Estimates vary as to how many actual Clippers fans exist in the world. However many there are, it’s not a good time to be one. Paul George is gone. Even worse, James Harden isn’t. And worst and most predictably of all, Kawhi Leonard is hurt again.
It’s the knee. Again. The one that knocked him out of last year’s playoffs two games into a first-round series with the Dallas Mavericks, a series the Clippers lost in six games. The one that got him sent home from the Olympics. The one Clippers president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank referenced less than a month ago when he said the swelling was “almost gone” after yet another offseason procedure.
Evidently that’s not the case as Leonard is now out “indefinitely” as he continues to deal with inflammation, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania and Ohm Youngmisuk.
Reminder: the Clippers signed Leonard to a three-year, $153 million contract extension in January when they decided to bet that a few months of sustained health would continue when there were literally years of evidence to suggest otherwise.
Suffice to say, that decision to stay in business with Leonard — a move that was ill-advised at best and downright desperate at worst — is looking exponentially worse by the minute. If you think it’s even a remote possibility that Leonard is going to somehow turn up healthy through a full postseason run, your optimism is commendable. Even enviable. But me? I stopped believing in fairy tales long ago.
If you are one of these optimists who sees hope in just about everything and looks for positives instead of negatives (which can admittedly be refreshing), you might point to 2018-19 as an example as how compromised Leonard can be “managed” throughout a full season and postseason run.
That season, the Toronto Raptors barely managed Leonard’s health by not playing him in back-to-backs and he lasted through whole postseason and won a championship.
However, since then Leonard has endured three surgeries after tearing both his ACL and MCL in his knee.
So if he was barely being managed before an ACL and MCL tear occurred how could they think it would last?
At some point realism has set-in.
Let’s call this what it is: The Clippers went all-in when they signed Kawhi-Leonard & traded for Paul George & have been desperately trying validate their decision ever since.
To be clear it wasn’t bad decision given his performance but now trading for Harden? Desperate!
