2014-15 NBA Season Preview: Los Angeles Clippers
Welcome to theScore's preview of the 2014-15 Los Angeles Clippers. Visit our preseason hub for previews of all 30 NBA teams.
Los Angeles Clippers
2013-14
| Record | Division | West | Playoffs |
|---|---|---|---|
| 57-25 | 1st | 3rd | Lost R2 |
In Doc Rivers's first season in charge, the Clippers took another step toward legitimate title contention.
Blake Griffin continued his evolution into one of the best big men in the NBA, DeAndre Jordan turned in a career year manning the middle and anchoring the Clips' defense, and the team even survived Chris Paul missing a chunk of time with a shoulder injury, en route to a franchise-record 57 wins.
The Clippers then won a seven-game thriller of a series against the division rival Golden State Warriors to open the postseason - just their third series victory in the last 38 seasons - but unfortunately saw their triumph overshadowed by the Donald Sterling scandal, which set off a firestorm.
The Clippers lost a tough six-game series to the Thunder in the Western Conference semifinals to end their roller coaster of a season, but, more importantly, the wheels were in motion to oust Sterling once and for all.
Offseason Roundup
The Clippers didn't make any blockbuster moves this offseason, but a 57-win team that's already reached contender status doesn't need to make any drastic changes.
Darren Collison, who played well in Paul's absence last season, was replaced by Jordan Farmar, who looked solid in his stint with the Lakers in 2013-14 after some time in Turkey. With all due respect to Danny Granger, Ryan Hollins and Willie Green, the only other departure of note was Jared Dudley, who was dealt to the Bucks.
Dudley was a regular in Rivers's rotation last season, but he regressed after a solid 2012-13 campaign and can be replaced by Chris Douglas-Roberts at a fraction of the price (Douglas-Roberts will make less than $1 million this season while Dudley earns more than $4 million).
The biggest on-court move of the summer for the Clippers was signing Spencer Hawes, who is overmatched as a starter but should fit in perfectly as a floor-stretching big man off the bench behind Griffin and Jordan.
Of course the real news for L.A. came off the court this summer, when former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer bought the team in the wake of the Sterling scandal.
Additions
*PF Glen Davis (1/$1.2M)
SF Chris Douglas-Roberts (1/$915K)
PG Jordan Farmar (2/$4.2M)
C Spencer Hawes (4/$22.7M)
*PF Hedo Turkoglu (1/$1.4M)
PF Ekpe Udoh (1/$981K)
*Re-signed
Departures
PG Darren Collison (free agency)
F/G Jared Dudley (trade)
SF Danny Granger (free agency)
SG Willie Green (waived)
C Ryan Hollins (free agency)
2014 Draft
SG C.J. Wilcox (1st round, 28th overall)
With their only pick of the draft, the Clippers selected an NBA-ready, four-year player in Wilcox.
The 23-year-old is a bit undersized at the two and may not have the highest ceiling, but he made more than 39 percent of his 3-point attempts last season and already has NBA range, plus his consistent defensive effort should help win over Rivers.
He can step in immediately and contribute, and given the departures of Dudley, Green and Granger, he may get the opportunity to do just that.
Starting 5
- PG Chris Paul
- SG J.J. Redick
- SF Matt Barnes
- PF Blake Griffin
- C DeAndre Jordan
Breakout Player: Chris Douglas-Roberts
Wilcox and Reggie Bullock are certainly candidates here, but Douglas-Roberts is an interesting choice as a veteran swingman who's getting the chance to play for a really good team for the first time in his career.
CDR isn't going to stuff a stat-sheet and he's certainly not going to score in bunches, but the 27-year-old quietly turned in a career year last season after signing with Charlotte. He can adequately defend the perimeter and wing players, and he showed some three-point range in Charlotte, connecting on 38.6 percent of his 2.7 attempts per game.
With just 210 games played since being drafted by the Nets in 2008, he's still green enough and young enough to have room for improvement. As a role player on a Doc Rivers-coached contender, with wing minutes up for grabs, Douglas-Roberts may just be able to land something more than the minimum next summer.
All that, and we haven't even discussed the fact that his attempt at bringing back short shorts should keep his name in the news.
Season Expectations
Expectations for Western Conference contenders can get cloudy.
On one hand, the Clippers are more than capable of winning a championship this season. On the other hand, between themselves, the Spurs and the Thunder, there are three surefire title contenders in the same conference, so would losing to one of those teams in a six or seven-game series really be a complete failure?
The Larry O'Brien trophy should be the goal in L.A., and being eliminated by a West team not named San Antonio or Oklahoma City would be a massive disappointment. But at the end of the day, another Pacific Division crown and perhaps the franchise's first trip to the conference finals would be an acceptable result ... unless you're a Clippers fan, of course.
1 to Follow on Social Media
As GQ's October cover boy and the star of some surprisingly funny KIA commercials, Blake Griffin is probably the most active Clipper on social media. Whether he's promoting horror movies, showing love to kind-of-stalkers and superfans, or just sharing photos from Jamal Crawford's wedding.