The Los Angeles Clippers didn’t just lose, 98-84, in Game 4 of their first round series with the Portland Trail Blazers Monday night.
Any hopes the Clippers had of finally overcoming their playoff demons went away the moment Paul caught his right hand in Gerald Henderson’s jersey in the third quarter of Monday’s game.
The team huddled in the trainer’s room after the game, spending time with their floor general. But the players had to be thinking the same thing.
“It was nice, in that sense,” Clippers Coach Doc Rivers said of that moment. “But the reality is, you’re without Chris Paul.”
What a whirlwind the past 36 hours have been in the Western Conference. First it was Stephen Curry slipping on a wet spot on the court in Houston Sunday afternoon, and being diagnosed with a sprained medial collateral ligament in his right knee. Curry’s injury has ruled him out for two weeks, meaning his Golden State Warriors will be without him until at least partway through the Western Conference Semifinals.
It was there that they were supposed to face the Clippers, who suddenly had gone from a team that seemed destined to once again fall before the Western Conference Finals to one that would’ve been considered a betting favorite to beat the Warriors without Curry.
But then came Paul breaking his right hand in the third quarter. Then, a few minutes later, Blake Griffin hobbled off the court after re-injuring his left quad – an injury that Rivers said would leave Griffin “50-50” to even play in Game 5 of this best-of-7 series Wednesday night.
Now the Clippers have gone from the possible favorites to make it to the Western Conference Finals to likely exiting the postseason by the end of this week.
It’s a stunning turn of events in Los Angeles. After years of failing to make a deep playoff run – they lost to the Spurs, Grizzlies, Thunder and Rockets the past four seasons, never getting past the second round – if they failed to advance this season, that could be the end of the Paul, Griffin and DeAndre Jordan troika that had brought this franchise more success than in its entire prior history put together.
Now we likely will never know what this team would’ve done against the Warriors at full strength. We’ll never know if they could’ve made the kind of run everyone has been waiting for them to make ever since they traded for Paul five years ago, pairing him with young big men in Griffin and Jordan and immediately churning through one 50-win season after another.
It may have only been five years ago, but it feels like a lifetime, given everything that’s happened to this team. There were the racial slurs Donald Sterling uttered on tape, leading to his having to sell the team. There was the collapse in the second round that year against the Thunder, and the second round the following year against the Rockets. There were two knockdown, drag-out fights with the Grizzlies in the first two years they were together, winning one and losing another. There was losing Griffin for half of this season – first because of the quad injury, and then after he broke his hand from punching the team’s assistant equipment manager.
But Griffin was able to get back on the court before the regular season ended, and when Curry got hurt, it looked like things, for once, might finally be breaking in the Clippers’ direction.
Just when things looked that way, though, Monday night happened. Chris Paul walked out of Moda Center in Portland with his right arm in a sling and his hand wrapped, Blake Griffin hobbled out with the rest of his season in doubt and the Clippers – although they have at least two games left to play – knew their season had already come to an end.
This was supposed to be the year that determined the fate of this era of Los Angeles Clippers basketball.
Instead, it has become the most disappointing one yet.