Mann, a perennial bench warmer under Doc, was played by SC for majority of the second half. Mann got unleashed and delivered big time, a revelation.

Upon Doc’s return, Mann was back to the bench. And Cassell had been with Rivers for the longest time as assistant.

I mean, RoCo and Batum are gone, so…😅

Seriously though, I’m guessing you mean bringing Harden off the bench?

Star centric offense, one on one, contested long shots, bad shot selections, done in volumes, ball movement is 2nd or 3rd priority. Same old Clips from previous years. Back to Lue’s beloved system. And he is an offense minded coach. Is this all there is to his offensive game plan ?

Flash in the pan :

I read that the Clips was going to involve lot of cuts, which happened in the Portland game, with good defense leading to transition points – such style of plays were exactly shown to the Clips by this game by the Nets – incredible.

Ty is good in “in-game adjustments” (??), how about waiting for one season to adjust by starting Roco and benching Morris – CD … I dont see a promising future with Lue continuing as HC of the team.

My preference is for Dan Craig take over. He is a defensive minded coach, the Miami type of D, under Spo. Now that is one respectable coach. But then, Lue and Frank belong to the Doc’s stable …

1) Westbrook was one of 4 new players to integrate while 3 rotation players who had appeared in at least 34 games were sent out. The Clippers were in the middle of a much bigger roster overhaul.
2) Harden and Tucker were already with the team before having 4 days of practice. Russ had 1 full day before the first game.
3) The Clippers faced the would-be 3-seed with the league’s best offense twice, they lost both games by a single point, they played both games without Zu vs an all-star center and they missed Kawhi in one of the two. They then faced the fully healthy Denver Nuggets – on the road, without Zu, vs the best center in the league. Game went to OT. They furthermore played the Wolves (without KAT but with Naz Reid filling in) and the Warriors without Steph and Wiggins while missing Zu once again, another competitive game. The Warriors loss was a bad one, they stood no chance as only Plumlee and to some degree Kawhi showed up.

This team faces the Knicks and the Nets who missed 3 of their top10 rotation players and lost a 4th early in the third quarter. They weren’t truly competitive in either game.
4) Fit and performance: Russ fit in from the start and contributed in a variety of ways. He had 10 assists to 4 turnovers vs the Wolves – the rest of the team had an amazingly poor 14 assists to 20 turnovers.

Vs Denver, he was vital in the game being that competitive in the first place. Russ had the highest BPM and the best defensive rating by a mile. He played amazing defense in that game.

Vs the Kings he made everyone better on offense while helping out vs Sabonis on defense. Not his best performance but once again with a far better assist-to-turnover ratio than the rest of the team, providing lots of energy. In the second game he posted 27/10 on 74% true shooting with a +10 in a one-point loss.

Defense, assisting, scoring, versatility, making others better and making the team more competitive were on display in 4 of the 5 games – vs strong opponents while missing Zu mostly whose defensive skillset can’t be replaced.

Harden has displayed some individual skills – but so far there aren’t any signs of enhancing the TEAM or a willingness to adapt his game. If anything, his press conference was a warning sign the other way. Both offensively and defensively there are major concerns about his willingness to do the unglamorous things and in consequence the fit.
5) Russ was added from the buyout market, with no other candidate remotely capable of providing what he did.

Harden earns 35.6 million dollars and cost two-way players and additional assets to acquire.

The much more accurate comparison to this situation is Russ on the Lakers while earning 47 million a year. Also a trade that was completely unnecessary and created chaos, a roster lacking two-way players and big fit issues affecting at the very least LeBron and Russ himself (the Russ/AD combo was fine which they displayed when Bron was missing games).

• Restoring the original starting lineup to the court.
• Getting Kobe Brown and Amir Coffey quality minutes on the 2nd unit w/Harden. Each guy can provide some defensive protection, connector play and physicality to go win loose balls. They can both hit a shot if the stars serve them up and they hustle to the spot and get set.

Anything else is just Ty messin’ around and not taking the NBA game seriously.

Barring injuries there will come a point where this talent excels.

I remember hearing this all last season and guess what, they never excelled with or without injuries.

The front office is the same, the coaching staff is the same, and the roster is older and slower, so why should we expect anything different this time around?