According to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, the LA Clippers have traded Luke Kennard to the Memphis Grizzlies in a 3-team deal that will net them the Houston Rockets’ Eric Gordon:

Exact details on deadline trades can often take hours (or even days) to trickle out, especially for minor matters like “which 2nd round picks got thrown into this trade?” The current reporting on this deal suggests that the Clippers sent Kennard to Memphis for 3 second-round picks, while they sent John Wall and swap rights in the first round in this year’s draft to Houston for Gordon. Veteran wing Danny Green is heading from Memphis to Houston as part of the trade to facilitate salary-matching. Notably, the Clippers also sent out 3 second-round picks today, 2 for Bones Hyland and 1 for Mason Plumlee. However, we’ll have to wait for the dust to settle before we know if those are the same picks or if there is a value differential between what was sent out and brought in. (Update: Andrew Greif has the details on the 2nds the Clippers got in this trade–though which of them remain in the team’s war chest is unclear.)

Getting three second-round picks for Kennard is not an amazing return that blows you a way, but it makes sense–the Clippers likely missed an opportunity to sell high on Luke last summer and it was always going to be hard to move a $15M salary for a player that was only on the fringes of their rotation. It certainly has seemed for weeks that the emergence of Norman Powell meant that the writing was on the wall for Luke, and recouping some value while repurposing his salary into a player that was a better fit for what Ty Lue is searching for in the rotation. There is the element of what Kennard brings to the Grizzlies, a conference rival and potential opponent of the Clippers. While I don’t want to dismiss his shooting or the Grizzlies’ quality (they could easily beat LAC in a series with or without Kennard), I think it is probably wise that the Clippers are focused more on making moves to improve themselves than worrying about Memphis. Both teams have significantly larger concerns in the form of the Denver Nuggets and Phoenix Suns.

The real question is if repurposing Kennard’s salary slot into Eric Gordon was the move that the Clippers needed. The former Clipper draft pick is now 34 years old and makes just under $20M this year before getting a raise to $20.9M next season, and isn’t quite the scoring volume/efficiency monster that he was as a support scorer for James Harden in Houston years ago. He’s still a better scoring option than the guards he is replacing–he creates for himself far more than Luke Kennard is capable of doing and does so much more efficiently than Reggie Jackson or John Wall. However, he’s more like Norman Powell as a player than the “point guard” archetype that the Clippers had been linked to–Mike Conley, Fred VanVleet, Kyle Lowry, etc. What he does still do effectively is drive, so he brings a potential value add of initiating the Clippers’ paint-and-spray offense, even if he isn’t going to be a super dynamic playmaker.

Gordon’s contract is team-friendly, as the $20.9M salary for next season is fully non-guaranteed. Typically for a veteran deal, there would be a trigger date where he would have to be waived before free agency opens to allow him to find a new team, but Spotrac doesn’t show that for his contract–I’d take that with a grain of salt just because it’s unusual. Regardless, it’s a big expiring for next year that doesn’t have to be guaranteed if he is moved in a draft-day deal, meaning that acquiring Gordon–much like Eric Bledsoe not too long ago–might be a deal made with the next trade in mind, especially because they did not move any future first round pick capital at this deadline and are set up to be able to put pretty compelling offers together this summer.

The pick swap here hurts, in my opinion. The upcoming draft is very deep and the Clippers are starving for youth, athleticism, talent, and upside. Currently their own pick is slated to be 18th, while the Milwaukee Bucks pick that Houston will have the right to swap is slated to be 28th. The draft order will change as the standings do, but it’s going to be a notable shift backwards in the first round. Losing John Wall is a non-factor for the Clippers, as he was unlikely to play for the team again. He, funnily enough, heads to the Houston Rockets, who will buy him out for the second time in under a year. It appears unlikely that his NBA career will continue.

213Hoops is an independently owned and operated L.A. Clippers blog by Clippers fans, for Clippers fans. If you enjoy our content, please consider subscribing to our Patreon. Subscriptions start at $1 a month and support from readers like you goes a long way towards helping us keep 213Hoops sustainable, growing, and thriving.

NBA Trade Deadline: Clippers swap Luke Kennard for Eric Gordon
Lucas Hann

Our 2022-2023 player season preview series continues with Luke Kennard —the Clippers’ sharpest shooter who, despite his elite shooting, might be the odd man out this year.

Basic Information

Height: 6’5”

Weight: 205 pounds

Position: Shooting Guard

Age: 26

Years in NBA: 5

2021-2022 Key Stats: 11.9 points, 3.3 rebounds, 2.1 assists, and 0.1 blocks in 27.4 minutes per game across 70 games (13 starts) on 44.9% shooting from the field and 44.9% from behind the arc.

Contract Status: $13.7M guaranteed for 2022-2023 and $14.7M for each of the following two seasons.

Expectations

Luke Kennard is yet another key player from last season who will not be expected to carry the same load again for this season. Along with Brandon Boston Jr., Xavier Moon, Terence Mann, and Reggie Jackson, Luke suddenly will find himself a spot or two deeper on the depth chart. Case in point, when the Clippers were (more) healthy during the 2020-2021 season, Luke only averaged 19.6 minutes per game; last year, while the Clippers resembled a MASH unit, he averaged 27.4 MPG.

This could go one of two ways: In one case, Kennard is a 10-15min per game guy, coming off the bench, who gets to focus on what he does best—catching and shooting. This route seems quite probable and perhaps even exciting, given that it seems like John Wall will running the second unit. Moreover, Kennard, in that scenario, is likely to be sharing time with Terence Mann and Robert Covington, who can shoulder the defensive load. (As we have noted on TLTJTP, though, Luke is better on defense than most assume.)

In the other case, Luke Kennard is simply the odd man out. He will be directly competing for minutes with Normal Powell and Terance Mann; indirectly, he’ll be behind Paul George, Reggie Jackson, and John Wall. And that’s assuming he will earn preference over Amir Coffey and Brandon Boston, Jr., both of whom are more well-rounded players than Luke (Editor’s Note: For Brandon, I’d argue this is still more upside-related).

If you are Ty Lue, the argument in favor of taking the first route is Luke’s elite three point shooting ability. As noted above, he shot 44.9% from three, which was the best in the league last year (min. 100 attempts), and shot 44.6% the year before, which was good enough for eighth in the league. This efficiency on decent volume at the most important shot in modern basketball suggests that Kennard needs to be on the court complimenting the driving and playmaking ability of the Clippers’ marquee players.

The second route, however, becomes more likely when the other three-point threats on the roster are taken into account: Marcus Morris, Sr. (career 43.5%), Norman Powell (38.4%), Kawhi Leonard (38.4%), Amir Coffey (38%), Terance Mann (37.9%), Paul George (38.2%), and Reggie Jackson, whose careers shooting numbers are not that impressive but who we know can be an elite catch-and-shoot threat. Not only are these players great shooters, they also offer other things that Kennard does not (defense, rebounding, etc.). These facts suggest that Kennard’s three-point shooting is not in fact that valuable to this Clippers roster.

So what can we expect from Luke Kennard? Regardless of playing time, whenever Luke is on the floor, he should continue to be an elite shooter. Moreover, if he’s learned anything from last season, he should let it fly even more, even if his percentages suffer as a consequence.

Strengths

Without rehashing the above, Luke is an elite shooter. But the indirect “strengths” that flow from that are many: he attracts some level of attention from opposing defenses, his presence behind the arc opens up lanes for cutters and drivers, and his shooting can change the momentum of a game, especially when he hits a couple in a row.

He is also a phenomenal free throw shooter (89.6% last year), a competent ball handler, and is pretty clutch:

Weaknesses

Luke’s defense is a constant “issue” even though it is not a true “weakness” at this point. That is, although Luke has improved as an on-ball defender and in the show-and-recover scheme, he still gets picked on by opposing offenses. And if Luke was picked on last year, it should only get more pronounced this season, given the Clippers’ deeper roster.

A constant frustration with Luke is his shyness. Throughout his time with the Clippers, the recurring refrain is that he needs to shoot more. In order to be a factor this season, Luke cannot afford to turn down open shots. That is, although he’s not a one-dimensional player, he’ll have to be one dimensional on this roster—and aggressively so.

Summary

On the whole, Luke Kennard will either be a secret weapon in the 2023 season—or, just a secret. Whether or not he receives consistent playing time or not will depend on if Ty Lue sees him as a compliment to the Kawhi and PG led offensive attack or as redundant given the Clippers’ other shooters. And, without getting too much into it, the answer to that question might determine if the Clippers keep Luke long term or spin him for a player who addresses a more pressing need.

Clippers 2022-2023 Season Preview: Luke Kennard
Kenneth Armstrong

Update: The Los Angeles Times’ Andrew Greif has strongly stated that sources are “adamant” that the Clippers are not looking to trade Luke Kennard. It is unclear at this time what the Clippers are looking to do–they’re obviously working on stuff, but the team hates to have leaks and rumors surrounding them. It’s also possible that they were talking about Luke, but nothing materialized, so they are now covering their tracks.

According to Sean Deveney, a lower-profile but established NBA reporter, the Clippers are shopping sharpshooting guard Luke Kennard. While it’s likely that the heaviest flurry of trade activity this off-season will focus around today’s NBA Draft, Deveney notes that the Clippers are expected to continue looking for a deal for Kennard during free agency if he isn’t moved today. He listed the Cleveland Cavaliers, Chicago Bulls, and Sacramento Kings as suitors; subsequent (questionable) Twitter scuttle this morning has linked the Celtics to Kennard:

Kennard is coming off a fantastic bounce-back second year with the Clippers where he stayed healthy to make 70 appearances, averaging 11.9 points while shooting a league-best 44.9% from beyond the three-point arc. It’s no wonder, in today’s high-scoring game, that teams would covet the highest-efficiency three-point shooter in the league. And the Clippers, despite Kennard’s strong season, have reason to look to move on–they have a severe logjam at the wing positions as Paul George and Kawhi Leonard retake their full-time starting spots and trade deadline acquisition Norman Powell plays his first full season with the team. Kennard would be competing on the fringes of the rotation with Terance Mann, whose defensive-minded skillset is a better complement to the aformentioned players, and Amir Coffey, who can’t be traded as the Clippers hope to retain him in restricted free agency next month. Trading Kennard would hopefully allow him to find a larger role to flourish in during his prime (he turns 26 tomorrow) as well as net the Clippers an asset and allow them to avoid awkward playing time disputes this season.

Of the three teams mentioned, Chicago could likely put together the most appealing package for the Clippers. Assuming little-used center Tony Bradley picks up his $2M player option, the Bulls could make the math work by trading young guard Coby White and Bradley for Kennard. White is only 22 years old and appears to have some upside, but hasn’t really emerged as a good player yet. For the Clippers to bite, I’d expect they’d also want Chicago’s 18th overall pick in tonight’s draft, which they could either use to add another developmental piece or flip again (eyeing Marcus Morris + 18 for Malcolm Brogdon or Kyle Kuzma in this space). But to give up both White and their first round pick, the Bulls will likely want to hunt bigger game, and without both, it’s hard to make a deal that is both legal and attractive for LAC.

Boston and Sacramento both have an easier time making the math work on a Kennard trade–the Celtics have a massive, soon expiring trade exception from Evan Fournier last summer that they could absorb Kennard into, and the Kings have small, expendable contracts. To add value, each team would have to look at prospects or picks. Boston is dangling Grant Williams and Payton Pritchard in talks, but neither is super appealing in a straight-up swap for Kennard since the Clippers don’t have roles for them to fill anyway (I could maybe see the Clippers eating the downgrade on a Kennard-Pritchard swap to get a cheap, solid, younger backup PG for the next two years and save a bunch of luxury tax money).

Once Sacramento refuses to put Davion Mitchell in a deal, as they should, they don’t have enticing young players for LAC to consider. Boston doesn’t have a first round pick this year to offer LAC, and Sacramento only has #4, which they’d never surrender in this deal. Both teams have plenty of their own future picks, but that’s complicated as well–Boston, fresh off a Finals appearance, should be very good for a long time, making those picks low-value, while Sacramento is perpetually bad and likely wouldn’t surrender their own future firsts without strong protections.

It’s possible that a deal could be workable, but the protections would have to get wonky. Would Boston give LAC a pick 4 or 5 years out, increasing its value and giving them more time to flip it in another deal? If it’s their 2023 pick, would they be willing to reverse-protect it (so if it’s 21-30, Boston keeps it and LAC gets 2024, but if it’s top-20, LAC gets it)? What protections would Sacramento require? All protected future 1sts either eventually lose their protections as they role over year-to-year, or convert to 2nd round picks instead. How many years would the Kings let it roll over with lottery protections, tying up their ability to make future trades? And when the protections changed, would the pick grow less and less protected or would it simply convey as a 2nd rounder instead? Negotiating out these tiny details can be painstaking, but they determine how much value teams are really getting out of these future picks.

NBA Trade Rumors: Clippers “Shopping” Luke Kennard; Bulls, Kings, Celtics Interested
Lucas Hann

Clippers shooting guard Luke Kennard will compete in the NBA Three-Point Shootout at All-Star Weekend in Cleveland, the NBA announced today on TNT.

The Clippers have had several players compete in Saturday Night contests in recent years, most recently Patrick Beverley in the Skills Challenge in 2020. However, no Clipper has been a contestant in the Three-Point Shootout since J.J. Redick was entered in back-to-back contests in 2015 and 2016–though current Clipper Paul George participated in the shootout as a member of the Oklahoma City Thunder in 2018. The last time a Clipper actually won a Saturday Night event was Blake Griffin’s 2011 Slam Dunk Contest victory. Brent Barry also won the 1996 Slam Dunk Contest as a Clipper, marking what I believe to be the only other time that LAC has had an entrant emerge victorious on All-Star Saturday Night. Luke Kennard has a chance to be the third–if he’s still a Clipper by the time the competition rolls around.

Kennard is having a strong season for the Clippers, averaging 11.9 points, 3.6 rebounds, and 2.2 assists per game in 28.4 minutes while leading the team from downtown at 42.8%, good for 6th in the NBA. His ability to get hot at a moment’s notice has been an asset to the “Cardiac Clippers,” who have mounted massive comebacks at a historic rate this season–frequently in part due to multiple threes from Kennard. His season was highlighted by a 25-point, 8-rebound, 6-assist effort against the Washington Wizards in January as the Clippers came back from down 35 to win by 1 point. Kennard made a three-pointer with 9 seconds left to cut Washington’s lead from 6 to 3, and then after a Wizards turnover successfully converted a 4-point play to nudge the Clippers ahead and give them a shocking victory.

For Luke, this will be his first appearance in any All-Star event (I had to double check the Rising Stars Challenge from his first two seasons), but it remains to be seen if he’ll enter the event as a Clipper or not. The Three-Point Shootout is on Saturday, February 19th, and the NBA Trade Deadline is Thursday, February 10th at 3:00pm Eastern Time. While Kennard has been a valuable member of the team this year, he faces competition at his position with the emergence of two-way player Amir Coffey, who has been starting over Luke in recent weeks, as well as the addition of Norman Powell in last week’s trade with the Portland Trail Blazers. Jake Fischer of Bleacher Report noted that before the Cleveland Cavaliers opted to flip the expiring contract of Ricky Rubio (who is out for the season) to Indiana for Caris LeVert, the Cavs were talking to the Clippers about Kennard as well. None of this means that the Clippers want to trade Luke or will, but it’s no surprise that his name has come up in conversations.

Either way, Clipper Nation will be cheering on Luke in the Three-Point Shootout next weekend. Good luck, Luke!

213Hoops is an independently owned and operated L.A. Clippers blog by Clippers fans, for Clippers fans. If you enjoy our content, please consider subscribing to our Patreon. Subscriptions start at $1 a month and support from readers like you goes a long way towards helping us keep 213Hoops sustainable, growing, and thriving.

Clippers’ Luke Kennard to Compete in Three-Point Shootout
Lucas Hann

Lucas, Rob, and Shap wrap up their Around the Beat series with Tomer Azarly from Clutch Points and then with fellow podders Joseph Raya-Ward from Clipset, and Will Updyke/Chuck Mockler from Locked On Clippers.

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Around the Beat Pt 2 with Tomer Azarly, Joseph Raya-Ward, William Updyke and Chuck Mockler
Shapan Debnath

Lucas, Rob, and Shap joined by Law Murray of the Athletic, Mirjam Swanson of the OC Register, and Andrew Greif of the LA Times for TLTJTP’s annual Around the Beat series! Pt 2 coming tomorrow. Questions included our expecations for PG, will Kawhi come back, breakout LAC player, and hot takes.

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Around the Beat Pt 1 with Law Murray, Mirjam Swanson, and Andrew Greif
Shapan Debnath

Lucas, Shap, and Rob answer your Twitter questions in this week’s TLTJTP. Fun topics include the ceiling of the 21-22 Clippers, what we expect from Luke/Zu/Terance, and what the DeAndre Jordan signing to the Lakers means for the Clippers prospects with Marc Gasol.

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Twitter Questions Episode!
Shapan Debnath

Basic Information

Height: 6’5”
Weight: 206 pounds
Position: Shooting Guard
Age: 25
Years in NBA: 4

Key Stats: Kennard appeared in 63 of the possible 72 regular-season games for the Clippers, having started 17 times. He finished the season with averages of 8.3 points, 2.6 rebounds, and 1.7 assists in 19.6 minutes per game with 47.6/44.6/83.9 shooting splits. During his 15 playoff appearances with the team, Kennard played 14.6 minutes per game and averaged 5.6 points, 0.9 rebounds, and 0.5 assists while shooting 47.7 percent from the field and 41.2 percent from beyond the arc.

Contract Status: Luke has just finished the final year of his rookie contract —one that paid him just north of $5.2 million throughout the 2020/21 season. In 2021/22, he’ll enter the first year of his four-year contract extension that he signed last offseason after being acquired by the Clippers via trade, which will net him just over $12.7 million next season.

Expectations

The Clippers’ trade for Luke Kennard during the 2020 NBA Draft was both unexpected and sudden — typical of the front office. The move, however, was met with mixed reviews. Kennard figured to be at least an upgrade in skill and production over Landry Shamet, who’d underwhelmed during his sophomore season with the Clippers. Also, expectations were that he’d provide the team some needed ball-handling and playmaking abilities from the backup guard position to aid the Clippers’ second unit and occasionally provide alongside the starters, things that 2020 Clippers lacked aside from Lou Williams. 

A breakout third season in Detroit saw Kennard’s efficient 15.8-point, 4.1-assist season cut short due to a knee injury. Additionally, his across-the-board improvements as a lead guard prompted Dwane Casey and the Detroit Pistons to experiment with Luke as a point guard in their offseason workout program while preparing for the upcoming 2020/21 season. If you combine the progressions from season three with the lead guard experimentation, the Clippers figured to have a younger, long-term replacement for Lou as the trade-discussed veteran entered the final year of his contract.

Reality

Luke signed a four-year contract extension with the Clippers worth up to $64 million before the league’s December 22nd start. The move seemed to signal that Kennard would likely have every opportunity to be a pivotal contributor to the team as early as the upcoming season. The unfortunate reality, though, was that he never became that key contributor.

Kennard began the season often entering games as the first or second player off the bench, allowing him to overlap with some of the other starters while also playing with the reserves. The returns were mixed. With the starters, Kennard was mostly impactful as solely a spot-up shooter, and his pick-and-roll efforts as the ball-handler often left him stuck pivoting in the paint without a plan. Things looked even funkier for Luke while he struggled in an early-season, misfit, three-guard bench lineup that also relegated him to primarily a catch-and-shoot role, as Reggie Jackson and Lou Williams did a bulk of the ball-dominating. Through the first couple months of the season, he didn’t have much impact on games outside of making threes and was often invisible in the outings in which he was differential and unaggressive — a knock on him stemming from his Detroit days. So by February, Kennard found himself out of Ty Lue’s rotation as Lou and Reggie, amongst others, had outperformed him.

Lou Will eventually left in a trade for Rajon Rondo, and the Clippers turned to Reggie and Terance Mann to fill the void instead of Luke, the presumed replacement. Luke found his fit eventually in a different — and probably more suitable — role as somewhat of a “break glass in case of emergency” sparkplug. Most fans believe that the specific turning point of the Clippers’ season was when Kennard’s 20 points on 8-8 shooting led L.A. back from a 22-point second-half deficit to overtake the Atlanta Hawks. From there, he strung together more than a handful of similarly fun scoring performances — the 21-point Milwaukee game, the 28-point game against Memphis in which almost all the starters rested, and the 17-point game on his and Reggie’s first return to Detroit. He’d become an enjoyable story after being hugely disappointing for the better part of the season.

Despite the better finish to the regular season, the postseason came, and Kennard was initially an afterthought. After playing just four minutes through the first five playoff games, he seized an opportunity when it arose towards the end of the Dallas Series as his scoring and spacing was a welcomed addition in Game 7 especially. Luke carved out a spot in the rotation for the rest of the playoff run and appeared in each of the remaining 12 playoff games, with shot-making being his main contribution to the game. Though he never had any game-changing impact, he was a valuable rotational player when things were going right.

Future with Clippers

Luke’s future with the Clippers is complicated to predict. On the one hand, regardless of how frequently or infrequently he plays — as a 33-minute per-game player on a bad team or a 20-minute per-game contributor to a contender — Luke has proven throughout his career that his shooting is legitimate. He’s shot over 39 percent from three during all four seasons in the league, including 44.6 percent as a Clipper. But the Clippers don’t necessarily need more shooting. Of all of their regular-rotation guys, only Serge Ibaka and Ivica Zubac shot under 39 percent from beyond the arc. Therefore, Luke could be expendable from the Clippers’ point of view. His proven shooting and, more importantly, decent postseason showing may have made his contract slightly more tradeable should the L.A. look to package away pieces for a more immediately impactful return.

However, as things currently stand, I’d expect Kennard to play a similar role to the ones he did down the stretch of both the regular season and the playoffs. Speaking optimistically, a second season in the Clippers’ system could equate to more comfort and a better understanding of his fit, and another season removed from the 2020 knee injury could do good for his confidence going forward — both potentially creating pathways to more minutes. A lot depends on what the roster looks like next season, though. Considering that PG, Kawhi, Pat, Mann, and Reggie return next season to make up the Clippers’ wing and guard depth — it’s hard to imagine Kennard being more deserving of playing time than any of those players. 

213Hoops is an independently owned and operated L.A. Clippers blog by Clippers fans, for Clippers fans. If you enjoy our content, please consider subscribing to our Patreon. Subscriptions start at $1 a month and support from readers like you goes a long way towards helping us keep 213Hoops sustainable, growing, and thriving.

Clippers 2021 Exit Interview: Luke Kennard
Cole Huff

Dr. Shap and Robert Flom catch up as the Clippers trip in their homecoming game to the Boston Celtics following the news that Paul George could be sidelined going forward with a toe injury.

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Podcast: Celtics Trip Clippers
Shapan Debnath

Dr. Shap, Lucas Hann, and Mike Jaglin sit down to talk about the Clippers’ pair of 30-point weekend blow out wins against the Sacramento Kings and Indiana Pacers. Without Beverley on Friday, Ibaka on Sunday, and Lou Williams in both contests, LA nonetheless routed each opponent.

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Podcast: Clippers Blow Out Pacers, Kings
Shapan Debnath