Doc Rivers is persona non grata for some Celtics faithful for how he forced his way out of Boston once it was clear the team was headed for a rebuild. Despite the fact that it worked out quite well for the Celtics, and it ultimately getting a draft pick and the job opening to lure Brad Stevens out of college, there are more than a few around town that are enjoying spoonfuls of Schadenfreude after the Clippers collapse against Houston.
Doc left town to chase success, and he found a fair amount of it in Los Angeles. He also wanted to, as Bill Parcells once said, shop for the groceries, which the Clippers allowed him to do. And that’s put him at odds with himself.
Doc the coach is still among the elite. He’s an expert button-pusher who can still find ways to get a bunch of ego-maniacal multi-millionaires to work together towards a common goal. Even after the loss to Houston, his words to his team were pretty inspiring.
Doc’s message to the Clippers after the game. pic.twitter.com/9ZcFoVd1VX
— Arash Markazi (@ArashMarkazi) May 17, 2015
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Unfortunately for the coach, Doc the grocery-shopper is still a bit suspect. I can’t deem him a failure at this point because the sample-size isn’t big enough. He inherited a few problems, but he’s also created his own.
The Clippers bench was a huge problem this year, and it played a major role in the Clippers collapse. Doc was basically left with trying to drive a car on fumes from gas station to gas station, just putting enough in the tank to get him home. He had little choice but to ride his starters like Tom Thibodeau, because his choices off the bench were limited. This past summer, his big free-agent signing was Spencer Hawes, who was a dud in year one as a Clipper, and Doc was not shy about making that clear.
“Obviously Austin (Rivers, his son, acquired via the Celtics) was a huge help for us, so that was the surprise. That was the good part. Spencer (Hawes, the 7-foot center), on the other hand, I know he can play better than he played, and he wasn’t that player this year, so we have to figure that out, because he’s the one we went out and paid for and it didn’t work out.
“That happens. We had a bunch of those in Boston, as well, but you’ve got to try to make it happen. That was the big one for us. If Spencer would have played great, you already had Jamal (Crawford), and we added Austin to that group. Baby (Glen Davis) was in and out. The fact that Baby was playing in front of Spencer told me where Spencer was at. But he can play. We’ve got to figure out a better way of using him, and he has to come in in better shape. I think at the end of the day he’ll help us. Unfortunately this year he didn’t.”
Making it worse, Hawes is still under contract for three more years, so they’re stuck with him. Doc admits the obvious fact that the bench needs to be improved, but there aren’t many options.
“You may be able to get players that wouldn’t come here if you weren’t close,” Rivers said. “I found that when we were in Boston too. When we were bad, we couldn’t get a guy. We couldn’t get anyone. When we were good, all of a sudden you can get [players] at veteran minimums and you can get the best of that group. That’s what we’ll try to do.”
And here’s where Doc the GM is going to employ Danny Ainge’s blueprint for maintaining a capped-out contender. Keep paying your core guys, get an obviously passionate owner to keep spending money, and hope you can find some ring-chasing vets willing to take a little less over the last few financially-comfortable-but-productive-and-hungry-enough-to-play-a-key-role years. It’s really the only choice he has when his team has almost no money to spend.
“I want to fix it,” Rivers told USA TODAY Sports. “I want to win. That’s why I came here. I knew when I came here that roster-wise it was going to be very difficult. The first thing I did before I took this job, I looked at the roster and we laughed. I was like, ‘What the (expletive) can we do with this?’ It was more the contracts. But we have to try to do it somehow. I don’t know how yet, but something will work out.”
Priority number one will be paying DeAndre Jordan. Their pitch to him should just be parking a bunch of Brinks trucks in front of his house on July 1, because he’s immensely valuable to them. Even if you don’t feel like Boston should pay him huge money in a pitch to steal him away, the Clippers have little choice.
In a way, it’s almost the situation Danny Ainge found himself in when it came time to give Jeff Green his current contract. The Clippers don’t have the money to go chase a cheap alternative to Jordan. He’s already familiar with his role there, and he fits that team quite well. Even if you’re one of those who believe a max contract is an over-payment for Jordan considering his lack of an actual post-game and his horrific free throw shooting, it’s clear the Clippers have no choice but to give him everything because without him, they’re nowhere near as good.
All season, multiple sources say, a growing schism emerged between Jordan and point guard Chris Paul, and it could contribute to Jordan’s decision to stay or go as a free agent.
Sources say Paul’s well-known edginess and drive ground on Jordan’s nerves for much of the year. Contributing to the problem was Paul’s view that Jordan lacked the appropriate commitment to working on his free throws, including not working enough with the Clippers shooting coach on that issue, sources said.
“Things aren’t good there,” a league source familiar with the inner workings of the Clippers organization said. Asked if the issues between the two were serious, the source said, “Oh yeah. (Jordan) might leave. He really might.”
Again, that would be devastating to the Clippers because there’s no way they’d be able to replace him. They don’t get 5-year, $100-plus million to just hand to someone else. They’ll probably just end up with the full mid-level if Jordan bolts, which means Doc the GM can’t whiff on this one.
Doc got the coaching gig he wanted when he left Boston. He was minutes away from the Western Conference Finals and is, theoretically, a few moves away from being at least in the same spot next year. This is what he asked for. And the way he left opens himself, and his team, up for criticism like this:
This is a critical summer for River the executive. He has to make sure player rifts are smoothed. Luckily for him, he’s got experience with asshole point guards, so he’s at least got something he can lean on there. But he needs to make sure the Clippers don’t lose Jordan like the Celtics lost Ray Allen after his falling out with teammates. And if he manages to keep Jordan, he then needs to figure out how to spread the remaining few million he can spend in the right places.
If he doesn’t, then Doc will be screwing over his coach. It makes for a cloudy future in Los Angeles and a potentially legacy-shifting offseason for Rivers. Will he be able to become the dual-threat and cement himself as a potential Hall of Famer for his post playing days, or will his front-office stint be a black mark in what has been by most account a pretty stellar coaching career?
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