How the Clippers Became The NBA’s Biggest Losers

How the Clippers Became The NBA’s Biggest Losers

the only things that are guaranteed are death taxes and the Clippers being knocked out before the NBA Finals 5 years after the move that brought the Battle of LA to the mainstream that storyline has completely disappeared along with the future hopes of this team this PG Kawai era much like the lb City era before them has been demolished by choke Jabs untimely injuries and unlikely circumstances that always seem to keep the little brother team in Los Angeles from ever becoming a legitimate threat and despite maintaining some of the NBA’s brightest talents the last 15 years the Clippers have maintained being one of the NBA’s biggest losers with their current collection of talent now fading fast the world has quickly noticed that these timelines no longer align Westbrook has turned into pretty unplayable piece on playoff time James Harden is just as bad as he always is in the postseason and Kawai seems to have booked his trip for Cancun every playoffs as failure after failure is stacked up not only does PG seem ready to pack his bags out of his home City and get away from this deadend team but the whole world seems to have gotten fed up with the team that even when everything seems to be going right ends up going so so wrong the Clippers are not only a sorry franchise that’s likely going to fall into misery in the near future the Clippers from their Inception are one of the sorest franchises in sports in controversies small and large missteps and boneheaded errors a flurry of bad luck and the dream of taking over basketball’s biggest Market has caused The Underdogs of LA to turn into nothing more than Eternal losers since the beginning the Clippers have been atrociously bad Underachievers and I mean since the beginning of 1970 is the Buffalo Braves under star Bob McAdoo and Hall of Fame coaching Jack Ramsey the Braves never managed to make it pass the second round like every other team in franchise history and after multiple years the playoff under performances the Braves would let go of Coach Ramsey before he would go take home the championship the very next year with the Portland Trailblazers in his first season free of Buffalo but upon the disposition of one Hall of Famer the Braves quickly got their hands on another acquiring Moses Malone from the ABA expansion draft in 1976 despite being an All-Star level player as a rookie in the ABA the 30 and 52 Braves decided to give the best player on their team three minutes a game in the two games he played and as he rightfully complained about riding the bench as a 21-year-old who’s already one of the best players in the NBA he would be traded to Houston for winning three MVPs in the next six years which is pretty hilarious the Clippers were the worst manag team in the league running through three coaches the season alone before they were even the Clippers this was far from the only Monumental slip up in this year alone as the Saving Grace of the Braves a 25-year-old Center who had finished top two in MVP voting in three out of his first four seasons as well as taking home the only MVP trophy in franchise history and probably eding his name is the goat of this entire franchise was flipped for pennies on the dollar after moving on from one of the best centers of va time just a few months prior for next to nothing but the Braves had one more in them all of Famer Adrien Dantley had a little bit too good of a rookie year putting up 20 game at 21 years old and of course had to be moved as well pulling off to repeat of three Hall of Famers being moved for next to nothing in one year if there’s anything that is deserving a lifelong curse I think it may be that the brave the bed worse than Amber herd in their short existence moving on from three all Fame talents and a Hall of Fame coach and a calendar year the real Clippers curse began at the 78th season to follow as at the end of the season the team would move to the opposite side of the country to set up shop in Sunny San Diego under the new identity as a Clippers named after some stupid boat or something more importantly this move not only marked the start of a new team but the real start of the Clippers curse is after their three straight second round exits in the mid 70s the Clippers wouldn’t make another playoff Run for the next 14 years it’s not like they have talent with guys like World be free making an All-Star appearance putting up nearly 30 a game during his time in San Diego but doing the right thing for him got the hell out of there and let the Clippers do their thing which included drafting future All Stars like Tom Chambers and Terry Cummings and shading away both of them before they had a chance to break out in historic Clippers fashion other than World be free the only real notable player during this time came with a monstrous contract to Bill Walton before foot injuries would completely sideline him for three seasons and completely ruin his career immediately after as he played Just 169 games averaging 12 points for the Clippers if you’re anything like me hearing about the dysfunction spanning this long is pretty puzzling going like 40 years without figuring it out but taking into account the new ownership in 1981 is Donald Sterling purchased the team for just $12.5 million it all starts to make a little more sense after promising to make the Clippers the pride of San Diego Sterling quickly went back on his word in pretty Sterling asque fashion proposing to move the team to his hometown of Los Angeles just one year later and after being rejected by the league Sterling was back getting rejected with the same proposal just two years after that but this time he wasn’t going to take no an answer being the only instance in NBA history Donald Sterling packs their bags and moved the teams to Los Angeles himself without the approval of the league launching a 25 milli lawsuit more so Centric on retaining San Diego’s team but as an attorney a counter suit against the NBA would conclude in a reduced fine to $6 million and more importantly the highway robbery allowing Sterling to steal the short tenard San Diego Basketball Club to pursue the more profitable route of building that diet Los Angeles Lakers with the Shady origins of the team’s tenure in Los Angeles the first few teams of the sorest franchise in basketball went about as good as you would expect them to go the additional Los Angeles Legend Elgen Baylor as a GM would not go according to plan although an all-time great player and one of the most underrated of all time dude was a flat out brutal GM beginning with a 1987 drafting of Reggie Williams and Joe wolf over Pippen and Kevin Johnson drafting Danny fer second overall in 1989 who refused to even play for the team the 1990 Edition selection of Bo Kimbell whose career went so poorly thought of offing himself and even the extreme unlucky additions of Danny Manning and Ron Harper suffered immediate injuries derailing their early days in their Clippers careers it wasn’t until 1992 after a decade and a half at tanking that the Clippers managed to turn the slightest Corner being knocked out of the 1992 and 1993 playoffs after Decades of rebuilding the best these guys were able to do was a mediocre 45 and 37 finish before being knocked out by Stockton Malone in the first round the Clippers with the little fan base built in seven years in Los Angeles went back to the drawing boards blowing up the team trading most of their valuable pieces for aging stars like Dominique Wilkins who quickly disappeared off the face of the Earth despite being aggressively tanking the Clippers really were not any good at it and entered the turn of the decade with a 30-year empty resume these guys really were the laughing stock of the league with the League War finished in 1998 being rewarded with an all-time draft bust in Michael oy although being quiet for the entirety of the decade the minuscule editions of entertaining talents in Quinton Richardson Elton br and Chris Cayman and Darius miles was enough to cultivate the first real noticeable fan base outside of people who couldn’t afford Lakers tickets having failed to find a Cornerstone piece the Clippers decades and Decades of misery would finally be somewhat turned around by what was thought to be the generational talent in Blake Griffin picked first overall in 2009 although the Clippers curse seemed to be in full swing as Griffin would be sidelined his entire rookie season the following year would truly be the beginning of a whole new era top MVP voting is a rookie in All-Star selection and one of the most memorable Dunk Contest moments in history even if it was kind of manufactured just to S key is Blake Griffin was instantly one of the best shows in basketball and instantly was the brightest piece of Clipper’s history since Bob madoo 35 years ago despite taking home the Rookie of the Year Trophy and instantly become one of the most popular players in the league there was still some major holes with this team although Blake skill set is highly underrated outside of his leaping ability with his really ugly but we l effective post-up game secretly Elite passing at his position and at here and there jump shot the Clippers surrounding pieces were just not there Eric Gordon was a decent secondary piece and Mo Williams was always pretty solid along with DeAndre Jordan surprisingly looking like the center of the future as a really good supporting piece covering all the Dirty Work the Clippers best playmaker was also the best pick and roller not named white Howard that’s a problem what would be a better way to fix it than snagging the best playmaker maker in the NBA for Eric Gordon Chris Cayman aluk aminu and a previously acquired first round pick the Clippers stole CP3 without having to give up anything too crazy in one move the Clippers instantly turned from a below average team to one of the best teams in the west and the best Clippers team since they were in Buffalo two major pick and roll threats with a unique Little twom Man game with Blake Griffin with some dribble handoff Tom FY mixed in this team seemed to be a few Shooters and Defenders away from NBA goals climbing to 40 and 26 in the lockout short in 2012 season the Clippers came out firing with a crazy comeback backed by Nick Young getting hot out of all people in the Lob City Cliff’s first playoff game together a tight win in a seven game series was a decent start to see this team put together the team would be knocked out by the Spurs who pretty severely outmatched them the following series but the following year was when the additional pieces to the puzzle started falling into place DeAndre Jordan began blossoming as an additional Ro man and the quarterback of the defense is a vocal leader and pretty talented anchor on that end the Clippers went from a Duo to still kind of a Duo but DeAndre was pretty good what made a bit more noise was the addition of Jamal Crawford and it benched up that this team was really lacking with a roster built on a few stars and then bums like Ronnie ter off Ryan Holland and post crack Lamar odm although Jamal Crawford is one of the most overrated players of this decade if your goal is to win games at least they had really no one else to create outside of CP so I’d still call it a pretty good addition at the time the Clippers with a very respectable 56- win season would snag the four seed in what was the battlefield of a western conference honestly it seemed like every season these middle seeds were the ones putting out Classics and this is no different rematching the grid and grind Grizzlies the Clippers jumped out to an early 20 lead on the back of cp’s play being as consistently solid as it gets highlighted by a game two game winner really building some steam for the future year unfortunately this would be the beginning of an ongoing Trend in playoff disappointments in LA City Blake Griffin playing on one leg and underperformance from key role players like Jamal Crawford who shot 38% from the field and basically the rest of their bench who the bed outside of map points although the talent on this team was ridiculous and totally crushed the gray on paper I can’t think of a team more built to Wi in playoff games in Memphis and the Clippers just simply were not really built for that at all so they got back into the office to move pieces together in one of the strangest moves of all time the Clippers would give up a second round pick to trade for the head coaching at Doc Rivers when his value was close to its highest as a talented team that lacked coaching giving up a second rounder to build a better system is kind of a cool move on paper that I’m kind of surprised more teams haven’t pulled the trigger on but in this instance the addition one of the most overrated coaches of his time didn’t exactly work to Perfection with a move that did move the skill didn’t involve Doc’s coaching but his work in the front office acquiring lights out two guard JJ reic for backup point guard Eric blitzo this was the single best addition that Lob City made outside of trading for Chris Paul as JJ reic added a whole new dimension to this offense that was strictly just a two-man game as a role player is more valuable than some low-level Stars JJ reck was one of those guys who could instantly make 30 teams better overnight one of the brightest sball players of all time who can navigate the wing as well as anyone shoot the piss out of the ball if it give him a smidge of daylight and demand attention off your off ball screen Setters who happen to be two of the best rollers in the NBA JJ although far from the most talented even compared to the guy he was starting over was somewhat of the final piece of the Lob City team and really made this group more of a cohesive big four and if Jamal Crawford happened to show up more of a deadly Big Five putting up an extremely exciting 57 wins the highest Mark in franchise history these guys were the best sh in basketball in the 2014 season and hands down two monstrous dunkers with an all-time great point guard finding them JJ reedit getting his Ray all on and Jamal Crawford coming in to make sure the crowd never had a chance to breathe the Los Angeles Clippers finally brought the Stars to live up to their luxurious Abode running into the playoffs this looked like the time for the Clippers to finally shine but at this time the Clippers were in the headlines for all the wrong reasons man who assembled his team and put their asses in La would infamously be outed for his racial remarks telling his girlfriend to stop bringing black people the Clippers games and Destroy his public reception in the process although people kind of already knew Donald Sterling was a POS this was all the evidence they needed to rightfully get the guy out of the league for good with a lifetime band slapped on his face although the Clippers weren’t directly involved with him this still put a light on the players that was a bit unfair when they’re trying to piece together their first successful playoff run as an organization this also marked the Steve wmer era in La which up to this point does seem like an allaround improvement I mean at least the guy seems to give a damn about his players and fan base but regardless the Clippers would return into the playoffs at the six seed for putting together a hell of a series against the Warriors that were just one year away from a championship run in the first round for anyone outside of the one or maybe two seed there really wasn’t an easy Series in the Western Conference in the 2010s as after beating out Stephan the Warriors Lob City had a match up against wolv was probably a top five team in the decade finding themselves against a rare fully healthy Thunder team with Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook these guys had themselves one hell of a match up in a fitting manner the two exchange blows back and forth one after the other until game five where the Clippers had the opportunity to put these guys down 3-2 heading back to Los Angeles that was until the Clippers curse shined On Through To Rune their all-time best series with an all-time choke job that still hurts to watch a seven-point lead with 49 seconds blown thanks to two CP3 turnovers and a last second foul on a three-point shot for any CP haters you might want to bookmark this part of the the video because this is kind of the staying on his legacy the Clippers if they had been able to turn what should have been a guaranteed win and likely trip to the Western Conference Finals would have likely had a significantly better chance to take down the eventual Champion Spurs than the Thunder who were battling injuries it’s a little hard to point the finger on this one since all in all Chris Paul’s late game collapse did Kill the momentum of this team but what allowed them to get in this position the first place was what I believe was the real death of the Clippers outside of their big four there was a little production off defensively or defensively on this roster Jamal craford may have been the third in scoring at 14 a game but it took him 15 shots to get there while being one of the worst defenders in the league in a total black hole and Matt Barnes although he does have the hottest cast out of all NBA players really wasn’t a championship small forward and what was the hole in their lineup shooting 39% from the field on pretty good defense his role on this team made sense on paper but a streaky hot-headed 3 and D guy just didn’t fit the role as a last starter on this team they needed a better fit and frankly they need more depth all around Glen Davis sucked and is now in jail Ryan ens is a dumbass Granger was old as dirt and Darren cison is actually nice but would leave La after the series which actually would have been a massive addition to the dep shart which was in total shambles at the time regardless of the lack of depth with a 29-year-old Chris Paul and a 25-year-old Blake Griffin the 2015 Clippers are where I believe this team was at their very best hanging around the mid to high 50 wins as usual the playoffs is where we cut a glimpse of this team in their Prime and the first round match up against the San Antonio Spurs was where we saw this in full swing outside of 2016 this may have been the best playoff match up in the 2010s in allout War of a seven game series this is as back and forth as it gets the series at it all along with the ultimate conclusion a gamewinner from Chris Paul all the momentum in the world in a match up against the Rockets who really did seem like a choke artist as well frankly this looked like the year of the clips but in Clippers C fashion a hamstring injury to Paul would derail their Championship hopes four games into the series and the Clippers were about to close it out without their franchise point guard the Clippers set up 3-1 in a dominating first four games ready to head to their first Conference Finals in franchise history with the return of CP to help them get across the Finish Line come back is complete the Houston Rockets will play in their first Conference Final in 18 years and embarrassing fashion the Clippers would completely collapse bling another big lead in what was likely their best champ at a championship run in history again with consistent 20 and 10 on good efficiency from CP a monstrous 2712 and five from Blake and an efficient 16 from JJ and they total collapse from their second unit Jamal Crawford again shooting below 35% from the field for the series Matt bar shooting sub 40 and a flurry of other guys like Spencer HW big baby and hedo that went out and and buildt houses all series if your entire offensive fire power comes from your cor four players and the only Off the Bench punch you have shoots 34% from the field you’re bound to have some long nights this 31 collapse may as well have ended the Lob City days as we knew it because after this point the Clippers were somewhat back to being an afterthought in the Western Conference the warriors on a 73- win run with the Spurs right behind them at 67 wins and the Thunder back healthy in their absolute primes with one of the most talented d Duos in league history there were other teams that seemed to be lurkers in the bottom of the playoffs every year like Portland Memphis and Dallas and frankly the Clippers were really more in that bracket than a part of the three-headed monsters up top that was actually competing for a championship over the next two seasons the Clippers curse really began to put this team away after not seizing their opportunity beforehand an injury to Paul and Griffin in the 2016 playoffs C another blown lead in the first round of the 2016 playoffs and another first round exit the following year to the Young Gun Jazz following an injury to BG after six failed Seasons as a unit it became very clear in 2017 and frankly way before that even despite how entertaining this team could be at times and no matter how much individual Talent was on this roster they really began to doubt their own abilities and didn’t seem to trust each other were too injury-prone to make a Deep Run in the playoffs unless a miracle Struck it lacked the depth or the money to build it with this somewhat half-ass constructive roster after numerous postseason collapses it’s safe to say that they were bound to lose from the jump I mean maybe a lucky string of series could result in a championship if the stars were aligned but as we saw the peak of their run it’s hard to win championships with star power alone LeBron and AD haven’t taken massive declines since their 2020 Championship win those guys are still a championship duo with the identity and defensive presence of the guys like Dwight Howard markei Morris javil McGee Danny Green and other championship level role players this team was incomparable to what we see today similar can be said for the Nuggets current roster I mean yit sure as held Dent Decline and if he isn’t putting up alltime numbers guys like Reggie Jackson aren’t going to win any chips the Clippers clear holes in their roster were really going to be too much to overcome when teams like the Spurs and warriors had an army of Championship level pieces to throw at you and with the injury bug going around these guys had no chance in hell and that’s really why despite being thought of as a championship contender these guys couldn’t even make a Conference Finals they grew apart from each other which each and every member have made it known as of late and upon Chris Paul’s departure from the team trading him to the Rockets to play along James Harden and actually competing for chips the Clippers were effectively out of the Lob City era the clips would resign BG in an attempt to build around him or so they say at least as Griffin would be flipped 33 games into the season completely blasting the Clippers into a new era with guys like Tobias Harris mantes Herold L will Danilo galinari and the surprising rookie contributions of shil just Alexander these guys were one of the bright spots out of the Western Conference being essentially just a team that was put together on the fly when departing from their Stars the 2019 Clippers were way more of a cohesive unit with legitimate depth with multiple six men of the Year candidates on the same damn team winning 48 games is a team that looked like more of a mid Lottery team these guys were legitimately better than some of the Clippers teams before them as an eigh seed stealing two games against the Golden State Warriors in the postseason is better than a whole lot of other teams would be able to do there was reasons to be high on this team but in reality as an eighth seed with a core outside of Shay that really was pretty damn close to their Peak already in hopes of winning a championship these guys more likely should have shifted to some younger Talent as most teams do when their Championship window closes but this of course is when all hell broke loose waking up to the news of the Clippers Cannonball of a move a wearing Paul George in a trade with Oklahoma City to attract the defending Finals MVP and Kawhi Leonard instantly made the Clippers the Championship favorites in a league that was up for grabs as much as it had been in the last decade been G andari for contract purposes along with six first rounders and a pick swap alongside Shay guildas Alexander move really did look like a win for both sides piece that was necessary for the Clippers to attract the real gold and Kawhi Leonard although they gave up a ton in return and hindsight of course tells you not to give up Shay if you thought that this move made sense in the moment you were right chances are in six picks you’re not going to land a pck as good as kawh Leonard and you might not even land a Paul George giving up on their only Young Piece who no one could have predicted would end up better than George by a landslide just a few years later made sense given that there was really no younger pieces to build around on this team you could blow it up and stink it up for the next few years in hopes of maybe being a contender or you can take the guarantee of being one of the best in the NBA right now frankly in the Clippers position they should have made this deal and in OKC’s position it went better than they could have possibly imagined but regardless entering a brand new era in La brought a whole new wave of excitement that completely overshadowed the last decade of disappointment with the addition of 80 on the Lakers and the Clippers now looking like legitimate contenders more so than the decade of being kind of talented yet kind of fraudulent this sparked the actual war in La which really had never happened up to this Point oddly enough teams though are equally as talented yet kind of Polar Opposites and play style as a Clippers Lakers rivalry is one of the best things that could happen to the league and every Big Time regular season match up between these two was literally a star studded movie 20120 was really set up to be one of the best NBA seasons in racing history after a three-year lapse in competitiveness thanks Katie but after the league shut down these playoffs got a whole lot different playing in the bubble was really an odd time I don’t know why so but it really seemed like the unorthodox circumstances allowed for different faces to shine and the play of the Clippers was for damn sure out of the ordinary matching up against a 20-year-old Luca in the first round is a two seed the Clippers would let this series stretch out to six games which is far too long for how talented this team was Luca who couldn’t even drink Le was Far and Away the best player on the floor as kawhai may have been great but Luca carried this team on his back against a stack team with star power and legitimate death while pandemic P looked absolutely brutal shooting 35% from the field in a series as a second option George was sped up into making tons of mistakes and throwing up loads of bricks in the process L will was the second best player on this team of this series in all honesty somewhat of a red flag the series the Clippers Advanced to a matchup to gave him a run for their money yic and playoff Murray in the second round and what looked like somewhat of a cakewalk the Nuggets were pretty outmatched compared to how deep the clips roster was going down 3-1 setting the stage the Battle of La in the Conference Finals but in a nailbiter of a finish the Nuggets held on to game five to avoid elimination before being completely outplayed in game 6 and 7 to blow yet another 3-1 lead Kawai shooting 6 for 22 in game seven and pandemic B shooting 4 for 16 marked the biggest choke jobs in each of their careers and an all-time choke job in history and just another mark on the spotty playoff resume of this sorry franchise this one was hard to swallow but really easy to point the finger on you’re two of the best players in the league you can’t get outplayed by Jamal Murray three games in a row all they could really do is run it back I guess as there was no moves to make outside of dumping Doc Rivers ending his disappointing tenure with the organization with another respectable regular season all that mattered was the playoffs and you’re not going to catch Kawai choking two years in a row in a superhero first round Kawai would put up a hyper efficient 32 and8 shooting over 60% from the field and 40% from Deep for PG would step up for an efficient 30 in the following Series this is why they made the trade happen in the first place stopping into their first Conference finals against the very very beatable Phoenix Suns this was the best chance they had into running into the finals in their franchise’s history but in Clippers fashion injury to kawhai really couldn’t have came at a worst time with an ACL Terror taking him out of the playoffs with PG as the soul star and the roster they lack the manpower to knock off the Suns with red Jackson being forced in their second option and allowed cb3 of all people to take his first trip to the NBA finals rer is lacking Kawai for the entirety of The Following season and PG as well for the majority of it would be forced into the playing tournament before Pat Bev got his dwe on and sent the clips packing in year that obviously wasn’t theirs the 2023 season was another sad tale of injuries for the Clippers with some new phases coming in the team was a bit different and really a bit worse than their first two ini IAL runs Norman pow was huge in bringing an efficient third option and John Wall was still a point guard I guess but at 40% from the field and half the speed of his former self wall was pretty ass this sparked the mid-season edition of Russell Westbrook being traded for each other for a second time oddly enough again adding a piece that was I guess at 70% of his former speed fast forward to the playoffs and a similar story can be told once again postseason injuries to qu lanard repeatedly seem to happen when the world’s at its brightest taking out the claw against the Phoenix Suns for the second year in a row what the hell is going on with the clips four years one choke job and 3 years derailed by injuries although the roster is completely different it doesn’t matter who’s on the team the Clippers will finish in an identical ending no matter what even with the addition of James Harden last season the clip still managed to finish with a mix of each with Kawai sidel land and three Infamous playoff choke just doing their thing the Clippers may have screwed up for the last time 5 years into the Qui PG era and these guys still have nothing to show for it choking away their best opportunities just for the frequent injury bug to destroy their team for over a decade the Clippers are the NBA’s inevitable losers with PG now seeming ready to give up on this team I think I’m right there with him the Clippers time and time again seemed ready to take home at ship but time and time again again are cursed with bad luck or failed to play at the level they’re supposed to 54 years of misery for the same outcome is not only depressing but is indicative of the struggles they’ve had to live up to the LA expectations now with a new stadium just to play a team that looks like to be on a dead end Road the Clippers curse doesn’t look to be ending anytime soon there really isn’t many questions to ask at this point with the history of nothing but failures in a future that’s looking Bleak put it nicely the Clippers might have all the talent in the world but there’s no winning on a team that’s the NBA’s Biggest Loser thank you for watching if you made it this far check out my last video here if you missed it and I’ll see you boys in the next one

The Los Angeles Clippers are in a very bad place. After losing the Dallas Mavericks in the first round, it seems that their core of Kawhi Leonard, Paul George, Russell Westbrook, and James Harden is ready to disperse, leaving this team as a shell of their former selves. Today we relive the long tenured Clippers life long curse to eternal irrelevance.