No, it wasn’t last week when Blake Griffin slugged his buddy, equipment manager Matias Testi, who barely comes up to his shoulder. It goes all the way back to Doc Rivers’ arrival in the 2013-14 season that ended with Donald Sterling igniting himself, streaking across the sky like a fireball and disappearing from their sight forever. If that seemed like a good thing for the Clippers, it marked their zenith. They have been devolving ever since Steve Ballmer paid $2 billion for
If Laker fans hope—actually, expect—a fast turnaround, last week’s draft that brought D’Angelo Russell and two more of the top 34 picks was a reminder how tricky the process is going to be. The announcement of Russell’s selection at No. 2 prompted cries of anguish from the half of Lakerdom that wanted Jahlil Okafor. The Los Angeles Times’ Bill Plaschke kept from passing out long enough to tweet, “wow… crazy… wow… unreal… you’ve got to be kidding.” No, they were serious. The Lakers
Donald T. Sterling Sterling World Plaza Beverly Hills, Calif. 90210 Dear Donald, How the heck are you? Long time, no see. Oh gosh, I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. We miss you, or at least I do. After decades covering you as Clipper owner, where will I ever get another one like you? It’s a year since you, uh, left. I know how badly you must miss your guys. As to whether anyone ever asks about you, uh, well, not really a lot. I’m sure they they remember you
A funny thing happened on the Clippers’ way to continued ignominy. Imagine finishing the season on a 14-1 surge that takes you to the third seed in the brutal Western Conference and finding yourself facing the sixth-seeded booby prize, the defending NBA champion San Antonio Spurs, who are favored in the series opener on your floor. What else is new? As one buzzard said to another, “I’ve been having Clipper luck.” Oh, you say the Clippers won? Fairy tales can come true; they just
The envelope for the MVP of the 2015-15 NBA season, please…. There’s a hush in the hall as the camera pans over the anxious faces of Steph Curry, James Harden, LeBron James, Russell Westbrook, Anthony Davis, Chris Paul, LaMarcus Aldridge, John Wall, Kyle Lowry, Derrick Favors, Eric Bledsoe, Boogie Cousins–yes, extra security is standing by in case he doesn’t win–and the entire Atlanta starting five with their arms entwined, befitting their status as a collective entry. Oh, and Kobe Bryant! The standards aren’t
Why is the trade deadline different from all other nights of the year? It’s not. The West just got tougher. In the East, where there’s no life-or-death importance attached to getting better, the top teams sat this one out while the bad teams—your Knicks and 76ers—dumped, shut down or otherwise disposed of their best players in order to tank more definitively. [Read more…]
When the NBA has had father-son stories, the dad always watched from the stands like Joe Bryant, Rick Barry and Stan Love; or from the other bench like George Karl and Mike Dunleavy Sr. Now comes Doc Rivers, who’s not only watching 22-year-old Austin, but putting him in and subbing him out as the first man in the NBA to coach his son. It’s at least a little awkward, if only in a domestic comedy sense. Having acquired his child in his role
LOS ANGELES — Doc Rivers has seen challenges before, as when he went 102-144 in his first three seasons in Boston, before Danny Ainge got him Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen to go with Paul Pierce. The rest became Celtics history, leading to their 2008 title and the one they came so close to in 2010 when they led the Lakers by 13 in the second half of Game 7. Not that the Celtics had been forgotten before that… as much as