Despite some unrealized excitement earlier in the week, the Clippers had an uncharacteristically quiet draft night (they didn’t make a single trade tonight after making at least one during each of the last 8 NBA Drafts). For the first time since Lawrence Frank took over basketball operations from Doc Rivers, the Clippers simply entered the day with two picks, made them, and called it a night. While the hope is that these two guys–Kobe and Jordan–develop into good players, it’s unlikely that either is a major factor in the Clippers’ pursuit of the 2024 NBA title. Forward Kobe Brown will be on the 15-man roster in a reserve role behind a host of veterans, while wing Jordan Miller is expected to sign a two-way contract, spending most of the upcoming season with the Ontario Clippers.

The biggest story of the draft for the Clippers, though, wasn’t who they took–it was the players who weren’t moved. It’s no secret that the team is ready to move on from Marcus Morris, who has been the team’s primary power forward for the last 3.5 years. Originally, the team expected to send the 30th pick and Marcus Morris to the Washington Wizards in a 3-team trade that would have brought guard Malcolm Brogdon to Los Angeles, but they backed out over concerns regarding Brogdon’s health. Adding Brown with the 30th pick instead is all well and good, but the clear need to move on from Morris at the power forward position remains–and the team targeting Brogdon (and Chris Paul who was dealt to the Golden State Warriors today) suggests that they’re looking to move for a guard and a forward this summer. Whether the goal of making a big addition at guard is to replace or complement Russell Westbrook, who is an unrestricted free agent, is anyone’s guess.

At guard, the Clippers could always simply re-sign Westbrook, having sufficient depth to round out a solid guard rotation without an addition (Bones Hyland will definitely appreciate not being stuck behind two hall of fame point guards next year). Questions about the championship upside of putting his shooting and turnover issues alongside Paul George and Kawhi Leonard remain, but it would hardly be a surprise to see him back with the team after he became the emotional centerpiece of an otherwise listless Clipper team last year and put up big numbers in the team’s first round loss with George and Leonard sidelined. I’d still look for the Clippers to deal a guard (Westbrook, Hyland, Norman Powell, and Eric Gordon is one too many guys as long as Paul George is starting at shooting guard, and that’s without mentioning Terance Mann, who more easily slots into the backup small forward role), likely Gordon who is the most expendable and movable due to a combination of skill level, age, and contract status.

Westbrook cannot be traded as a current free agent, only re-signed. Powell’s contract is likely unappealing to trade partners, but he’s an important piece for the Clippers, so it’s hard to see a win-win deal developing there. Mann and Hyland both represent players with positive trade value, but they’re both players the Clippers would be reluctant to part with lightly. Gordon, at 34 years old and with a fully non-guaranteed salary of $20.9M next season, is an easy choice to explore moving. The Clippers face an interesting decision with Gordon–in many ways, he’s a completly expendable piece on this team, because if Westbrook is retained (or another guard added in his place) the team can build a comfortable backup rotation with Hyland, Powell, and Mann. While it’s certainly possible that Ty Lue would play Gordon over Hyland if both are on the team in October, it wouldn’t be healthy for the organization to invest minutes in a mediocre 34-year-old veteran over a high-upside (if tumultuous) 23-year-old prospect. Cutting Gordon does Lue a favor by taking away a bad choice and leaving him with a straightforward guard rotation. At the same time, Gordon isn’t a bad player, and the Clippers aren’t getting that $21M salary slot back if they release him. He has on-floor utility, especially during a regular season where you know you won’t always have your first-choice 10-man rotation available, and could be a part of a deadline deal as a huge expiring. Then there’s the tax angle: simply releasing Gordon would save the Steve Ballmer something like $100M next season. Even for the league’s wealthiest owner, that’s gotta be hard to not consider for a guy who shouldn’t be in the nightly rotation.

Even if the Clippers are hunting for an upgrade at guard, the possibility of running it back with Russ at least exists. That isn’t the case at power forward, where Morris was woefully ineffective for the majority of last season before losing his starting job late in the year. His time with the team, both on the court and interpersonally, seems to have fully run its course. 34-year-old backup glue guy Nico Batum isn’t exactly ambitious to take over starter’s minutes, and it’s hard to imagine Ty Lue trusting Robert Covington to fill Morris’ shoes next season after routinely giving him the cold shoulder last year. In fact, while Gordon and Morris almost need to be moved in this off-season, Covington is the third player who I most expect to depart. The non-trade options for the Clippers to address replacing Morris come down to Covington and Kawhi Leonard… and while I’m into the idea of shifting Kawhi to PF in certain lineups, it’s hard to imagine the team asking their oft-unavailable superstar small forward to play against bigger, stronger opponents on a nightly basis in the regular season.

Knowing that the Clippers should be shopping Gordon and Morris (and Covington) hard while looking for a guard upgrade/insurance and a new starting power forward is the easy part. Making a deal or two along those lines is a bigger challenge. Without the 30th pick to attach in deals (the Clippers can still trade Kobe Brown’s draft rights, but the pick is always more valuable as currency before the selection is made), the Clippers will have a hard time attracting much interest in Gordon and Morris. In fact, last night, the Sacramento Kings straight-up gave Dallas the 24th overall pick in order to take the undesired contract of Richaun Holmes–and Holmes is a useful player that the Mavericks will use! If 24 + Holmes = nothing, then 30 + Morris = Brogdon was actually a massive win (health notwithstanding)… and Morris without 30 = less than nothing. The Clippers are hardly in a position to give up future picks, Terance Mann, or Bones Hyland just to get off of Morris’ contract, so unless someone is really clamoring for Amir Coffey or Brandon Boston Jr., they’ll have to get creative to make a deal work.

As far as I can figure, the Clippers’ best bet is to go deeper into the crevasse by trading Gordon and Morris for less desirable contracts, thereby creating a situation of leverage where they can get some value back to help the team next year (either via a flippable asset or a useful player on an undesired contract). Say what you will about not wanting to pay them next season, but both of their contracts end after just one more year (and in Gordon’s case, only the amount required to make trade math becomes guaranteed, meaning he could offer some instant savings–more on this in a second). That’s not true for someone like Ben Simmons, who will make $40M in 2024-25. Would the Nets downgrade from Dorian Finney-Smith to Robert Covington if it meant the Clippers ate Simmons’ extra year in exchange for Gordon and Morris? Would they give LAC an additional asset too? If the Heat need Duncan Robinson’s outgoing salary to make a trade work this summer but their trade partner doesn’t fancy owing him $30M over the two seasons beyond next year, would Miami compensate the Clippers for taking on that deal in exchange for Morris’ expiring, and could they use that asset with Gordon to land a new power forward? Would the rebuilding Hornets jump at the opportunity to offload 3 years and $75M of Terry Rozier, a player who could be useful to LAC? What about the Hawks and ever-rumored forward John Collins’ similarly big deal? Atlanta particularly strikes me as a team that has to prepare to pay their upcoming young talent and could look to offload money this summer to set the stage for those deals in future years.

While it’s possible that some trade partners could value Gordon as a short-term role player, his presence allows for some immediate savings, too. His deal is fully non-guaranteed, which means the Clippers are completely off the hook for his salary if they cut him by June 28th. It’s not a complete mulligan for trade partners, though–enough of his contract needs to be guaranteed to make a trade legal. Still, teams can save money that way. Let’s look at that Gordon/Morris/Covington for Simmons/Finney-Smith deal, just as an example. To bring back those two players, the Clippers would have to send out about $38.6M. After Morris and Covington, the Clippers would only need an additional $10M, meaning that the Nets could immediately cut Gordon and have trimmed $13M ($19.6M if they elect to stretch his salary hit over the next 3 years) from their payroll for next season on top of savings on Simmons’ additional year.

Of course, there is the possibility of bigger deals solving these issues organically–maybe Gordon, Morris, Terance Mann, and future picks can land the Clippers Zach LaVine (good luck figuring out how to make him fit with Paul and Kawhi on offense, but talent is talent). If they get off of Morris’ deal in such a fashion, there are a couple of younger, less established power forwards that the Clippers could always look at as upside plays with the knowledge that they can turn to Batum or move Kawhi up a position in the playoffs: Obi Toppin is looking for a way out of New York to a bigger role, and the Clippers are rumored to have interest in Rockets forward Kenyon Martin Jr. One issue with targeting Toppin or Martin, aside from their relative inexperience and unprovenness, is that their salaries are too low to make a swap for Morris easy. Another is that they’d likely cost draft capital to acquire, something the Clippers have very little of and need to treasure.

Then, there are the elephant(s) in the room: the lingering rumored availability of Paul George in trade talks (and Damian Lillard’s satisfaction in Portland). It’s been mentioned throughout the week that the Clippers are gauging George’s value, though the latest update from Andrew Greif in the LA Times suggests that the feedback they received wasn’t great, with teams concerned about the downside of trading serious packages for a 33-year-old with a looming opt-out next summer who has averaged just 47 games played over his 4 years as a Clipper (2 of which were shortened from 82 to 72 games due to COVID scheduling, for what it’s worth). Still, Knicks reporter Ian Begley says he would expect New York to continue a pursuit of George if the Clippers are open to trading the star wing. The problem: both teams are trying to get closer to a championship in the near future, not further away. The Clippers would surely entertain a George-Randle framework for the same age, health, and contract reasons that the Knicks wouldn’t; the Clippers would hopefully rebuff a package built around RJ Barrett for the same quality disparity reasons the Knicks would pursue it. Perhaps a convenient way out: if Damian Lillard does finally decide it is time to leave the Trail Blazers behind instead of hanging around to mentor #3 overall pick Scoot Henderson, could a 3-team deal sending George to the Knicks, Lillard to the Clippers, and Barrett and a heap of draft picks to the Blazers satisfy everyone? The Knicks are committed to Jalen Brunson as their younger, cheaper star point guard, but covet a two-way All-NBA wing to join their core, while the Clippers would embrace the Lillard upgrade, especially given George’s reluctance to be a playmaker last season. I wouldn’t bet money on it, but I wouldn’t rule it out either. Lillard isn’t eligible to be traded until July 9th, the one-year anniversary of signing his designated veteran maximum extension last summer, so I’d expect these talks to be slow-developing as all sides (including Lillard himself) consider their options.

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After Quiet Draft, Clippers Need Trades For Gordon, Morris
Lucas Hann

With the 43rd overall pick in the 2022 NBA Draft the Clippers have selected Moussa Diabate from Michigan. 20 years old, standing 6’10 and weighing around 215 pounds, Moussa was a 5 star high school recruit who played just a single season at Michigan before entering the draft.

In that lone year, he averaged 9 points, 6 rebounds, 0.8 assists, and 0.9 blocks per game in 24.9 minutes with a 56.5 True Shooting. Not bad numbers for a young guy in a major conference, but not great either.

Moussa Diabate was maybe a tad bit of a reach at 43 for the Clippers in the draft, with most projections having him going in the 50s or undrafted entirely. He was 60th on Sam Vecenie’s top 100 board and not in the top 60 on ESPN’s. Still, part of the appeal for the Clippers is that Moussa will almost certainly be ok with a two-way deal, and that’s about the only spot the Clippers will probably have. There were a few players who were higher on my board, but Moussa is a good swing.

The reason Moussa should be fine with a two-way deal is that he’s a project. His tools are legit. He has size, wingspan, and excellent athleticism – he was nearly always the best athlete on the court in the Big 10, one of the top conferences in the NCAA. He’s a quick twitch guy when guarding the perimeter, has a second jump when protecting the rim, and is lightning fast running down the court in transition.

All of that sounds great, but there are some caveats. Namely, Moussa is very raw. He didn’t start playing basketball until age 12, which is late compared to most American prospects (Diabate grew up in France), and he still reads the game fairly slowly. His skills on offense are also nascent – there are flashes of a jumper and playmaking, but he’s mostly just a finisher around the rim now. His hands can also be shaky in traffic, which isn’t unusual for young big men, but is something that he will need to work on.

The vision for Moussa at the NBA level is clear. A versatile defender who can both do traditional big man rim protection as well as switch-everything and hedge-and-recover type schemes while providing a lob threat on the other end. He plays extremely hard and with a lot of energy, and should be a positive rebounder fairly quickly. The question is whether he can make the necessary reads at the speed of an NBA game, and how much he can contribute on offense besides lob dunks and putbacks.

Welcome to the Clippers, Moussa Diabate!

Clippers select Moussa Diabate 43rd overall in 2022 NBA Draft
Robert Flom

After a whirlwind of a day in the NBA, let’s take a look at how the Clippers did in the 2020 NBA Draft and recap the action. The team walked away at the end of the night with Luke Kennard, Daniel Oturu, and Jayden Scrubb.

The Deals Not Made

The biggest thing that happened for the Clippers on Wednesday was certainly trading Landry Shamet for Luke Kennard, upgrading their bench shooting role for a player with more size and playmaking. But looming over the deal was another not involving the Clippers: Minnesota’s acquisition of Ricky Rubio in exchange for the 17th pick, with other moving parts in the deal. After Chris Paul and Jrue Holiday joined the Phoenix Suns and Milwaukee Bucks, respectively, for trade packages far more lucrative than anything the Clippers would have been able to piece together, Rubio was the last player left on the trade market who provided a clear upgrade at starting point guard.

A veteran playmaker who creates good looks for others, has been a strong defender his entire career, and increased his spot-up three point percentage to 40% last season, Rubio checked all the boxes for the Clippers. Unfortunately, that meant he was also appealing to other suitors. LAC only has one more real chance to secure a clear point guard upgrade this off-season, as Goran Dragic appears prepared to take meetings in free agency and could potentially be available for an offer at the full mid-level exception. Other guards are available via trade but present issues of their own as potential Patrick Beverley replacements and are not clear upgrades: Eric Bledsoe gets to the rim more than Beverley, but is a much worse outside shooter who has struggled in the playoffs; Patty Mills is a sharpshooter who doesn’t solve the distribution problems and represents a significant step back defensively; Spencer Dinwiddie put up numbers for a bad team but is a poor defender and floor-spacer to put next to LAC’s stars; George Hill is supremely steady on both ends, but unspectacular.

Kennard In, Shamet Out

In the most surprising and impactful Clipper move of the night, the team sent Landry Shamet to the Brooklyn Nets and Rodney McGruder to the Detroit Pistons in a deal where Brooklyn’s 19th overall pick went to Detroit and Luke Kennard came to the Clippers. The Nets wouldn’t have been able to fit Kennard into the trade exception they utilized on Shamet, requiring them to involve the Clippers.

For the Clippers, it was a free upgrade to get a player whose offensive game resembles what optimistic fans might have hoped Landry would grow into in the coming years. Securing that now without waiting to see whether or not Landry gets there is a nice step in the right direction for LAC. Kennard will make an immediate and substantial impact offensively. As sharpshooters, any difference between the two is negligible–they’re both elite from three at high volumes, with Kennard more capable of launching threes off the dribble (2.6 per game last season at a 37.1% clip, compared to Shamet’s 1.0 per game at 32.7%).

That off-the-dribble creation is where Kennard really separates himself from Shamet. While two-point pull-ups aren’t efficient shots that offenses search for, it’s important for scorers to diversify their offensive repertoire to keep defenses guessing. Kennard took more mid range pull-ups than Landry (2.8 vs 0.5 per game) and hit at a much higher rate (41.3% to 28.0%). He also got into the paint more regularly (23% of his shots, or 2.8 attempts per game to Landry’s 17% and 1.3) and finished slightly better (60% to 56.1%). That ability to create for himself off the bounce forces defenses to react, allowing him to find teammates for good looks. Kennard’s assist numbers weren’t as good in his first two seasons, and he only played 28 games last year due to a knee injury, but his 4.1 per game in that small sample size is a healthy distribution load and he showed an ability to make simple pick-and-roll reads to find the open roll man or corner shooter when the defense overreacted to him on the ball.

Luke has one year left on his rookie deal worth $5.3M. With McGruder’s $5.2M salary heading to Detroit and Shamet’s $2.1M also outgoing, the Clippers actually save $2M in this trade. This provides some flexibility if they attempt to use the full mid-level exception and navigate the hard cap, but they’ll also need to fill the extra roster spot opened by the two-for-one swap. Kennard is extension-eligible, and the Clippers have from now until December 21st to find common ground on a long-term deal that could give him a significant raise while adding up to four additional years onto his contract after this season. If an extension is not signed, he’ll be eligible for restricted free agency next summer with a qualifying offer of $7.3M, which would allow the Clippers to keep Kennard by matching any offer he signed with another team.

Clippers Trade For 33, Draft Daniel Oturu

There was a lot of speculation heading into the draft that the Clippers might utilize Steve Ballmer’s checkbook to purchase an additional draft pick in the early-to-mid second round, but no such opportunity materialized. Cash was used to grease the wheels on several trades last night, but unless I’m missing something no pick was simply sold for solely cash considerations without at least a future second trading hands as well.

Not to be left out, the Clippers utilized a real asset–Detroit’s 2023 2nd round pick–to jump into the early second round and acquire the 33rd overall pick from the New York Knicks. Before talking about the choice to draft Daniel Oturu, I want to explain why I don’t like the trade in principle. LAC’s lack of future draft assets is well-documented, and that situation contributed to their inability to land one of the bigger veteran point guards on the trade market this week. The sober reality is that draft picks, especially outside the top 10, are unlikely to turn into above-average players. Even among the players who will go on to have NBA careers, many make average or replacement-level impacts that are easily replaceable for cheap on the free agent market.

Future picks, however, are important tools in facilitating trades. Without them, you’re unlikely to be able to make many trades. Once that trade currency has turned into a mediocre prospect, it’s no longer effective sweetener in a trade. With their future first rounders tied up by the Paul George trade and their own future second rounder likely low-value picks in the late 50s, this Detroit pick that LAC owned was their last real piece of sweetener to use in a trade this off-season or at the deadline until 2027. Last season, they traded a future first-round pick in order to get pick 27 and draft Mfiondu Kabengele.

The pick they traded for Fi became 19th overall this season; Brooklyn traded that pick for Landry Shamet and Detroit was willing to trade Luke Kennard for it. Imagine if the Clippers hadn’t made last year’s draft-day trade for Kabengele and were able to acquire Kennard without giving up Shamet. In essence, they traded Landry for Fi–who the team was so low on by the end of last season that they didn’t even bring him with them to the Orlando bubble. The 17th pick last night netted Ricky Rubio, the 25th pick, and the 28th pick in this year’s draft. It certainly feels like having pick 19 could have helped the Clippers put a competing offer forward for Rubio. Now try to imagine those offers with Kabengele going to Brooklyn instead of Shamet, or Oklahoma City instead of pick 19. The value simply isn’t there for those teams to even consider it. In terms of liquid trade capital, the Clippers made a big negative move by trading into last year’s first round to take Fi, and their only hope of recouping that value is if he turns into a good or unique enough player as a 27th overall pick that his production couldn’t be easily replaced in free agency. Even if he progresses from last season, earns some playing time, and goes on to have a perfectly nice career, that’s an unlikely proposition.

Similarly, this deal to acquire pick 33 is negative asset management for the Clippers, and it was done to secure an early second-round pick, where players are extremely unlikely to turn into irreplaceable pieces. I think that Detroit’s 2023 2nd might have been a chip for LAC to use in a deal to land a solid veteran role player who became available this season; now, they have no such asset and will be easily outbid by any other interested team. The odds of anyone they selected here doing enough between now and the trade deadline to have more trade value than that future pick are astronomically slim.

Oturu himself is an uninspiring prospect, adding a bit of salt in the wound of the Clippers’ poor-value trade. You can read about his profile here, but I’ll just note that when I wrote about free agent depth center targets two weeks ago I noted a handful of early- and mid-20s third string guys who were fine but unspectacular and would be available at the minimum salary. Oturu may make a career for himself in the NBA, but the likelihood of him bringing more now or long-term than inexpensive free agent centers makes it a puzzling pick when quality guards and wings are much more difficult to obtain for cheap on the free agent market. The one aspect of his skillset that might not be easily replaced by a minimum-salary player is his three-point shot, if it translates to the NBA, but it feels odd that the Clippers would prioritize that when they just made an asset-negative trade to get Mfiondu Kabengele for the same reason last year. It’s even odder when you consider that Oturu’s slow feet defensively will often turn him into a negative on that end when asked to defend pick-and-rolls, despite his quality rim protection and high-motor rebounding.

If purchasing a pick in this year’s second round wasn’t an option, I would have rather the Clippers sat out (I would have been willing to do cash plus a future LAC 2nd, but not the DET 2nd). But if they were going to trade in, they could have done better than Oturu. High-upside French point guard Theo Maledon, a projected first-round pick, went immediately after them at 34. Xavier Tillman, a big man with modern defensive versatility that is a valuable skillset, went 35th. Some highly-regarded point guard prospects who are considered good bets to provide reliable backup minutes, like Tre Jones and Cassius Winston, went later as well.

Jayden Scrubb Drafted 55th

Somewhere along the line tonight, the Clippers ended up with the 55th pick instead of the 57th pick. It seems likely to me in retrospect that this swap was the lowest-stakes way for the Clippers and Nets (who originally owned pick 55) to make the 19-Kennard-Shamet trade legal, as the Clippers couldn’t officially complete the trade without getting something from Brooklyn. Landry for nothing isn’t allowed, but Landry and 57 for 55 is. At this point in the draft, moving back 2 selections really isn’t a big deal, but as the 55/57 flip wasn’t reported with the the initial trade, it caught many–including me–by surprise.

The stakes with a 55th pick are so low that it’s hard to get too worked up either way, but Scrubb seems like as good a bet as any in the closing selections of the draft. Sam Merrill, who went 60th to Milwaukee, is more likely to provide emergency depth this season (a la Sindarius Thornwell), but Scrubb is potentially a higher-upside gamble. After a traumatic childhood caused Jayden to struggle in school, he was able to have success in his later years of high school but needed to go to junior college as he was academically ineligible for NCAA play. That was the only thing keeping him from high-major Division 1 ball, and after an All-American freshman year and National Player of the Year sophomore year, he was set to head to Louisville this year before entering the NBA Draft.

The Athletic’s Sam Vecenie suggested that Scrubb would have been better served by going to Louisville, potentially becoming a first-round pick in two years’ time. For the Clippers, that progression happening in their system is the best possible outcome. If Scrubb spends the next two seasons on a two-way contract and grows according to those projections, he’d be a cheap restricted free agent for the Clippers in 2022, basically giving them a free first-round pick in a year when they won’t have one. Jayden will have a lot of work to do if that scenario is going to become a reality, the first bit of with will be proving he deserves that two-way contract in competition with other undrafted free agent candidates, such as the pair of Saint Mary’s teammates that the Clippers are bringing into training camp.

What’s Next?

Free agency begins at 3pm Pacific time on Friday afternoon, with Thursday serving as decision day across the NBA for a number of team options, player options, qualifying offers, and non/partial guarantees. I’ve compiled a list of these for anyone curious about which players do and don’t end up hitting the free agent market.

The most directly significant news for the Clippers tomorrow will be regarding JaMychal Green’s player option. It seems like a coin flip whether or not the veteran power forward will take his $5M salary for next season or choose to enter free agency. He could get a raise, or at least a multi-year deal at a similar price point, but with such a saturated market for depth bigs and not much money out there for free agents, opting out could be a risk. The Clippers could also attempt to talk him in to opting out and returning for a pay cut, where they could save a little bit of money for hard cap calculations and make it worthwhile for Green by adding additional years of guaranteed money to his deal.

Pending Green’s decision, the Clippers will enter free agency with either 10 players under contract and $26M under the hard cap, or 9 players and $31M. That means that in order to utilize the full mid-level exception at a cost of around $9.3M and still have enough hard cap room to fill out the roster, the Clippers would have to let at least one of Marcus Morris or Montrezl Harrell depart in free agency. In a scenario where Green opted in, Morris returned at a starting salary of $12,000,000, Harrell walks, and the Clippers utilized their full MLE on a free agent, they’d have $4.7M left under the hard cap with 12 players under contract–enough to sign two more minimum-salary players and just short of adding a 15th man to the roster (they could get there with even a tiny reduction elsewhere).

That calculation, though, assumes that the rest of the Clippers’ roster remains static. If Patrick Beverley and/or Lou Williams (who may be more likely to depart following the acquisition of Kennard) are traded in an attempt to shuffle the team’s guard rotation headed into next season, the team wouldn’t have very much wiggle room to add salary in a deal while still being able to pull off using the full MLE to add a higher-impact free agent. If the Clippers can’t build their roster under the hard cap, they’ll have to avoid triggering it and instead use the smaller, $5.7M taxpayer exception.

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 2020 Draft Recap: Kennard, Oturu, Scrubb
Lucas Hann

According to reports, Malik Fitts and Jordan Ford will join the Clippers in training camp. The duo were teammates at Saint Mary’s last season and went undrafted last night in the 2020 NBA Draft.

Fitt’s, a 6’8″ combo forward, announced his move on twitter:

Ford’s addition came minutes later via Yahoo Sports’ Chris Haynes:

Fitts, who is 23 years old, averaged 16.5 points and 7.1 rebounds per game last season while shooting 40.8% from three (he shot 40.6% the year prior). He’ll need to effectively utilize his lateral quickness and increase his volume from deep to develop into an NBA player, but it’s a good sign that he’s already got that quickness and solid shooting numbers in college. The Athletic’s Sam Vecenie had him 75th overall on his big board, grading him as a two-way contract player, and he was 80th on ESPN’s big board. He’ll likely compete for a two-way deal, with 55th overall pick Jayden Scrubb and current two-way prospect Amir Coffey the favorites to nab those two spots. Short of that, expect him to spend time with the Clippers in training camp before joining Agua Caliente.

Ford is legitimately one of the best pure scorers in the draft, but a lot of things stood in between him and being selected. He’s a small guard at 6’1″, playing for a smaller (but still well-respected) program at Saint Mary’s, and he’ll turn 23 next spring. He’s also not really enough of a distributor to be a point guard at 6’1″, and his size will keep him from being a plus defensively in the NBA, so there’s enough downside to keep teams away. But back to the scoring–he is a polished three-level scorer who finishes well at the rim for a tiny guard, tortures defenses with high-efficiency floaters and pull-ups, and shot over 40% from three each of the last three seasons. As a junior he scored 21.1 points per game, slightly increasing to 21.9 per game as a senior and earning all-conference honors each year. He was 73rd on Vecenie’s big board and 96th on ESPN, and should face a similar path with the organization as Fitts: a training camp deal where he tries to earn an end-of-bench open roster spot (like Derrick Walton Jr. last year, if a spot is open again this year) or impress the staff enough to displace one of the presumptive two-way guys. Otherwise, he’ll be with Agua Caliente as an unrestricted free agent.

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.

Fitts, Ford Join Clippers From Saint Mary’s
Lucas Hann

According to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, the LA Clippers will trade Landry Shamet to the Brooklyn Nets. The Nets will send the 19th pick in the 2020 NBA Draft to the Detroit Pistons, who will select Saddiq Bey, and the Pistons will in turn send young wing Luke Kennard to the Clippers. Rodney McGruder will also depart the Clippers for the Pistons in the deal.

Landry Shamet came to the Clippers at the 2018 trade deadline as part of the deal that sent Tobias Harris to the Philadelphia 76ers. He immediately stepped into a starting role, hitting big shots in the playoffs. However, he suffered a bit of sophomore regression due to a combination of unfortunate circumstances–a move to the bench due to the arrival of Paul George and Kawhi Leonard, injuries throughout the team pressing him into duty at different positions, injuries to himself preventing him from fully rounding into form. He also tested positive for COVID, causing him to have a delayed arrival to the league’s Orlando bubble and a minutes restriction as he worked on his conditioning.

Kennard, for his part, is a step ahead of Shamet at this point in their careers. A more polished all-around scorer and prolific shooter in his own right, Kennard averaged 15.8 points and 4.1 assists per game for Detroit last year in his third NBA season while shooting 39.9% from three on 6.5 attempts per game. Unfortunately, he was limited to 28 appearances due to knee tendinitis. His per-game averages were more modest in his first two seasons in lower minutes, but his efficiency and volume from deep have been consistent. He’s 24 years old, not turning 25 until next June, meaning that the Clippers did not move one of their only valuable young players without getting youth and upside in return. He will make $5.3M next season, quite a bit more than Shamet’s $2.1M salary.

That’s where Rodney McGruder comes in. McGruder’s $5.2M salary goes to Detroit as filler to satisfy the league’s salary-matching rules. The scrappy depth wing had an underwhelming 2020 campaign with LAC after being more reliable for the Miami Heat before coming to the Clippers, and moving his contract will give the team additional flexibility under the NBA’s hard cap to potentially use their full non-taxpayer mid-level exception, which is worth around $9.3M. That possibility will ultimately be determined by the cost of retaining players like Marcus Morris and JaMychal Green.

Clippers Trade Landry Shamet; Acquire Luke Kennard
Lucas Hann

The day is finally here: we get to learn what the Clippers will do in the 2020 NBA Draft. While this figures to be an anticlimactic year for the Clippers–they have no first-round pick and control just the 57th overall pick in the second round, draft day always represents a focal point on the NBA calendar.

Due to the varying evaluations teams have of prospects as the draft develops, this is the single most hectic trade night of the year in terms of assets trading hands, often as part of bigger deals involving established NBA players. The Clippers, even without a first-round draft pick, could find themselves partaking in a multi-team trade that is made possible by one of their trade partners including their selection. They could even trade for a higher pick to use themselves. In recent years, LAC has typically been very aggressive in making draft day deals to secure the prospects they like.

In 2015, the Clippers did not have a pick but spent $600,000 to purchase pick 56 and secure the rights to Branden Dawson, whose potential was never realized. In 2017, they again entered draft night without a pick but bought two second rounders, 39th and 48th overall for $3.2M and $2M, respectively. They took Jawun Evans and Sindarius Thornwell, both of whom provided solid depth minutes for a scrappy, injury-ravaged Clippers team. Both players were ultimately cut as the Clippers needed to maximize cap room and free up roster spots, but they’ve hung around on the fringe of NBA rosters. In 2018, LAC used two future second-round picks to move up from 12th to 11th and select Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who became the centerpiece of the Paul George trade, and in 2019, without a first-round pick, they gave up a future 1st (#19 in this year’s draft)and the 56th pick to acquire pick number 27 and select Mfiondu Kabengele.

Even if the Clippers don’t always get clear value wins on their deals (the Kabengele one sticks out like a sore thumb in this regard), they’ve been nothing but aggressive in getting the selections necessary to draft the prospects they like in recent years. Particularly, the team has been willing to spend to purchase second rounders.

With so much up in the air, it’s hard to predict exactly what is in the cards for the Clippers tonight during the 2020 NBA Draft. That said, here’s a few things to keep an eye on as the evening develops:

• Dallas’ 18th Pick: ESPN’s Jonathan Givony reported that Lou Williams could be an option for the Mavericks if they move this pick for an established veteran. The Clippers have worked out a couple of point guards projected in the late first round, including Malachi Flynn and Tyrell Terry. Between them and a couple higher-profile prospects like Tyrese Maxey and Cole Anthony, it’s possible that LAC fell in love with a prospect and are looking to move the 34-year-old Williams, who struggled in the playoffs, for a younger guard who can eventually take the reigns from Patrick Beverley. It would be high-risk, as the odds of a pick in the late teens becoming an impact rotation player on a contender as a rookie are very low. The Athletic’s Seth Partnow published an analysis today finding that less than 1 in 3 prospects play 500 replacement-level-or-better minutes as a rookie, and fewer than 1 in 10 are above-average players as rookies. Those numbers are somewhat dragged down by late second rounders but they’re also boosted by stars in the top 5–pick 18, for example, comes in right around those 1-in-3 and 1-in-10 odds.
  
  Given the potential downside of trading one of their most productive players for an unproven rookie, it’s possible that the Clippers could remain in pursuit of an established veteran guard. Ricky Rubio seems ripe for a re-trade from Oklahoma City. Spencer Dinwiddie may be temporarily unavailable in Brooklyn as the Nets explore James Harden packages. New Orleans seems unlikely to keep both Eric Bledsoe and George Hill, who they acquired for Jrue Holiday this week. The San Antonio Spurs, with a crop of emerging young guards, may be willing to part ways with Patty Mills. I’ve heard in the last couple of weeks that if the Clippers really want to pull off a deal for an established point guard, they likely need to find a first-round pick. Right now, Dallas’ 18th selection is the only one LAC is rumored to be linked with.

• Trades Around The League: Whether the Clippers make a move tonight or not, we need to keep our eyes on what goes on around the league. Is a Harden-to-Brooklyn deal consummated? If so, will the Rockets keep Spencer Dinwiddie? If Harden goes elsewhere, will Dinwiddie become available in a trade from Brooklyn? Do other teams pull off deals for players like Rubio, Bledsoe, Hill, or Mills before the Clippers can get involved? Are any trades or picks made that create redundancies, suggesting new potential targets becoming available? For example, if the Indiana Pacers select a point guard tonight, T.J. McConnell could become an option for LAC.

• Buying Into The Second Round: Multiple second-round picks get sold every year, and the Clippers are known buyers. Under league rules, LAC has about $4.2M available to spend on potential pick purchases tonight. That amount is typically enough to get you into the 30s, but someone in the 30s has to have a pick that they don’t want and are willing to give up for cash. In a year where the draft is supposed to be weak at the top but deep through the 30s, will teams sell? With COVID revenue shortfalls impacting teams around the league, will ownership groups prioritize getting a check over a prospect, or will the cheap contract of a second-round pick appeal to front offices who need to keep their payroll low?
  
  Different teams have different priorities. Earlier today, the Milwaukee Bucks sent two future second-rounders to Orlando for the 45th pick tonight. The Bucks are in pursuit of cheap rookie minimum deals to help them avoid the hard cap, but it’s hard to know if Orlando demanded assets instead of just cash, or if the Bucks didn’t want to cut a check. When the second round rolls around, someone will be selling, and if the Clippers like a player on the board, it’s a safe bet that they’ll be buying. Last weekend, I took a look at some of the teams who have multiple picks this week and could potentially sell to the Clippers.

• Pick 57: If the Clippers hold on to the 57th pick and choose a player–and it’s entirely possible the selection is involved in a trade, should they make one–he likely won’t make the 15-man roster next season but will either earn a two-way contract or, if possible, be “stashed” in an international league. While this isn’t likely going to be a hugely impactful player, we’ll either know who is taking over the team’s second two-way slot next season or have a new obscure prospect to keep tabs on overseas. 213Hoops’ Robert Flom rounded up some of the high-profile mock drafts’ predictions for where the Clippers will go with this pick, including Marko Simonovic, a big man who plays for Ivica Zubac’s former team in Europe. They had also previously been mocked to take Justinian Jessup, an American player from Boise State who will play in Australia’s National Basketball League this season.

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Clippers 2020 NBA Draft Preview and Open Thread
Lucas Hann

While they currently only have the 57th overall pick, the Clippers could look to buy a second round pick in next Wednesday’s NBA Draft to give them another shot at adding a prospect. After all, the 57th pick has a pretty low yield rate–in the last 5 years, 25 players selected 56th-60th haven’t done a ton in the NBA. Eleven of them have never even made an appearance, and of the fourteen who have, most were little-used two-way contract players. The only two guys I see at first glance who actually played a consistent rotation role were Abdel Nader and former Clipper Tyrone Wallace.

Nader has become a replacement-level forward who should get a minimum salary deal in free agency this season, while Wallace was a fan favorite for the Clippers but quickly flared out of the league, being cut by the Clippers, Wolves, and Hawks in 2019. Diamonds in the rough happen sometimes. Isaiah Thomas became an All-Star after going 60th in 2011. Ramon Sessions had a solid career as a backup point guard after being the 56th pick in 2007. The 2005 draft had Amir Johnson and Marcin Gortat, both who had long and successful careers, go back to back at 56th and 57th. Luis Scola, who went 56th in 2003, rounds out the list of bottom-5 picks who had extended NBA careers. That’s it for this century.

That’s all to say that pick 57 on Wednesday night has a 50/50 chance of either never making the league or turning into a two-way player who provides depth in a few regular season games, with really, really low odds of becoming anything more than that. If the Clippers want to carry a rookie on their 15-man roster this season, they probably won’t find a deserving one at pick 57. Buying a pick earlier in the 2nd round is far more likely to yield a player worthy of a minimum deal, allowing whoever they select at 57 to replace Johnathan Motley on a two-way contract.

Each team is allowed to give and receive up to $5.6M in trades each year, with the salary cap year resetting when free agency opens after the draft. The Clippers have paid out cash in two trades this salary cap year, to acquire Moe Harkless last summer and to dump Derrick Walton Jr’s contract to the Hawks last season. As a result, they have about $4.2M in the war chest to purchase a pick or two next week. Based on past transactions, I’d expect that a pick in the early or mid 30s could cost the full $4.2M amount, while picks later on could cost less and perhaps leave LAC with room to buy two picks or save some money–not that saving it does a ton of good from a fan’s perspective. It’s a use-it-or-lose-it situation, with LAC’s annual $5.6M allowance resetting next week, so as long as LA’s scouts have their eyes on someone in the 30s and 40s I’d expect them to splurge in an attempt to maximize their chances of finding homegrown talent without first round picks for much of the next decade.

LAC also has a pretty good track record of being willing to make these purchases since Steve Ballmer bought the team. They had multiple picks in 2018 (12 and 13), and in 2019 they flipped a future 1st to pick Mfiondu Kabengele at the end of the 1st round before taking Terance Mann in the second. But in the 2017 draft, without any picks to their name, the Clippers purchased picks 39 ($3.2M) and 48 ($2M) to select Jawun Evans and Sindarius Thornwell, respectively. In 2015, the Clippers spent $600,000 to purchase the 56th pick and take Branden Dawson. Those moves haven’t yielded an important player for the Clippers yet, but second round picks are always long shots to become solid NBA players. Every additional gamble they take increases the odds that, at some point, they’ll end up finding a useful player in the second round.

To read more about the players the Clippers could be looking at in the second round, check out Robert Flom’s statistical breakdown of this year’s guard and wing classes. Robert’s post on this year’s big men will be out Monday.

The second round of the NBA Draft is always chaotic and unpredictable. Already, 20 of the 30 picks in this year’s second round have been traded over the course of the last several years, several multiple times. It’s a safe bet that plenty of them will move (again) on draft night, and utilizing otherwise expendable second round picks to sweeten bigger deals or secure future assets is probably more appealing than the Clippers’ cash. So while it’s still useful to survey the teams that have multiple selections and packed rosters and could be looking to sell when they’re on the clock Wednesday night, keep in mind that many of these teams might see selling their pick to LAC as a last resort if better deals that they’re angling for don’t come together.

Teams with 3 or more picks:

• Minnesota Timberwolves: picks 1, 17, 33
  
  Very few teams are ever in a position to carry three rookies, and the Wolves are looking to break their playoff drought next year with D’Angelo Russell, Karl-Anthony Towns, and the top pick in this year’s draft. Rumor has it that they’d like to trade up for a second lottery pick, so #33 could get thrown into that deal. If not, I expect them to move the pick to avoid rostering a third rookie, but 33 might not be a strong candidate to sell. The higher a pick is, the more likely it is that a team will come in with an offer of a future second round pick (or two), and while some cash-strapped owners might prefer cash to a future fringe asset, teams are only allowed to receive a total of $5.6M in cash and the Wolves have already received $4M this season. Technically, the Clippers (or another prospective buyer), could promise to trade next year’s cash (the new salary cap year begins the day free agency opens) for the player’s draft rights a few days after the draft (the Clippers did this with Jawun Evans in 2017), but that ties up both teams’ tradeable cash for the 2021 deadline and draft.

• Golden State Warriors: picks 2, 48, 51
  
  Even though they’ve got financial issues trying to pay for a new stadium and massive payroll during a revenue shortfall, I have a hard time seeing the Warriors sell a pick, especially to the Clippers. Golden State is going to look to move the 2nd overall pick, whether in a draft day deal or later on during the off-season, and they have a bunch of open roster spots to fill with very limited tools to do so. I think they’ll make both of these selections (or if they don’t, it’ll be a productive trade, not a pick sale) and give those guys shots at making the roster or nabbing two-way deals.

• Charlotte Hornets: picks 3, 32, 56
  
  The Hornets’ roster is desolate enough that they should really take a pick as high as 32 and try to find a rotation-caliber player. Once we get to 56, we’re into “wait and see if the guy you like goes undrafted” territory–especially with the Clippers picking right after them at 57. Could LAC buy pick 56 and go back-to-back? Could they give Charlotte a little cash to swap picks and move up 1 spot to make sure they get a prospect they really like? Sure, but it probably isn’t the best use of resources.

• New York Knicks: picks 8, 27, 38
  
  The Knicks are always a little hard to get a read on because of how poorly they’ve been managed for as long as anyone can remember. They only have 6 guaranteed contracts for next year, though their team options and non-guaranteed deals could fill up the roster quickly. The 38th pick isn’t an obvious potential sale, especially since the Knicks had a low payroll last year and are set up for an inexpensive roster again in 2020-21, but it could still be an option if they’re planning on hanging on to some of their veterans from last year and don’t want to commit three roster spots to rookies.

• Sacramento Kings: picks 12, 35, 43, 52
  
  The Kings are a really curious case, as they’re one of a number of Western Conference teams that hope to be on the cusp of competing for a playoff spot while realistically having a difficult path to the 8th seed (the league expanding the play-in tournament this season helps those hopes be more realistic). It would be pretty surprising if they used all four of these picks, and pick 52 isn’t very appealing, so 35 and 43 are both realistic sale candidates. Alternatively, the Kings could try to package these selections to move up, but I’m not sure where a deal like that materializes.

• New Orleans Pelicans: picks 13, 39, 42, 60
  
  The Pelicans are another team that’s looking to get serious in the Western Conference playoff hunt. Their roster is young, but most of their young players are important rotation pieces, leaving them some flexibility to add prospects to their third string while also adding veteran depth to balance their youth. Pick 60 is unlikely to yield a year-one roster player or any return in a trade, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they move one of their earlier 2nds. The Pelicans took $1M from the Lakers in the Anthony Davis trade, but that leaves them plenty of space for incoming cash from selling one of these picks.

• Boston Celtics: picks 14, 26, 30, 47
  
  Danny Ainge is notorious for milking his assets for everything they’re worth and being stingy in trades–I’d be shocked if the Celtics moved even a late pick that they have no use for for just cash. I have a feeling that multiple of these picks will be on the move, but they won’t be for sale.

• Philadelphia 76ers: picks 21, 34, 36, 49, and 58
  
  Any time you head into a draft with this many options, all sorts of trades are going to be on the table. Daryl Morey could be looking to make a splash in his first big day in charge of the Sixers, so they might do any number of things. Once we get into the second round, though, I’m betting that some of these picks–at least #49–are still around, and the Sixers have the most expensive roster in the league and just gave big new contracts to hire Morey and head coach Doc Rivers. Philly’s ownership group has clearly spent money on their massive payroll and new staff, but they sold the 39th pick to the Clippers in 2017 and I’d expect they see having 4 second round picks this year as an opportunity to make money again.

Another candidate:

• Chicago Bulls: picks 4 and 44
  
  The Bulls have sold second round picks before, and just don’t have a ton of roster space this off-season. They’ve got 12 contracts already on the books with the restricted free agencies of Kris Dunn, Denzel Valentine, and Shaquille Harrison potentially bringing them to 15–before adding their 4th overall pick and any free agent acquisitions. I think that selling pick 44 could totally be in play here.

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Can the Clippers buy a second round pick next week?
Lucas Hann