Even if you argue that we’ll be fine w/ George leaving, I think it’s too much of a stretch to think we *improved* by him leaving – at absolute best we tread water, but in reality we’ll probably take a step back. That puts us firmly in the tier 2 (if we’re being optimistic) or tier 3 (realistic) range in the West. Plus in terms of luck, we *were* lucky last year, to even get that much health out of Kawhi, George, and Harden – would be unwise to expect that many games out of them again a year later.

I have fully given up on this team as a contender, but I’m more than happy to watch them try to play spoiler, play a more enjoyable to watch style of basketball (re: less iso ball), and hopefully develop some younger guys.

Last year we had the George/Russ team and the Leonard/Harden team. I’m glad they went with Leonard/Harden. Both Leonard and Harden can be traded—a cap space plus.

I hope it works out for George in Philly and thank you for your service.

Mann was benched continually after showing up during Cassell’s rotation then, and even up to John Wall’s time. He got to court sporadically during those times by design.

Christie, if and when he holds his own decently when he gets the opportunity to play, should hopefully not be relegated to the bench again ala Mann and Coffey.

Maybe by the trade deadline, the play-in or out of the playoff race might be the reality for these Clippers. I’ve argued that the Kawhi/Harden Clippers, should be able to be just as “successful” as the Kawhi/PG Clippers with hopefully more injury luck in the playoffs. But I guess if you look at the win total from like 2023, they won 44 games, which would’ve been the 11th seed in the West last season.

I really hope you get that feeling with Cam, but given Mann was like a 23 year old senior, I doubt he comes in that polished.

I think this is probably something smaller, like seeing if they can get Collins along w/ Dunn, or if there’s a couple more teams involved w/ random stuff going random places. God, I hope the FO isn’t thinking about bringing in Zach Lavine…

Also, I don’t think the team has even officially announced the DJJ, Batum, and Dunn signings yet, and I doubt that those guys are willing to wait around until after the Olympics.

The crickets on the trade front are starting to give me similar vibes to when CP left. We got some nice pieces back but began maneuvering toward the next era with first the Blake trade and then domino after domino. I wonder if they are waiting to see if Kawhi hits it off with LeBron or Steph with the possibility of turning the page entirely. That would make sense if not for signing Harden, so I would think they should be trying to add another shiny object and compete again this year. For once the FO has done some good things and it would be a shame for that to go to waste. I guess we’ll find out over the next couple of weeks.