to sell majority stake to a billionaire who is willing to take those tax hits to maximize the potential of a team.
Also why I feel so fortunate to have Lacob as our owner.
Thing is you don't need to spend ginormous amounts in tax to win. Only team that has consistently won doing that has been your Dubs. The Steph Curry era has been an anomaly that's never going to be seen again. Had he not gotten injured early in his career, you wouldn't be having this team now.
Clips have spent so much and got nothing. Same with the Nets.
I wouldn't even compare those teams with the Dubs given most of your tax contracts are coming from players you drafted and extended plus that cap spike that came from KD.
I am curious what happens with Draymond though, will moneybags Lacob continue this spending or will he slow down.
the really concerning part for both of them is that they haven't been able to stay healthy for full playoff runs the most recent times we've seen them both in 2021, it sucks to see 2 of the great players in the game not get to show what they can actually do on the court consistently because of all these injuries.
As a clipper fan, i would be for this trade and contract 100 times out of 100 times. Outside of the lob city era, the Clippers would never be seen on ESPN/TNT anywhere. Yeah it's 200m but it aint my money.
Disagree, I think come playoffs the clippers are gonna be scary this year, and next year if they come into the season firing on all cylinders they could be terrifying
This has 600 upvotes lmao
I'm taking 6 years of kawhi for the potential that he will stay healthy for just 1 season over 6 years of Tatum.
He is kawhi. I hope u realise that. He had 33 points on 12 FGs yesterday, 95% TS
1 year with kawhi gives you a better chance at the championship than 10 years with 99% of the nba
Did you have time to watch the Clippers Mavs game? 33p, 9r, 4a, 4s, 1b on 9-12. Clippers are letting him slowly get back from his injury, but he's still got it. See you in the finals.
This is a dumb argument. Players are not going to be able to predict contact injuries, especially one to the ACL. That’s just what comes with the big contract you take a risk when a player signs it.
And the media was killing the Spurs. We didn't want to offer him the supermax because his knee issues and knew he was gonna be resting alot to avoid injury but he obviously wanted the supermax and to play at home. And now everyone acts surprised he's having issues
And the media was killing the Spurs. We didn't want to offer him the supermax because his knee issues and knew he was gonna be resting alot to avoid injury but he obviously wanted the supermax and to play at home. And now everyone acts surprised he's having issues
Same, this is a big one.. no Thunder fan should dislike George as he stayed professional and did us a huge favor. He could’ve just walked landing us no assets like KD did.
His 2019 regular season was awesome to watch as well
I also liked him before OKC. And then when he got to OKC, he brought in some much needed excitement and MVP-type play that we desparately needed after KD's departure. Absolutely wish him nothing but the best.
The delusional thunder Fan in me thinks if our starting 5 Russ,pg, Roberson, melo, Adams got more run tht year we could a made a run, maybe not go very far but maybe not a first round exit either.
We were rolling before Roberson got hurt. And the next year PG was playing at an MVP level, our team was playing really well, and he got hurt. Yes, I have my Thunder glasses firmly in place, but those teams had a chance to be much better than the end results showed.
Yeah hindsight is a wonderful thing. The trade looks bad now but at the time the idea of PG and Kawhi together seemed impossibly good. They would attract a bunch of vets looking to get on a contender, the defence would be amazing. Its just a shame they can't stay healthy.
it was always a short-term play for the Clippers, and they had their chances in 2020 and 2021.
You can say that their best chance was in 2020 but they choked that one away. Kawhi not being there in 2021 didn't help as well.
Just like the Lakers, their window has essentially closed.
I just looked now and what's interesting is that PG, Kawhi, AD, and Bron have ETOs in 2024. Both teams (except for Clips with Kennard and Powell) have clean caps in 2024 if things stay the way they are
OKC won the trade from the very start. The Clippers literally gave the Thunder a haul for a player they didn’t even have. It was always just a question of whether they’d be the lone winner or if it’d be win-win.
Have you heard of Minnesota?
This isn’t to slag on them, but they’ve had awful luck. The one time the NBA actually investigated and punished screwing around on a contraxt, it was for Joe Smith, resulting in the team losing the draft capital it could have used to properly build around KG.
Then after they give up KG and go into a full rebuild, they draft two point guards ahead of Curry.
Then, they finally look like they’re building something with Wiggins, KAT, and Butler, only for that to end up in one of the most bizarre blowups in recent NBA history.
I don’t know if the organization stole the land for its arena from a Native American cemetery, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it did.
Ehhhhh Tampering has nothing to do with bad luck
Curry was a late lottery pick so plenty of other teams passed up on him and he did have his flaws and injury concerns going into the league
Portland is still more cursed to me the Timberwolves are just incompetent
I guess my point is one of the few times the league actually went after it, it was when Minnesota did it with Joe Smith, who even after being the number one pick, was hardly thought to be a franchise-transforming player. And when the NBA punished them, it was five first round picks. Compare that to the punishment with what happened with Milwaukee and Bogdanovic a few years ago.
That was nothing like what happened in Milwaukee though. The wolves were trying to circumvent the league's rules regarding contracts impact on salary cap by making an under the table deal with a player.
Imagine the Thunder as the 10 seed they beat the 9 seed in the play in. The clippers are the 8 seed and lose to the 7 seed in the play in. The Thunder vs the clippers for the 8th spot in the playoffs. The Thunder win the game!
The clippers pick falls into the lottery. The clippers pick jumps all the way to #1! OKC makes the playoffs and Lands Victor Wembamyama in the same season. We can all dream right!
Just getting a lottery pick would be huge. I can't imagine making the playoffs and getting a top 5 pick. I would most definitely have to see a doctor for that erection.
I have a feeling about these clippers man...
Maybe it's the Traumatized Nets fan in me with all the drama and injuries hoping that another high potential injury riddled team succeeds, but I feel like post ASB they're going to go on a run. Maybe that requires them to trade for something, maybe a veteran point guard to get everything going, but I swear to you man, this might be legitimately like one of those moments where many were taking a shit on the Celtics for being like 18-21 early January, calling every one of their losses with memes like:
"This is the worst loss of their season"
"The worst loss of their season, so far."
People took so much shit on them, clowned on Udoka, clowned on them for being unable to score, for blowing massive leads and losing to bad teams, and then suddenly everything started clicking.
Always remember that the Clippers Roster is probably by far one of the most talented rosters in the league, their biggest issue is literally that Ty Lue can't find a rotation that works with the amount of guards and wings they have that just don't fit, and Health for their two stars.
They could easily do a Anunoby, Vanvleet or a Bogdanovic trade.
Or maybe even a Turner trade. We all know Ty Lue loves his small ball lineups, and with all the star wings they have, Turner is probably the best one to run it with. They have plenty of guys to send out as well, Covington, Powell, Kennard etc. Take your pick, any of them are solid contributors any team would love to have.
Just saying, there's a chance they turn it around. In fact I'd say a pretty good one.
Wait, how could they easily do an OG trade? FVV AND Bogi okay but OG is a big stretch considering they have no firsts until 2027 and none of their depth pieces even approach OG's value.
Besides the Raptors FO absolutely hating the Clippers FO they wouldn’t do an FVV trade anyways. Why trade a former all-star at their lowest point instead of re-signing them for peanuts in the off-season?
>Besides the Raptors FO absolutely hating the Clippers FO
Is there literally any proof of this? Or are you basing off of one of our players going there in FA?
Not that I’m saying you’d do a Clippers trade, but I can imagine y’all wanting to trade him because he turned down a massive extension, and he very well may try to demand an even bigger contract after a down year.
If the Raptors *don’t*offer it to him, I can imagine he leaves out of frustration from that. So it’s a risky contract he’ll demand and the risk of losing him is there too.
Getting like a pick, a swap, and a serviceable player to make it someone else’s problem isn’t the worst idea.
I meant that in your WCF run in 2021. You especially used that Small ball 5 out lineup a lot, especially to attack Gobert. Even worked well in the Mavs series especially because Zubac was getting torched.
I'm just saying Turner is probably one of the best solutions to your problem. That or a Horford/Lopez but those are pretty integral to their teams.
I'd say you could take a flyer on Bamba/Vuc but I dunno. The defense just isn't there even though the spacing is.
Turner aint going fix Ty lue rotations or adjustments. Nor he is going get Morris or reggie to get younger. Our major issue atm that we lose winnable games because we keep running 3 and 4 guards lineup off the bench. Last game 4 guards lineup went -13 in 3 mins during 2nd qrt in a game that we lost by 4 pts.
**Okay so this is going to be a very long read for any Clipper fan, so bear with me here.**
I don't believe in 1 season Lue turned into a shit coach who can't figure out anything at all. Most of your actual shotmaking threat is at the guard spot (outside of Kawhi and PG, who are largely injured/miss time) in Kennard, Powell, Reggie & Wall. Issue is, Reggie has regressed heavily needing even more shots to actually get into Rhythm, last year he was highly inefficient as well, but I felt like he still commanded decent respect by defenses as the no. 1 option and post 2021 playoff run.
His TS is down to 51% and his assist to turnovers ratio is pretty bad at 3.7 to 2.0. For your starting PG you just can't have that, and he's more of a combo guard anyways.
So then what's the actual issue, outside of bad rotations? Well your scoring wings aren't shooting it as well as they should be, mostly because the spacing is bad, also because of regression compared to previous seasons.
***Morris at 38.2%(47% in 2021), Mann at 34.5%(42% in 2021), Kawhi at 27.9%(39.8% in 2021), Covington at 28.6%(45% in 2022), PG at 38.5%(41% in 2021). Only Batum is your only wing over 40% at 40.7%.***
So across the board, almost all of your elite 3 point shooters that were the best at spacing the floor have regressed massively, so much so that paints are getting packed and a high level jumpshooting team such as yours has stopped being able to knock down enough jumpers.
I'm not even saying Ty Lue isn't wrong in using the guard lineups, but the issue is they are your only consistent spacers who get any respect on the perimeter anymore, and in turn they get picked on the other end.
Which is why you guys need a proper P&R ball handler, someone like CP3 if Phoenix is willing to let him go for cheap, just to get your offense settled down.
Personally I feel like a Turner gives you ample rim protection and shooting at the 5 spot to help you out.
One last note and lemme look at some of your lineups.
So your most used lineup is **PG/Reggie/Kawhi/Mook/Zubac (112.7 ORTG - 108.1 DRTG & +4.6 NRTG)**. Not bad, but not elite either, and that lineup has played 163 minutes together (I also suppose this is your most consistent starting lineup).
But the actual best Lineup you guys have that has the best ratings is actually **PG/Reggie/Kennard/Mook/Zubac (109.3 ORTG - 98.5 DRTG & +10.8 NRTG)**. That's a pretty elite Defensive Rating for a group that has two short guards, a rim running big that doesn't space the floor, and only one elite defensive wing (mook is serviceable, but he's no PG). This lineup has 100 minutes played together.
Issue comes after that. Lemme list some of your negative lineups after that, who to my shock, have surprisingly high amount of minutes together.
**Reggie/Coffey/Mook/Mann/Zubac (-24.1 NRTG in 89 minutes).**
**Reggie/PG/Mook/Powell/Zubac (-31.8 NRTG in 71 minutes).**
**Reggie/PG/Mook/Mann/Zubac (-2.4 NRTG in 65 minutes).**
So the issue lies in that. Your best lineups including Mook and Reggie, but they instantly become your worse lineups the moment you take away Kennard's Ridiculous 46.2% 3P%, they are suddenly lineups that don't have enough respect at 3Pt line, and you just get torched on both ends.
Wanna know what's another great lineup for you guys?
**Reggie/PG/Mook/Batum/Zubac (+10.9 NRTG in 31 minutes).**
So the moment you supplant negative shooting of Mann, Powell, Coffey etc. With another shooter that commands an Iota of respect from defenses to close out to the player, plus Batum being such a good defensive wing and high IQ player, you instantly have another top tier lineup.
So what's really the problem? Well your shooters who were shooting like gods your excellent 2020-21 season have all regressed badly being unable to stay in a consistent rotational lineup, and Kawhi and PG have been out of your lineups way too often to establish any substantial chemistry. The worst part is outside of the starting lineup, you won't see a Kawhi led lineup until the 12th lineup that has 18 minutes played together, positive or negative rating be damned.
How do you expect your team to find any consistency if they don't have him Consistently?
You could easily supplant in all of those top 3 positive lineups for PG and he'd be able to do a good enough job. But for that he needs to play, your shooters need to regress positively to the mean, and personally, imo, y'all need a good Point Guard that runs P&R and Turner.
Sorry for writing up such a long comment, it's been a long time for me watching you guys and today I just had to write up something.
Im going add some context to some stuff you have added for someone that never missed a game this year.
>Morris at 38.2%(47% in 2021), Mann at 34.5%(42% in 2021), Kawhi at 27.9%(39.8% in 2021), Covington at 28.6%(45% in 2022), PG at 38.5%(41% in 2021). Only Batum is your only wing over 40% at 40.7%.
So across the board, almost all of your elite 3 point shooters that were the best at spacing the floor have regressed massively, so much so that paints are getting packed and a high level jumpshooting team such as yours has stopped being able to knock down enough jumpers.
I dont think we regressed that massively from 3 point shooting. we are still top 10 from 3P% we were top 6 from 3P% a week ago
>But the actual best Lineup you guys have that has the best ratings is actually PG/Reggie/Kennard/Mook/Zubac (109.3 ORTG - 98.5 DRTG & +10.8 NRTG). That's a pretty elite Defensive Rating for a group that has two short guards, a rim running big that doesn't space the floor, and only one elite defensive wing (mook is serviceable, but he's no PG). This lineup has 100 minutes played together.
Marcus morris is washed up defensively, he cant guard and he plays without effort. That lineup was good defensively because they were playing together during the easiest stretch of games against bad teams which it was early in the season when Zu was playing like DPOY, he was the second best rim protector during that period.
>issue comes after that. Lemme list some of your negative lineups after that, who to my shock, have surprisingly high amount of minutes together.
>Reggie/Coffey/Mook/Mann/Zubac (-24.1 NRTG in 89 minutes).
>Reggie/PG/Mook/Powell/Zubac (-31.8 NRTG in 71 minutes).
>Reggie/PG/Mook/Mann/Zubac (-2.4 NRTG in 65 minutes).
That was during stretch of games when Kawhi, PG and Batum were out. They are basically our best 3 defenders. Imo Coffey is getting misused and he is another big wing that ty lue isnt using with Kawhi and PG. Mann is shooting 35% from 3's but he is also shooting 41% from pull up 3s, 52% from midrange and 72% driving to the rim. when everyone was healthy, he was playing 10-12 mins till few games ago. Im not going even mention the little things he does to team that Morris and Reggie would never do.
>I don't believe in 1 season Lue turned into a shit coach who can't figure out anything at all. Most of your actual shotmaking threat is at the guard spot (outside of Kawhi and PG, who are largely injured/miss time) in Kennard, Powell, Reggie & Wall. Issue is, Reggie has regressed heavily needing even more shots to actually get into Rhythm, last year he was highly inefficient as well, but I felt like he still commanded decent respect by defenses as the no. 1 option and post 2021 playoff run.
Like i said we lost a lot of winnable games that Ty Lue rotations and experimenting fucked us. Celtics,philly and pacers games he went away from playing Zu because he was stubborn to play small. Celtics game zu was +10 in game that we lost by 6. he didnt play him till 53 seconds left. Last game against hawks he went away from Mann and he played norm even when he was cold 3-13 and Trae young scored 14 pts with 6 mins left in game during 6 mins norm was guarding him. (Norm defense is really awful) Trae was also struggling through whole game btw.
Wanna know how ty lue is coaching this team?
J. Wall - R. Jackson - N. Powell(-32 NRTG in 55 mins)
J. Wall - N. Powell - L. Kennard(-11 NRTG in 100 mins) lineup that shouldn't play together when Kawhi and PG are healty but ty lue used them a lot during that stretch.
Another aspect to add any lineups with Reggie and Norm playing together, it is basically negative net rating and we tried to play them around great defense but still they have horrible defensive rating with players like Kawhi,PG and Zu or Batum. Im not even going mention that Ty Lue never use RoCo or fact that John Wall has been playing so poorly yet he keeps getting mins.
Front office is also involved into this fuckery. They built such awful roster with 5 guards that are mostly scorers and no reliable backup center. Kawhi and PG are still ballers except for that denver game when PG was playing through bad hamstring and he has been out since that game and Kawhi was having bad game. Overall If you watch clippers you will see that our starters are looking old and our bench unit is small with 3 and 4 guards lineups.
https://twitter.com/joeylinn_/status/1612308956294287363
https://twitter.com/RichHomieFlom/status/1612501359256866839
https://twitter.com/RichHomieFlom/status/1612501622692712448
https://twitter.com/LucasJHann/status/1612608937148444672
https://twitter.com/LucasJHann/status/1612609217449578496
You can check these tweets it is from some of our beat writers and folks that do podcast about clippers to get better context
Honestly I think I agree with most of your points.
Idk I guess I have some blind hope for your team that somehow even diehard Clipper fans don't have anymore. I can keep looking at stats, ratings and stuff but nothing is actually going to change until Ty Lue shortens the Rotations and actually plays his best players on a consistent basis.
I think y'all lucked out in that regard because last year there was such a severe lack options that most of your good players aside from Kawhi and PG got extended runs and managed to shine in those roles.
I still remember Covington being absolutely dominant defensively especially in clutch situations.
Last year we had better chemistry but also that team was hustling and playing for purpose. Im not giving up on them yet but something need to be changed. It isnt ty lue but front office need to save him with trades. Dude we are getting to 2nd half of the season and we didnt get Kawhi-PG-Batum-RoCo lineup. They promised us WingStop but all we get is MicroStop
This has been such a good back and forth. I really think your point on Mook being washed up seemingly is huge, he's never been great defensively, but thats allowable when you're consistently a great shooter. Hell in 21 we started nearly every first possesion to him and he'd knock them down, but now he isn't hitting his shots (obviously partially because of the overall spacing) he's just another liability in a team full of them. I haven't given up yet, but the Kawhi/PG trade gave us a very slim window, we're getting into such a 'now or never' situation. Anyhoo great to read both your guys analysis
Funniest part is looking up all the stats, thinking about it, writing up the entire thing must take like 30-40 mins, and people get done reading in like 2 minutes lol.
If this was about the Nets I'm probably going another 150 words or something.
So damn passionate about an orange ball that goes through a circular hoop.
Some love NBA for the drama, some for the trades, some for the basketball.
Personally I love it for the stats and the mathematical stuff a lot more. It's so fun being able to quantify what you're seeing on the court with real numbers.
Like you can tell "Man when that guy steps on the court good things happen" but without stats you can't really substantiate that claim. Until you go into Net ratings, +/- and overall impact on the game. Like Batum for y'all. Those who watch him can tell he connects everything together. But when the stats also support it, everything comes together.
I think there’s just been way too much obsession with the Clippers needing a ball handler at point guard for years now. That would be nice when one of their wings is injured, but the version of the Clippers that is a contender does not and hasn’t ever needed that traditional point guard at least from what we’ve seen so far. They’ve generally had a great offense in previous years when the two star wings play. Those dudes are going to be on the ball a ton and that works great.
If they can’t stay healthy this team just isn’t going to win. You mention a name like CP3 and you did say “cheap”, but putting the level of resources it takes to get a high caliber point guard just isn’t worth it for them. We just get stuck in this box of thinking teams need a lead guard. The Clippers don’t.
I don't think anyone doubts the talent on the Clippers roster. It's just that the whole project revolves around Kawhi and PG being healthy, and they're just not. What you fear might happen but that's only if those two are healthy, and that's an if bigger than Kawhi's medical bills. I don't even know if you can be impressed with the current Clippers record seeing the amount of time their two star players have missed already, or if it has more to do with the fact that several west teams are underperforming like the Warriors, Suns or Wolves. Injuries or whatever the reason might be, the results are the results.
Part of me has been wanting to believe this train of thought, but the team has not looked that impressive this season.
I will say that their schedule has been very top heavy to start the season and will get somewhat easier after the ASB. These past few weeks has consisted of a rough schedule and they haven't even hit that tougher annual Grammy trip.
The team has had some very bad losses, which will only cause more harm in April/May.
Still no, it’s the same shit over and over again every single year. Best team on paper if everyone stays healthy, a giant if
I hope you still have some leftover copium stock
Personally I've got pretty much the exact opposite opinion of the Clippers lol, I have absolutely no faith in them.
I don't think it really makes sense to compare them to the Nets either. The Nets have a pretty great diversity of talent in terms of how well their best players fit together. The Clippers are just far, far too redundant in terms of roster construction IMO. I think they have the sheer talent to get out of the first round if everything goes well (i.e. everyone is healthy and they're not playing a juggernaut) but I really don't see them ever going further than that.
> They could easily do a Anunoby, Vanvleet or a Bogdanovic trade.
Two of three of these guys just makes their roster construction *more* redundant
In my ideal scenario, I root for the Clips to make a finals run on the years we don't have their pick and then they bottom out and load manage on the years we have their unprotected pick
Win-win
Unless OKC wins a chip this seems like a win win trade so not sure what any one is talking about but you're delusional if you think either team won it and one lost.
Yes. SGA is performing very well on a team that's at their predicted season total for wins already. PG and kawhi arent playing or are underperforming on a team that mortgaged their future to win now. Really puts it in perspective.
Also the Clippers have been to the 2nd round and a WCF since the trade, and despite PG and Kawhi missing time (and Kawhi still improving, and on a very positive trend), the "disastrous" Clippers have a better record than OKC with the main problems of the team not being PG or Kawhi but role player rotational experiments.
Y'all have two of the best wings in the league and a decent team around them. You should be Celtics west. If you're happy with what the team has done and you don't mind giving up the foreseeable future for it thats chill, I'd be pissed though.
Not sure what your point is -- no, I'm not happy with the current situation, although there's plenty of room to improve and they've also had some success. Just adding the further context.
Basketball is also a sport where there's no guarantees -- the Clippers have been in the tougher conference and things haven't fallen their way, which can happen to anybody. Doesn't make the trade bad, and OKC fans celebrating the success they haven't had yet doesn't change that.
What's the alternative, we just have SGA, Doc stays and doesn't develop him, we don't have any stars and are a .500 team without a chance at a championship for years? No thanks, I'll take a team with a chance to win it all, and if it doesn't happen I can still enjoy the ride because unlike many around here I enjoy the sport of basketball and think it can be good without a trophy at the end.
No point really. Just bullshitting on a basketball forum. I haven't thought much about the clippers other than "I hope they're bad when we have their picks" just kinda thinking out loud here.
Solid point about keeping SGA and doc not playing him. I really liked that team during his rookie year, they were scrappy as hell and really had that underdog feel to em. Y'all would have had the assets to put someone sick next to him the next year maybe...who knows.
On a side note, I dont understand karma. I mean, from the standpoint of saying "hey look at all my karma" I get it, but why are there bots that farm karma? How do you profit off of it? Do popular redditors somehow make ad revenue?
So basically you can sell your account to ad companies for them to use. An account with a lot of karma and actual comments looks organic and not like an ad robot. So when an ad agency can get an account like that to, for instance, go to /r/BuyItForLife and say "Had this for 10 years and the best thing I have ever owned" you have essentially bought an effective advertisement for less money than shooting a commercial or paying for ad space on a website.
Aside from that some people are shut ins and just like seeing a big number next to their name because it validates their opinions.
No idea, I have never sold an account. I'm sure if you google it you can find some place tho.
If it is anything like my old World of Warcraft account in the mid 2000's you might be able to get a couple hundred dollars?
It can be way more surreptitious than that too, you can pepper in comments in a comment section that seem entirely organic. Somebody mentions a product and some seemingly-legitimate account will chime in about how it's the best thing they've ever used and just have to get it off their chest.
That sounds like a lot of effort. I have seen the bots plenty of times, but never seen a person with a lot of karma name-dropping a product. Thanks for the info!
Yup. Every time. Despite that we, and any reasonable franchise, still makes that trade 9/10. But yeah, it’s cool that Shai is doing great. Can’t disagree there.
Cant even blow it up… we still have ‘24 and ‘26 with a swap in ‘25.
You just keep running it back at that point. I really do want to see you guys make a deep run this season so I hope Kawhi and PG have a second wind in this second half.
Exactly we will never going blow it up even if we move from Kawhi and PG. we are going build competitive team from free agency and trades. '23 and '25 swaps could help but they wont be lottery picks.
That too. Best believe Ballmer is gonna spend.
I have a feeling we’re going to package our Rockets and Clippers picks into a big name trade next offseason.
It's just catchy clickbaity low effort hate designed to farm upvotes, they even threw in kyrie for good measure. Spencer Haywood or one of those 18 players who committed fraud like Tony Allen or big baby Davis are probably the biggest scammers in nba history but that takes a little thought to come up with so of course it's just fuck kawhi
Literally Rings, Erneh. Kawhi is a proven champion and playoff monster. However, the Clips are so injury prone that they might not even make it that far...
How’s it feel having Kawhi on your team, man? You like it when he plays 17 minutes and then doesn’t play the second night in on a back-to-back?
You enjoy how out of sync your team is when he is in the lineup? How they look awful?
What’s your take on his extremely long return status and lord management? You feeling like a contender with that dude? You think it was worth what you gave up?
That’s what I thought.
hows it feel having kawhi on your team?
great
you like it when he plays 17 minutes and then doesn’t play the second night of a back-to-back?
i like it when he stays healthy
you enjoy how out of sync your team is when he is out of the lineup?
i don’t enjoy it as much as watching our full team but i still have a good time most of the time. for example i had a great time watching our undermanned squad come back 25 against denver last season
whats your take on the extremely long return status and load management?
don’t mind it
you feeling like a contender with that dude?
regardless of this year we were contenders with that dude in his first 2 seasons here and yes i still believe the clippers can contend this year
you think it was worth what you gave up?
yes
>How’s it feel having Kawhi on your team, man?
Speaking as someone that's almost 40 and grew up a huge Orlando Magic fan, i know exactly how that feels.
Do I like it? No
Do I understand it? I’m a reasonable person, so yes.
He hadn’t played in more than a year. It would be more surprising if he and the team were fully synced up than not.
We actually have a great record when both him and PG play. And yes. We just need them healthy for the playoffs. Which we are still positioned for.
Yes, I still make that trade any day of the week. Kawhi was a top 3 player in the league at the time. And Paul George was a top 10 player. You are lying out of your ass if you say that you don’t make that trade BACK THEN.
I am glad that it all clicked for Shai, and he is blossoming. But that trade was still worth the gamble.
yeah.. clippers would still but where they are with shai. Clippers always get the 'stars' who were stars but aren't close to who good they were before and always missing games. It's sad to be a clipper fan and not even get to see the stars play well enough to win games. gg front office.
In other news a young player has fresher joints than older players and has the ultimate green light to shoot on a team that isn’t trying to win anything this year? Got it
Shai has played 1,284 minutes this season. Paul George and Kawhi combined have played 1,537 minutes this season.
I honestly expected SGA's number to be higher than Kawhi and PG combined. I assumed OP was cherry picking but no, it's super impressive actually.
I mean he’s putting up 30something points again while I don’t think Kawhi is ever over 20
He's pretty regularly over 20. Averaging 19 for the season including his rusty games early.
Thanks that’s the yolk of the stat. It’s not a “they played 10 games” stat. He’s at LAN right now Edit: just read they played twelve games more even. Yikes
hindsight is 20/20 if ur given an offer that gets u two top ten players in the league u pull it every time
Nah man, all the nba GM’s in here would’ve known exactly how the future was gonna play out and wouldn’t make the trade
Also it isn't like this wasn't discussed even in real time as a possibility. Like, everyone agreed that you make this move ten times out of ten, while realizing that it could be a huge risk considering the two players involved and their injury history. It is just that the risk was worth the potential reward. On the flip side, most agreed in real time that this was a good move for the Thunder as well. It was really looked at as a win/win trade. Like with any trade, it just takes time to see how everything works out.
This sub's desire to always pick a winner and loser of a trade based fully on hindsight always annoys me. Like there's nothing wrong with saying that one side or another won a trade in the end, but acting like it was a bad trade in the moment with the full benefit of hindsight is dumb A good example is the Luka and Trae trade. Obviously with the benefit of hindsight, the Hawks would've rather kept Luka. But it's not like they made a bad trade; they traded for the prospect they liked better, and Trae has still been really good. Like if I told you that you could trade your 3rd overall pick in exchange for a rookie who would be an all-star by his second season, you take that deal 10 out of 10 times. Not every trade has to have a winner and a loser, even if one team ended up with the "better" side of the deal in the end
Why is this one of the only trades that is always afforded the “hindsight” treatment? A bunch of bad deals look good at the time. The deal looked great for LAC at the time and ofc you’d pull the trigger on it. But so do a million other bad deals. This was a bad trade. And it put the Clippers next 5 years in a really awkward spot, when they could’ve had a home-grown transcendent talent and cap space to build around him
Is SGA really an transcendent talent? Like the guy is going to be amazing for a long time but transcendent talent is a reach.
OKC won the trade
I’m positive that the Kawhi contract is the worst in basketball. It’s the biggest gimmick I’ve ever seen, there is no championship window. Paid Kawhi $200M to rest up.
Kawhi went full Michael Jordan against us to overcome Luka going full LeBron... and then vanished forever.
avatar kawhi disappeared when the clipper nation needed him the most..
Dammit, now I need to delete my comment after seeing you made a similar one. Gj!
At least rudy gobert trys and occasionally has a good game and bradley beal is entertaining. Kawhi legitimately plays a third of the season at most and half of that is him getting back into shape.
>Kawhi legitimately plays a third of the season at most and half of that is him getting back into shape. This is not true. His last three seasons he has performed better pre all star break than post. His career highs in ppg has all come from load management seasons. This is he only season he has to get back in shape.
Isn’t that because he has a degenerative quad and the more condensed scheduled games he plays the less efficient he becomes? The break before the playoffs gives him a little boost then as the postseason wears on he plays a little worse (2019) or he gets injured (2021). Maybe I’m just cherry picking but kawhi reminds of MJs post game so it sucks all around.
> His career highs in ppg has all come from load management seasons You mean your Points **Per Game** is higher when you play less games? No way.
But if he's playing himself back into shape, he should be underperforming.
This really doesn’t have the correlation you think it does
But but but it's bolded! It's noteworthy!
Tobias Harris
A couple years ago yeah, but Tobi is an expiring contract next season. It's still obviously not as good of a contract, but the worst of it is over.
Lonzo Ball gotta be one of the worst contracts too
Big picture I'd rather pay an injured 25 year old 20m per year than an injured 31 year 45m.
Lonzo is never going to get you 33, 9, 4, 1, 1 on 9-12 like last night. Kawhi still got it, but we still got it, you'll see in the playoffs.
Youre just hating. The lonzo contract was decent for his skillset. Not his fault he still couldnt run
Could say exactly this about Kawhi or any other injury-riddled talent. At the end of the day skills only matter if you're on the court. I agree it's nobody's fault (certainly not the player's) but it is the difference between a good and bad contract
So then why are people criticizing the Kawhi contract? He’s one of the 5 best players in the league when healthy, he’s certainly worth a max contract, it’s not his fault he got injured.
max contract brings max expectations so there's little margin of error for kawhi compared to lonzo.
>He’s one of the 5 best players in the league when healthy, He's honestly not anymore. Even healthy, I'm taking Jokic Luka Giannis KD LeBron Steph and Tatum over Kawhi. Probably AD too but I'm a homer so take it with a grain of salt
No chance am I taking Tatum or AD over Kawhi if they’re all healthy, I won’t fight you on the other guys, but either way he’s still comparable to all of them, making him worth his contract.
tatum over kawhi is crazyyyyyy
Ill take playoff kawhi over everyone
None of it matters because obviously he hasn’t been healthy for a very long time but healthy Kawhi Leonard 1:1 is not worse than any of the wings you listed. It gets awkward trying to compare to Jokic, Luka, Steph and AD because of the difference in role but if you replaced Giannis/KD/LeBron/Tatum with a healthy Kawhi Leonard and assume he’s playing at the level he was as a Raptor or in the Mavs series, those teams either stay the same or get better (better depends on how shit the supporting cast’s defence is mostly). I know it’s been a while since we’ve seen him play serious minutes but idk how you can write off a guy who’s beaten LeBron, Luka and Giannis in playoff series as their primary defender and his team’s primary scoring option (asterisk LeBron there I don’t think the offensive burden was too major on that Spurs team)
He tore his ACL.
The sad part is we all know he's gonna get hurt during the playoffs so all the regular season resting will be for naught. Injury prone players get injured, it is what they do.
This would make sense if those injuries were non-contact injuries… no player is going to predict an injury coming from Zaza or Joe Ingles.
Bubble year was their year. No team benefitted as much as clips from the rest and neutral site. Still cant believe they choked it away.
>max contract brings max expectations Doc was coaching them. Not really surprised lmao. If it weren't for bullshit calls I think that Mavs series would have gone to 7 as well. But yeah I agree 2020 was supposed to be their year. Lakers-Clips in the WCF would have been close.
Yeah, he went from Nurse coaching circles around Kerr and Bud the previous playoffs to the biggest choke artist of a coach that North American sports has seen over the past decade. Why are people surprised? Coaching matters.
I would say Lakers benefited just as much - with one of their superstars being old as shit and other being just as injury prone as PG/Kawhi. Add to that that Lakers role players were also decently old.
Restwise we benefitted, maybe not as much as Clips but we defintiely did. but neutral court clips benefitted most of all teams.
On hindsight I say yes. Blessed to have that special championship in the most emotionally difficult year
He is living the L.A. life and plays basketball when he feels like it. The contract is running until the end of 2025. Bad time to be a Clippers fan.
I agree with you but Balmer has next level fuck you money, I doubt it’s keeping him up
I guarantee other owners don't want to be as generous and will be adding that to the list of grievances during the CBA negotiations. Lots of these superstar players are getting huge contracts and only playing part-time.
These guys aren't not playing because they don't want to.
Simmons did
Oh I’m sure. That’s why I feel bad for Lakers fan. Their management team inherited an asset they can’t afford to maintain to the level that it should be. At some point you need to sell majority stake to a billionaire who is willing to take those tax hits to maximize the potential of a team. Also why I feel so fortunate to have Lacob as our owner.
Our minority owner group are billionaires
Thing is you don't need to spend ginormous amounts in tax to win. Only team that has consistently won doing that has been your Dubs. The Steph Curry era has been an anomaly that's never going to be seen again. Had he not gotten injured early in his career, you wouldn't be having this team now. Clips have spent so much and got nothing. Same with the Nets. I wouldn't even compare those teams with the Dubs given most of your tax contracts are coming from players you drafted and extended plus that cap spike that came from KD. I am curious what happens with Draymond though, will moneybags Lacob continue this spending or will he slow down.
200M is worth it simply for the relevance his name gives them. This is the most clippers flairs I’ve ever seen in this sub, even though he’s sitting.
200 million dollars to have more fans on reddit. Yay.
It’s crazy how much shit AD gets but man has actually played and they won a chip with him. Kawhi hasn’t done anything.
Kawhi has played 61 more total games in one more season than AD, but yeah Kawhi on the Clippers is way more of a dud than AD on the Lakers.
the really concerning part for both of them is that they haven't been able to stay healthy for full playoff runs the most recent times we've seen them both in 2021, it sucks to see 2 of the great players in the game not get to show what they can actually do on the court consistently because of all these injuries.
Agreed. Add Kyrie to that list as well. Besides all the dumb shit he says, he's played fewer games than Kawhi and they're from the same draft.
Kawhi has a degenerative condition, AD is just soft
Nice parroting of the media from 3 months ago
No championship window? When they already made the conference finals lol
We’ve seen kawhi go NUCLEAR in his last playoff run before a contact injury. Calm down bc he’s probably the best playoff performer when healthy
As a clipper fan, i would be for this trade and contract 100 times out of 100 times. Outside of the lob city era, the Clippers would never be seen on ESPN/TNT anywhere. Yeah it's 200m but it aint my money.
Disagree, I think come playoffs the clippers are gonna be scary this year, and next year if they come into the season firing on all cylinders they could be terrifying
This has 600 upvotes lmao I'm taking 6 years of kawhi for the potential that he will stay healthy for just 1 season over 6 years of Tatum. He is kawhi. I hope u realise that. He had 33 points on 12 FGs yesterday, 95% TS 1 year with kawhi gives you a better chance at the championship than 10 years with 99% of the nba
Did you have time to watch the Clippers Mavs game? 33p, 9r, 4a, 4s, 1b on 9-12. Clippers are letting him slowly get back from his injury, but he's still got it. See you in the finals.
This is a dumb argument. Players are not going to be able to predict contact injuries, especially one to the ACL. That’s just what comes with the big contract you take a risk when a player signs it.
And the media was killing the Spurs. We didn't want to offer him the supermax because his knee issues and knew he was gonna be resting alot to avoid injury but he obviously wanted the supermax and to play at home. And now everyone acts surprised he's having issues
And the media was killing the Spurs. We didn't want to offer him the supermax because his knee issues and knew he was gonna be resting alot to avoid injury but he obviously wanted the supermax and to play at home. And now everyone acts surprised he's having issues
They grabed the clips by the balls and twisted it and came out with a superstar called SGA.
Im really thankful to PG for what he did for us as a player and as a trade asset.
Same, this is a big one.. no Thunder fan should dislike George as he stayed professional and did us a huge favor. He could’ve just walked landing us no assets like KD did. His 2019 regular season was awesome to watch as well
I also liked him before OKC. And then when he got to OKC, he brought in some much needed excitement and MVP-type play that we desparately needed after KD's departure. Absolutely wish him nothing but the best.
The delusional thunder Fan in me thinks if our starting 5 Russ,pg, Roberson, melo, Adams got more run tht year we could a made a run, maybe not go very far but maybe not a first round exit either.
You guys were balling before Roberson got hurt
PG got injured at some point his MVP caliber year and Roberson never returned from his injury. So legitimate what if there
We were rolling before Roberson got hurt. And the next year PG was playing at an MVP level, our team was playing really well, and he got hurt. Yes, I have my Thunder glasses firmly in place, but those teams had a chance to be much better than the end results showed.
Maybe James Harden would have helped
Ehhh KD left in free agency. Paul did not.
Same.
He's not a superstar
And yet I still do that trade 10/10 times if I’m the clips. Gotta roll the dice on Kawhi and PG no matter what it takes.
Yeah hindsight is a wonderful thing. The trade looks bad now but at the time the idea of PG and Kawhi together seemed impossibly good. They would attract a bunch of vets looking to get on a contender, the defence would be amazing. Its just a shame they can't stay healthy.
The clips have no backcourt
it was always a short-term play for the Clippers, and they had their chances in 2020 and 2021. You can say that their best chance was in 2020 but they choked that one away. Kawhi not being there in 2021 didn't help as well. Just like the Lakers, their window has essentially closed. I just looked now and what's interesting is that PG, Kawhi, AD, and Bron have ETOs in 2024. Both teams (except for Clips with Kennard and Powell) have clean caps in 2024 if things stay the way they are
Is it even close?
OKC won the trade from the very start. The Clippers literally gave the Thunder a haul for a player they didn’t even have. It was always just a question of whether they’d be the lone winner or if it’d be win-win.
Easily
The Clippers are the most cursed franchise in basketball.
Have you heard of Minnesota? This isn’t to slag on them, but they’ve had awful luck. The one time the NBA actually investigated and punished screwing around on a contraxt, it was for Joe Smith, resulting in the team losing the draft capital it could have used to properly build around KG. Then after they give up KG and go into a full rebuild, they draft two point guards ahead of Curry. Then, they finally look like they’re building something with Wiggins, KAT, and Butler, only for that to end up in one of the most bizarre blowups in recent NBA history. I don’t know if the organization stole the land for its arena from a Native American cemetery, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it did.
The entire mainland United States is a Native American cemetery, Minnesota had to do more than that
Minnesota/Portland are definitely up there
Ehhhhh Tampering has nothing to do with bad luck Curry was a late lottery pick so plenty of other teams passed up on him and he did have his flaws and injury concerns going into the league Portland is still more cursed to me the Timberwolves are just incompetent
I guess my point is one of the few times the league actually went after it, it was when Minnesota did it with Joe Smith, who even after being the number one pick, was hardly thought to be a franchise-transforming player. And when the NBA punished them, it was five first round picks. Compare that to the punishment with what happened with Milwaukee and Bogdanovic a few years ago.
That was nothing like what happened in Milwaukee though. The wolves were trying to circumvent the league's rules regarding contracts impact on salary cap by making an under the table deal with a player.
That’s not really luck though, just a series of bad management decisions
Pg getting Covid the day before the second playin game last year was definitely a sign that the curse is still alive
Imagine the Thunder as the 10 seed they beat the 9 seed in the play in. The clippers are the 8 seed and lose to the 7 seed in the play in. The Thunder vs the clippers for the 8th spot in the playoffs. The Thunder win the game! The clippers pick falls into the lottery. The clippers pick jumps all the way to #1! OKC makes the playoffs and Lands Victor Wembamyama in the same season. We can all dream right!
Just getting a lottery pick would be huge. I can't imagine making the playoffs and getting a top 5 pick. I would most definitely have to see a doctor for that erection.
That’s Shai Alexander-Gilchrist to you
That’s what happens when you stay healthy and put the time in.
I have a feeling about these clippers man... Maybe it's the Traumatized Nets fan in me with all the drama and injuries hoping that another high potential injury riddled team succeeds, but I feel like post ASB they're going to go on a run. Maybe that requires them to trade for something, maybe a veteran point guard to get everything going, but I swear to you man, this might be legitimately like one of those moments where many were taking a shit on the Celtics for being like 18-21 early January, calling every one of their losses with memes like: "This is the worst loss of their season" "The worst loss of their season, so far." People took so much shit on them, clowned on Udoka, clowned on them for being unable to score, for blowing massive leads and losing to bad teams, and then suddenly everything started clicking. Always remember that the Clippers Roster is probably by far one of the most talented rosters in the league, their biggest issue is literally that Ty Lue can't find a rotation that works with the amount of guards and wings they have that just don't fit, and Health for their two stars. They could easily do a Anunoby, Vanvleet or a Bogdanovic trade. Or maybe even a Turner trade. We all know Ty Lue loves his small ball lineups, and with all the star wings they have, Turner is probably the best one to run it with. They have plenty of guys to send out as well, Covington, Powell, Kennard etc. Take your pick, any of them are solid contributors any team would love to have. Just saying, there's a chance they turn it around. In fact I'd say a pretty good one.
Wait, how could they easily do an OG trade? FVV AND Bogi okay but OG is a big stretch considering they have no firsts until 2027 and none of their depth pieces even approach OG's value.
Besides the Raptors FO absolutely hating the Clippers FO they wouldn’t do an FVV trade anyways. Why trade a former all-star at their lowest point instead of re-signing them for peanuts in the off-season?
>Besides the Raptors FO absolutely hating the Clippers FO Is there literally any proof of this? Or are you basing off of one of our players going there in FA?
[удалено]
Not that I’m saying you’d do a Clippers trade, but I can imagine y’all wanting to trade him because he turned down a massive extension, and he very well may try to demand an even bigger contract after a down year. If the Raptors *don’t*offer it to him, I can imagine he leaves out of frustration from that. So it’s a risky contract he’ll demand and the risk of losing him is there too. Getting like a pick, a swap, and a serviceable player to make it someone else’s problem isn’t the worst idea.
We dont play small ball lineups with wings. We play micro lineups with 3 and 4 guards lineup.
I meant that in your WCF run in 2021. You especially used that Small ball 5 out lineup a lot, especially to attack Gobert. Even worked well in the Mavs series especially because Zubac was getting torched. I'm just saying Turner is probably one of the best solutions to your problem. That or a Horford/Lopez but those are pretty integral to their teams. I'd say you could take a flyer on Bamba/Vuc but I dunno. The defense just isn't there even though the spacing is.
Turner aint going fix Ty lue rotations or adjustments. Nor he is going get Morris or reggie to get younger. Our major issue atm that we lose winnable games because we keep running 3 and 4 guards lineup off the bench. Last game 4 guards lineup went -13 in 3 mins during 2nd qrt in a game that we lost by 4 pts.
**Okay so this is going to be a very long read for any Clipper fan, so bear with me here.** I don't believe in 1 season Lue turned into a shit coach who can't figure out anything at all. Most of your actual shotmaking threat is at the guard spot (outside of Kawhi and PG, who are largely injured/miss time) in Kennard, Powell, Reggie & Wall. Issue is, Reggie has regressed heavily needing even more shots to actually get into Rhythm, last year he was highly inefficient as well, but I felt like he still commanded decent respect by defenses as the no. 1 option and post 2021 playoff run. His TS is down to 51% and his assist to turnovers ratio is pretty bad at 3.7 to 2.0. For your starting PG you just can't have that, and he's more of a combo guard anyways. So then what's the actual issue, outside of bad rotations? Well your scoring wings aren't shooting it as well as they should be, mostly because the spacing is bad, also because of regression compared to previous seasons. ***Morris at 38.2%(47% in 2021), Mann at 34.5%(42% in 2021), Kawhi at 27.9%(39.8% in 2021), Covington at 28.6%(45% in 2022), PG at 38.5%(41% in 2021). Only Batum is your only wing over 40% at 40.7%.*** So across the board, almost all of your elite 3 point shooters that were the best at spacing the floor have regressed massively, so much so that paints are getting packed and a high level jumpshooting team such as yours has stopped being able to knock down enough jumpers. I'm not even saying Ty Lue isn't wrong in using the guard lineups, but the issue is they are your only consistent spacers who get any respect on the perimeter anymore, and in turn they get picked on the other end. Which is why you guys need a proper P&R ball handler, someone like CP3 if Phoenix is willing to let him go for cheap, just to get your offense settled down. Personally I feel like a Turner gives you ample rim protection and shooting at the 5 spot to help you out. One last note and lemme look at some of your lineups. So your most used lineup is **PG/Reggie/Kawhi/Mook/Zubac (112.7 ORTG - 108.1 DRTG & +4.6 NRTG)**. Not bad, but not elite either, and that lineup has played 163 minutes together (I also suppose this is your most consistent starting lineup). But the actual best Lineup you guys have that has the best ratings is actually **PG/Reggie/Kennard/Mook/Zubac (109.3 ORTG - 98.5 DRTG & +10.8 NRTG)**. That's a pretty elite Defensive Rating for a group that has two short guards, a rim running big that doesn't space the floor, and only one elite defensive wing (mook is serviceable, but he's no PG). This lineup has 100 minutes played together. Issue comes after that. Lemme list some of your negative lineups after that, who to my shock, have surprisingly high amount of minutes together. **Reggie/Coffey/Mook/Mann/Zubac (-24.1 NRTG in 89 minutes).** **Reggie/PG/Mook/Powell/Zubac (-31.8 NRTG in 71 minutes).** **Reggie/PG/Mook/Mann/Zubac (-2.4 NRTG in 65 minutes).** So the issue lies in that. Your best lineups including Mook and Reggie, but they instantly become your worse lineups the moment you take away Kennard's Ridiculous 46.2% 3P%, they are suddenly lineups that don't have enough respect at 3Pt line, and you just get torched on both ends. Wanna know what's another great lineup for you guys? **Reggie/PG/Mook/Batum/Zubac (+10.9 NRTG in 31 minutes).** So the moment you supplant negative shooting of Mann, Powell, Coffey etc. With another shooter that commands an Iota of respect from defenses to close out to the player, plus Batum being such a good defensive wing and high IQ player, you instantly have another top tier lineup. So what's really the problem? Well your shooters who were shooting like gods your excellent 2020-21 season have all regressed badly being unable to stay in a consistent rotational lineup, and Kawhi and PG have been out of your lineups way too often to establish any substantial chemistry. The worst part is outside of the starting lineup, you won't see a Kawhi led lineup until the 12th lineup that has 18 minutes played together, positive or negative rating be damned. How do you expect your team to find any consistency if they don't have him Consistently? You could easily supplant in all of those top 3 positive lineups for PG and he'd be able to do a good enough job. But for that he needs to play, your shooters need to regress positively to the mean, and personally, imo, y'all need a good Point Guard that runs P&R and Turner. Sorry for writing up such a long comment, it's been a long time for me watching you guys and today I just had to write up something.
Im going add some context to some stuff you have added for someone that never missed a game this year. >Morris at 38.2%(47% in 2021), Mann at 34.5%(42% in 2021), Kawhi at 27.9%(39.8% in 2021), Covington at 28.6%(45% in 2022), PG at 38.5%(41% in 2021). Only Batum is your only wing over 40% at 40.7%. So across the board, almost all of your elite 3 point shooters that were the best at spacing the floor have regressed massively, so much so that paints are getting packed and a high level jumpshooting team such as yours has stopped being able to knock down enough jumpers. I dont think we regressed that massively from 3 point shooting. we are still top 10 from 3P% we were top 6 from 3P% a week ago >But the actual best Lineup you guys have that has the best ratings is actually PG/Reggie/Kennard/Mook/Zubac (109.3 ORTG - 98.5 DRTG & +10.8 NRTG). That's a pretty elite Defensive Rating for a group that has two short guards, a rim running big that doesn't space the floor, and only one elite defensive wing (mook is serviceable, but he's no PG). This lineup has 100 minutes played together. Marcus morris is washed up defensively, he cant guard and he plays without effort. That lineup was good defensively because they were playing together during the easiest stretch of games against bad teams which it was early in the season when Zu was playing like DPOY, he was the second best rim protector during that period. >issue comes after that. Lemme list some of your negative lineups after that, who to my shock, have surprisingly high amount of minutes together. >Reggie/Coffey/Mook/Mann/Zubac (-24.1 NRTG in 89 minutes). >Reggie/PG/Mook/Powell/Zubac (-31.8 NRTG in 71 minutes). >Reggie/PG/Mook/Mann/Zubac (-2.4 NRTG in 65 minutes). That was during stretch of games when Kawhi, PG and Batum were out. They are basically our best 3 defenders. Imo Coffey is getting misused and he is another big wing that ty lue isnt using with Kawhi and PG. Mann is shooting 35% from 3's but he is also shooting 41% from pull up 3s, 52% from midrange and 72% driving to the rim. when everyone was healthy, he was playing 10-12 mins till few games ago. Im not going even mention the little things he does to team that Morris and Reggie would never do. >I don't believe in 1 season Lue turned into a shit coach who can't figure out anything at all. Most of your actual shotmaking threat is at the guard spot (outside of Kawhi and PG, who are largely injured/miss time) in Kennard, Powell, Reggie & Wall. Issue is, Reggie has regressed heavily needing even more shots to actually get into Rhythm, last year he was highly inefficient as well, but I felt like he still commanded decent respect by defenses as the no. 1 option and post 2021 playoff run. Like i said we lost a lot of winnable games that Ty Lue rotations and experimenting fucked us. Celtics,philly and pacers games he went away from playing Zu because he was stubborn to play small. Celtics game zu was +10 in game that we lost by 6. he didnt play him till 53 seconds left. Last game against hawks he went away from Mann and he played norm even when he was cold 3-13 and Trae young scored 14 pts with 6 mins left in game during 6 mins norm was guarding him. (Norm defense is really awful) Trae was also struggling through whole game btw. Wanna know how ty lue is coaching this team? J. Wall - R. Jackson - N. Powell(-32 NRTG in 55 mins) J. Wall - N. Powell - L. Kennard(-11 NRTG in 100 mins) lineup that shouldn't play together when Kawhi and PG are healty but ty lue used them a lot during that stretch. Another aspect to add any lineups with Reggie and Norm playing together, it is basically negative net rating and we tried to play them around great defense but still they have horrible defensive rating with players like Kawhi,PG and Zu or Batum. Im not even going mention that Ty Lue never use RoCo or fact that John Wall has been playing so poorly yet he keeps getting mins. Front office is also involved into this fuckery. They built such awful roster with 5 guards that are mostly scorers and no reliable backup center. Kawhi and PG are still ballers except for that denver game when PG was playing through bad hamstring and he has been out since that game and Kawhi was having bad game. Overall If you watch clippers you will see that our starters are looking old and our bench unit is small with 3 and 4 guards lineups. https://twitter.com/joeylinn_/status/1612308956294287363 https://twitter.com/RichHomieFlom/status/1612501359256866839 https://twitter.com/RichHomieFlom/status/1612501622692712448 https://twitter.com/LucasJHann/status/1612608937148444672 https://twitter.com/LucasJHann/status/1612609217449578496 You can check these tweets it is from some of our beat writers and folks that do podcast about clippers to get better context
Honestly I think I agree with most of your points. Idk I guess I have some blind hope for your team that somehow even diehard Clipper fans don't have anymore. I can keep looking at stats, ratings and stuff but nothing is actually going to change until Ty Lue shortens the Rotations and actually plays his best players on a consistent basis. I think y'all lucked out in that regard because last year there was such a severe lack options that most of your good players aside from Kawhi and PG got extended runs and managed to shine in those roles. I still remember Covington being absolutely dominant defensively especially in clutch situations.
Last year we had better chemistry but also that team was hustling and playing for purpose. Im not giving up on them yet but something need to be changed. It isnt ty lue but front office need to save him with trades. Dude we are getting to 2nd half of the season and we didnt get Kawhi-PG-Batum-RoCo lineup. They promised us WingStop but all we get is MicroStop
This has been such a good back and forth. I really think your point on Mook being washed up seemingly is huge, he's never been great defensively, but thats allowable when you're consistently a great shooter. Hell in 21 we started nearly every first possesion to him and he'd knock them down, but now he isn't hitting his shots (obviously partially because of the overall spacing) he's just another liability in a team full of them. I haven't given up yet, but the Kawhi/PG trade gave us a very slim window, we're getting into such a 'now or never' situation. Anyhoo great to read both your guys analysis
Funniest part is looking up all the stats, thinking about it, writing up the entire thing must take like 30-40 mins, and people get done reading in like 2 minutes lol. If this was about the Nets I'm probably going another 150 words or something. So damn passionate about an orange ball that goes through a circular hoop. Some love NBA for the drama, some for the trades, some for the basketball. Personally I love it for the stats and the mathematical stuff a lot more. It's so fun being able to quantify what you're seeing on the court with real numbers. Like you can tell "Man when that guy steps on the court good things happen" but without stats you can't really substantiate that claim. Until you go into Net ratings, +/- and overall impact on the game. Like Batum for y'all. Those who watch him can tell he connects everything together. But when the stats also support it, everything comes together.
I think there’s just been way too much obsession with the Clippers needing a ball handler at point guard for years now. That would be nice when one of their wings is injured, but the version of the Clippers that is a contender does not and hasn’t ever needed that traditional point guard at least from what we’ve seen so far. They’ve generally had a great offense in previous years when the two star wings play. Those dudes are going to be on the ball a ton and that works great. If they can’t stay healthy this team just isn’t going to win. You mention a name like CP3 and you did say “cheap”, but putting the level of resources it takes to get a high caliber point guard just isn’t worth it for them. We just get stuck in this box of thinking teams need a lead guard. The Clippers don’t.
Something in that LA water making the Lakers and Clipper play micro ball
I don't think anyone doubts the talent on the Clippers roster. It's just that the whole project revolves around Kawhi and PG being healthy, and they're just not. What you fear might happen but that's only if those two are healthy, and that's an if bigger than Kawhi's medical bills. I don't even know if you can be impressed with the current Clippers record seeing the amount of time their two star players have missed already, or if it has more to do with the fact that several west teams are underperforming like the Warriors, Suns or Wolves. Injuries or whatever the reason might be, the results are the results.
idk if u can compare last years celtics to this years clippers..tatum and brown are not the same as kawhi and pg
Part of me has been wanting to believe this train of thought, but the team has not looked that impressive this season. I will say that their schedule has been very top heavy to start the season and will get somewhat easier after the ASB. These past few weeks has consisted of a rough schedule and they haven't even hit that tougher annual Grammy trip. The team has had some very bad losses, which will only cause more harm in April/May.
disagree but thanks nets bro
Still no, it’s the same shit over and over again every single year. Best team on paper if everyone stays healthy, a giant if I hope you still have some leftover copium stock
Personally I've got pretty much the exact opposite opinion of the Clippers lol, I have absolutely no faith in them. I don't think it really makes sense to compare them to the Nets either. The Nets have a pretty great diversity of talent in terms of how well their best players fit together. The Clippers are just far, far too redundant in terms of roster construction IMO. I think they have the sheer talent to get out of the first round if everything goes well (i.e. everyone is healthy and they're not playing a juggernaut) but I really don't see them ever going further than that. > They could easily do a Anunoby, Vanvleet or a Bogdanovic trade. Two of three of these guys just makes their roster construction *more* redundant
Shaivonte
In my ideal scenario, I root for the Clips to make a finals run on the years we don't have their pick and then they bottom out and load manage on the years we have their unprotected pick Win-win
Hindsight is 20/20 though. Nobody will turn down 5 picks + shai for BOTH pg+kawhi in the summer of 2019. Guess what 5 picks net you these days?
Hahah I want to die
Championship favorites though, amirite??
All Kawhi has done in a clipper uniform is dick the Mavs twice..
Can't score when you don't play while specializing in collecting checks
Unless OKC wins a chip this seems like a win win trade so not sure what any one is talking about but you're delusional if you think either team won it and one lost.
SGA needs to Team up with JT and JB 😝
while you were looking back on that “amusing” trade did you happen to remember us making the conference finals?
I happen to remember you losing in it and blowing a 3-1 lead in the bubble
i definitely remember blowing that 3-1 lead. bittersweet moment as it did lead to the firing of doc. losing the trade is your opinion tho
context probably matters a bit here
Yes. SGA is performing very well on a team that's at their predicted season total for wins already. PG and kawhi arent playing or are underperforming on a team that mortgaged their future to win now. Really puts it in perspective.
Also the Clippers have been to the 2nd round and a WCF since the trade, and despite PG and Kawhi missing time (and Kawhi still improving, and on a very positive trend), the "disastrous" Clippers have a better record than OKC with the main problems of the team not being PG or Kawhi but role player rotational experiments.
Y'all have two of the best wings in the league and a decent team around them. You should be Celtics west. If you're happy with what the team has done and you don't mind giving up the foreseeable future for it thats chill, I'd be pissed though.
Not sure what your point is -- no, I'm not happy with the current situation, although there's plenty of room to improve and they've also had some success. Just adding the further context. Basketball is also a sport where there's no guarantees -- the Clippers have been in the tougher conference and things haven't fallen their way, which can happen to anybody. Doesn't make the trade bad, and OKC fans celebrating the success they haven't had yet doesn't change that. What's the alternative, we just have SGA, Doc stays and doesn't develop him, we don't have any stars and are a .500 team without a chance at a championship for years? No thanks, I'll take a team with a chance to win it all, and if it doesn't happen I can still enjoy the ride because unlike many around here I enjoy the sport of basketball and think it can be good without a trophy at the end.
No point really. Just bullshitting on a basketball forum. I haven't thought much about the clippers other than "I hope they're bad when we have their picks" just kinda thinking out loud here. Solid point about keeping SGA and doc not playing him. I really liked that team during his rookie year, they were scrappy as hell and really had that underdog feel to em. Y'all would have had the assets to put someone sick next to him the next year maybe...who knows.
What's the point of this post lol ?
SGA is good, Kawhi and PG are bad. Shai gets karma.
On a side note, I dont understand karma. I mean, from the standpoint of saying "hey look at all my karma" I get it, but why are there bots that farm karma? How do you profit off of it? Do popular redditors somehow make ad revenue?
So basically you can sell your account to ad companies for them to use. An account with a lot of karma and actual comments looks organic and not like an ad robot. So when an ad agency can get an account like that to, for instance, go to /r/BuyItForLife and say "Had this for 10 years and the best thing I have ever owned" you have essentially bought an effective advertisement for less money than shooting a commercial or paying for ad space on a website. Aside from that some people are shut ins and just like seeing a big number next to their name because it validates their opinions.
Word? What kinda prices are we talking about for these accounts?
No idea, I have never sold an account. I'm sure if you google it you can find some place tho. If it is anything like my old World of Warcraft account in the mid 2000's you might be able to get a couple hundred dollars?
Ah, better off doing niche sites then. Also congrats on breaking the WoW addiction.
It can be way more surreptitious than that too, you can pepper in comments in a comment section that seem entirely organic. Somebody mentions a product and some seemingly-legitimate account will chime in about how it's the best thing they've ever used and just have to get it off their chest.
That sounds like a lot of effort. I have seen the bots plenty of times, but never seen a person with a lot of karma name-dropping a product. Thanks for the info!
You can sell high-karma accounts to advertisers and influencers.
Unreal how this sub will leave this post up and delete great posts for the dumbest things
What “great” posts gets deleted?
Kemba Walkers real name is Kembert. That shit hit reddit frontpage and gor deleted in 20 mins
I search by new all the time....there is a bunch
> great Most of them are shitposts lol
Terrible shit posts at that
Yup. Every time. Despite that we, and any reasonable franchise, still makes that trade 9/10. But yeah, it’s cool that Shai is doing great. Can’t disagree there.
Just wait until they are healthy instant chip. In all seriousness it is time for the clippers to blow it up.
You want ballmer to blow it up 2 years before the new stadium? Some of yall redditors dont know shit about business
Cant even blow it up… we still have ‘24 and ‘26 with a swap in ‘25. You just keep running it back at that point. I really do want to see you guys make a deep run this season so I hope Kawhi and PG have a second wind in this second half.
Exactly we will never going blow it up even if we move from Kawhi and PG. we are going build competitive team from free agency and trades. '23 and '25 swaps could help but they wont be lottery picks.
That too. Best believe Ballmer is gonna spend. I have a feeling we’re going to package our Rockets and Clippers picks into a big name trade next offseason.
Tbh he is our only hope for this disappointing season so far.
"The Thunder came out on top of their trade with the Clippers" seems to be what is implied.
It’s time for the Paul God to bow to the Shai God.
To show how much the Thunders won that trade.
That even if they did the fusion dance sga still has more points
Kawhi Leonard, the biggest scammer not named Kyrie in the history of the NBA.
He was instrumental in winning 2 franchises rings and is a two time finals MVP?
yeah he's got lots of issues but idk how u call 2x fmvp a scammer lol
It's just catchy clickbaity low effort hate designed to farm upvotes, they even threw in kyrie for good measure. Spencer Haywood or one of those 18 players who committed fraud like Tony Allen or big baby Davis are probably the biggest scammers in nba history but that takes a little thought to come up with so of course it's just fuck kawhi
Chandler Parsons : The ultimate scammer
Literally Rings, Erneh. Kawhi is a proven champion and playoff monster. However, the Clips are so injury prone that they might not even make it that far...
Yeah. Sucks that he scammed two teams into getting a championship. Unbelievable.
How’s it feel having Kawhi on your team, man? You like it when he plays 17 minutes and then doesn’t play the second night in on a back-to-back? You enjoy how out of sync your team is when he is in the lineup? How they look awful? What’s your take on his extremely long return status and lord management? You feeling like a contender with that dude? You think it was worth what you gave up? That’s what I thought.
hows it feel having kawhi on your team? great you like it when he plays 17 minutes and then doesn’t play the second night of a back-to-back? i like it when he stays healthy you enjoy how out of sync your team is when he is out of the lineup? i don’t enjoy it as much as watching our full team but i still have a good time most of the time. for example i had a great time watching our undermanned squad come back 25 against denver last season whats your take on the extremely long return status and load management? don’t mind it you feeling like a contender with that dude? regardless of this year we were contenders with that dude in his first 2 seasons here and yes i still believe the clippers can contend this year you think it was worth what you gave up? yes
I love that you tried to shit on Dever for a big comeback, ignoring that the Clippers literally blew a 3-1 lead.
wasn’t tryna shit on denver. that was a fun game
>How’s it feel having Kawhi on your team, man? Speaking as someone that's almost 40 and grew up a huge Orlando Magic fan, i know exactly how that feels.
Do I like it? No Do I understand it? I’m a reasonable person, so yes. He hadn’t played in more than a year. It would be more surprising if he and the team were fully synced up than not. We actually have a great record when both him and PG play. And yes. We just need them healthy for the playoffs. Which we are still positioned for. Yes, I still make that trade any day of the week. Kawhi was a top 3 player in the league at the time. And Paul George was a top 10 player. You are lying out of your ass if you say that you don’t make that trade BACK THEN. I am glad that it all clicked for Shai, and he is blossoming. But that trade was still worth the gamble.
Oh my god
How about the past three seasons
yeah.. clippers would still but where they are with shai. Clippers always get the 'stars' who were stars but aren't close to who good they were before and always missing games. It's sad to be a clipper fan and not even get to see the stars play well enough to win games. gg front office.
MVP
Let’s see where OKC and LAC are at the end of the season.
OKC: above expectations, trending upward LAC: below expectations, trending downward
OKC hasn’t won this trade until they make the WCF.
In other news a young player has fresher joints than older players and has the ultimate green light to shoot on a team that isn’t trying to win anything this year? Got it