tephen Dunn/Getty ImagesAfter beating the Heat, the Clippers have reason to celebrate their notable growth over last season.LOS ANGELES — A relative calm has settled over the Los Angeles Clippers. It’s a little disarming. There’s no talk of supernatural curses that cause freak injuries, or Vinny Del Negro’s job security, or whether pending free agent Chris Paul will bolt for greener pastures at season’s end.
Instead, the Clippers have been quietly going about their business.
Los Angeles Clippers forward Blake Griffin will start Wednesday night against the San Antonio Spurs despite having a burst bursa sac in his right elbow and a neck strain, Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro said Tuesday.
The Los Angeles Clippers are one of the deepest teams in the league, which means Vinny Del Negro can manage his players’ minutes.
Kate Fagan has written a fantastic story on ESPNW about the Clippers’ new video intern, Natalie Nakase, who is vastly overqualified for her current position, but sought the gig, like many do, because it’s a foot in the door for someone with big aspirations.
In Nakase’s case, she aspires to be groundbreaking female coach in the NBA.
She got the internship by being about as persistent, hard-working and opportunistic as one can be. She eventually impressed several members of the Clippers’ staff, who wanted to offer her a position.
Blake Griffin injured his left knee during a scrimmage with Team USA on Thursday afternoon. However, this unfortunate accident might not be the worst thing for the young superstar’s career.
The Los Angeles Clippers PF initially tweaked the same knee during the 2012 postseason and elected not to have offseason surgery after the San Antonio Spurs eliminated his team in the Western Conference semis.
Instead of getting the knee repaired and taking some time off, Griffin began preparations to play for Team USA. Chairman Jerry Colangelo suggested this is likely the cause of the torn meniscus.
“The reality is, that injury took place at the end of the season,” Colangelo said. “And he had an option to get scoped and he opted not to get scoped. And so, I guess he aggravated it. Whether he’s able to play now remains to be seen.”
It was later reported that Griffin would miss the Olympics. While this news may be devastating to the 23-year-old and his dreams of bringing glory to his country, it has to be almost relieving to the Clippers.
Instead of dealing with yet another severe injury to a familiar spot (Griffin was forced to miss the entirety of 2009-10 with a broken left kneecap) that may have happened during the regular season, Blake will have plenty of time to recuperate and prepare for the upcoming year.
Clips coach Vinny Del Negro certainly doesn’t seem to mind that Griffin will not be heading to London.
“We’re relieved that this does not affect Blake’s ability to be ready in time for training camp,” Del Negro said in a statement. “Missing out on the Olympic experience will be tough for him to take. I know how dedicated he was to doing that. We’re glad we can get this fixed now and take advantage of the available time for him to fully recover.”
By getting this injury to his unhealthy knee out of the way in the offseason, Griffin can now undergo proper medical treatment and a full rest and rehabilitation period, rather than putting rigorous and repeated stress on his legs.
It should pay dividends when the Clips prepare for another postseason run in 2013.
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Lamar Odom is officially a member of the Los Angeles Clippers, but the questions about his career really have yet to be answered.
Odom was traded by the Dallas Mavericks after an absolutely disastrous 2012 season where he only appeared in 50 games while averaging 20 minutes and 6.6 points per game. Injuries were not the issue, but Odom’s heart was.
He was disinterested, despondent and demoted to the NBA D-League during the year. Things even got so bad that Odom was de-activated after run-ins with the coaching staff and Mavs owner, Mark Cuban.
So, what does he have left? Is this a ticking time bomb for a Clippers team that doesn’t yet have strong infrastructure around coach Vinny Del Negro?
Or, is Odom’s versatility a godsend for a team that was desperately shallow behind Blake Griffin, DeAndre Jordan and Caron Butler? Odom’s multiple skill sets and combination of size and speed could be perfect for spelling all three of those returning starters.
NBA Featured Columnist Joel C. Cordes and NBA Assistant Editor Ethan Norof debate whether Odom’s return to L.A. is the next step for the Clippers or just a giant stumbling block.
You can catch these guys and more NBA free agency coverage on the Court Vision blog’s Basketball by Association podcast.
Be sure to sound off and let us know what you think in the comments below. If you like what you see, click here for more from Bleacher Report Productions.
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The Oklahoma City Thunder isn’t down 2-1 in the NBA Finals because of their coach. The team is down 2-1 because LeBron James has turned into some unholy amalgamation of Magic Johnson and Charles Barkley, and because Shane Battier has decided that he is really, really good at hitting three-pointers from both the wing and top of the key. And it’s not completely unreasonable for the Miami Heat — defending Eastern conference champions and owners of a regular season record that would have fetched 58 wins in a typical 82-game run, to be up 2-1 after three hotly contested Finals games.
This doesn’t mean Brooks is supposed to get off cleanly after the way he mishandled his team’s rotation in Game 3, especially in light of the news that Brooks and his representatives actually turned down a three-year and $11 million contract extension as reported by Yahoo! Sports’ Adrian Wojnarowski . Brooks has been criticized more than any other coach in this postseason, save for perhaps the oft-maligned Vinny Del Negro of the Los Angeles Clippers, and for good reason. And the man’s work in sitting both Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook during the last five minutes of the third quarter leaves him more than open for us to pick things apart.
Because though the Thunder only finished the third quarter down 69-67, the Heat basically turned the game around with a 15-3 run with Durant and Westbrook on the bench. Unless you count Derek Fisher’s four-point play. Which we don’t. Because it was awful. And because Brooks didn’t exactly draw it up.
A look around the league and the web that covers it. It’s also important to note that the rotation order and starting nods aren’t always listed in order of importance. That’s for you, dear reader, to figure out.
C : Reuters . OKC co-owner Aubrey McClendon sure does write off a lot of personal stuff as “business expenses.” He also appears to be the sort of guy that forwards you a ton of emails you don’t want to read. ( Via Ananth Pandian .)
PF : Hardwood Hype . Holy cow, an exhaustive list ranking the top 50 Lakers of all time.
SF : Deadspin . ‘The Problem with the Basketball Hero Industry.’ Thank you.
SG : The Point Forward . All eyes on Vinny Del Negro. Uh oh.
PG : The New Yorker . ‘The New Neuroscience of Choking.’ Mama Cass could not be reached for comment.
ESPN’s Kevin Arnovitz has many stories related to the Clippers and all their bizarre palace intrigue, and now reports the following:
Just filed to ESPN.com: Neil Olshey will not be returning to Clippers. Sources close to negotiations say he’ll be POR GM.
— Kevin Arnovitz (@kevinarnovitz) June 5, 2012
Olshey is leaving Los Angeles for Portland, running into the arms of an owner who communicates via octopus gesticulations (via Yahoo!). He will fill a general managing void that has lasted 377 days, according to Ben Golliver of Blazersedge. This opens up a Blazers-esque vacancy in Clipperland.
In this case, the sequence seems to be,
It would seem, at a glance, that Del Negro’s continued presence might have something to do with Olshey’s departure. Considering that Neil Olshey is fresh off bringing Chris Paul to one of the most maligned franchises in the history of sports, his fleeing might speak to just how dysfunctional and disinterested in winning the House of Sterling really is.
If you have to choose between Del Negro and almost any GM, it really shouldn’t be a choice. I rarely judge coaches so harshly from afar, but Vinny’s sideline antics were the final straw. Less than a year ago, the Clippers were building something with a Blake-CP3 foundation. After a second round playoff journey, that foundation is cracking.
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There are a few coaches in the NBA who have been fired this year. Flip Saunders, Mike D’Antoni and Nate McMillan have all filed for unemployment. Stan Van Gundy is now at the back of the line.
Some of them deserved it. Maybe not all of them though. However there are some coaches who are inexplicably holding onto their jobs in spite of woeful performances this season.
Often we look at teams with losing records and say, “bad coaching” and then look at teams that had winning coaches and say “good coaching.”
That’s not always accurate. Chris Paul’s former coach, Monte Williams coached circles around Vinny Del Negro, Paul’s new coach, this year. The Hornets may have the top draft choice while the Clippers made it to the second round of the finals, but that’s a distinction in player differences, not coaching difference.
If you understand basketball, and if you watched the Hornets this year, this seemingly paradoxical sentence makes sense. The New Orleans Hornets played better losing than the Los Angeles Clippers did winning.
If you adjust the 66 game schedule to an 82-game schedule then the Hornets won an equivalent of 27 games this year compared to the Clippers 32 games last year—what the Clippers had with Blake Griffin and Eric Gordon.
So either Eric Gordon and Blake Griffin combined are worth a meager five games or Monty Williams is a much better coach than Vinny Del Negro.
Del Negro offers little to nothing in defensive or offensive strategy and offers less than nothing in terms of player development. While with Chicago he did not develop Luol Deng or Joakim Noah. He did not even do much with Derrick Rose.
In the two years that Tom Thibodueau has taken over, all those players have blossomed and grown exponentially compared to when Del Negro was coaching.
Look at Greg Popovich and the San Antonio Spurs. Pops has one player who was drafted in the lottery. Everyone else is non-lottery picks and waiver-wire pickups. Yet the Spurs are considered to be the deepest team in the league.
Why? Because of player development. When you look at all the deeper teams you see a consistent theme. Players that were not considered anything special became special.
I know it is awfully demanding to ask a coach to, well…coach…but Del Negro does not do it. It is a cruel practical joke on Clippers fans that he has been renewed instead of fired.
Another coach who should be shown the exit door is Avery Johnson.
Since becoming head coach of the New Jersey Nets he has shown what many suspected but could not prove when he coached the Dallas Mavericks. Namely, his coaching success was the byproduct of having inherited a winning team.
In the two years he has coached the New Jersey Nets he has amassed a .310 winning percentage. Can I get a booya!?
It is increasingly clear that Johnson is one of those coaches that just does little more than occupy space on the bench. This version of the Nets stunk up New Jersey. It is a good thing for them the Devils are there. Technically, the Giants are too I guess.
The Nets were 23rd in offensive rating and 28th in defensive rating. Based on their SRS (Simple Rating System that Basketball-Reference uses) they were the 28th “best” team in the league.
This is a team which boasted one of the top players in the league, Deron Williams. They mortgaged their future to try and convince him that they could win. Then they promptly went out and sucked. There is really no kind way to put it.
Now because Johnson cannot coach defense any better than he can coach offense, and he cannot coach a lick of offense, the Nets do not have a draft pick this year, they do not have a franchise player and they do not have a future.
At least they have a new stadium in Brooklyn though.
Finally, Mike Brown was hired by the Lakers this year and he showed at least, a basic grasp of defense. The Lakers were not a bad team, but they were not a great team, which is what they should have been.
Brown was to committed to letting Kobe Bryant run the show he wanted. At times, it just starts to feel like Bryant is more intent on catching Michael Jordan than he is on winning games. Maybe he is. Maybe he isn’t, but it feels that way at times watching Bryant endless hurl up shots.
Meanwhile the Lakers have not one, but two (count ‘em) seven-footers who can score the ball. Combined they shot the ball just 27.4 times per game to 23.0 times that Bryant shot the ball by himself.
Pau Gasol shot .501 from the field and Andrew Bynum shot .558.
Granted you cannot get all of your shots inside and there are those who want to oversimplify the game and want to put a ban on ever taking a 16-foot jump shot from now unto eternity. I do not want to make it out that somehow Bryant should not be shooting at all, and every shot should go through Bynum and Gasol.
However the offense should work more inside-out than outside-in than it was. Using Bryant to stretch the floor is one thing. Overusing Bryant at the expense of an efficient offense is another.
The ratio should be closer to 30 shots for Gasol and Bynum to 20 shots for Bryant.
The reason it is not is a flawed design in the offense. The flaw in the design of the offense is mostly that there is no design to the offense. Brown wants to make Bryant the LeBron James of Los Angeles. Give him the ball and stay out of the way.
This is the NBA, not the YMCA. Even Kobe Bryant can be stopped if there is no real system in place.
Other than those three, there might be some other coaches who are on probation this year, such as Mark Jackson or Lawrence Frank, but they have not had sufficient opportunity to succeed yet so the losing cannot be blamed on them.
Vinny Del Negro, Avery Johnson and Mike Brown though had more talent than success. They show little ability to develop players. They show a lack of aptitude on one side of the court, the other, or both. They need to be fired.
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