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“I learned a lot from that situation [in 2007], and what we learned was the most important part of that was the chemistry part,” Rivers said. “As important as Kevin [Garnett], Ray [Allen], and Paul [Pierce] were, I thought Leon Powe and Glen Davis were huge for us. Obviously, [Rajon] Rondo was big, but so was Sam Cassell, James Posey, P.J. Brown, and Eddie House. We don’t win it without them, not only because they were good players but they were the right type of people in the locker room. So, learning that and figuring that out, clearly we’re trying to do that in Los Angeles right now. We’ve still got some holes to fill, and it may take another year to do that, I don’t know.”

Rivers said he has spent a good portion of the summer breaking down game video and trying to learn about his new players. He said he already had analyzed 42 of the Clippers’ 82 regular-season games, and was going to do the same with the final 40 regular-season and six playoff games.

“We have to play catch-up in that respect,” Rivers said. “I have to figure out why they were so good at times and why they struggled at times. They were a streaky team last year and we’ve got to figure out how to be more consistent.”

“DeAndre, in my opinion, should be, and I think he will be, on the all-defensive team,” Rivers said. “And I think he has a chance to be defensive player of the year. But he has to commit to that, and I think he wants to. And I think Blake should be one of those guys, as well. He should be a two-way player even more. I think we have the chance that we can help him into that, as well.”

Gary Washburn, Boston Globe

willywazza wrote:As any coach should.

QRich3 wrote:hopefully everyone comes in early





On a serious though, I don't know if he's trolling us or he's really that sure that Deandre is gonna be an all-defender this year. Meanwhile, our bench doesn't have one big man who has any business being on a NBA team's rotation and Doc doesn't seem at all worried about it. I guess he's convinced DJ can play 38+ minutes at a high level and Blake can play some C. I've been trying to convince myself of all that and I wanna be hopeful, but I wish I was half as sure as he seems to be...

og15 wrote:

QRich3 wrote:On a serious though, I don't know if he's trolling us or he's really that sure that Deandre is gonna be an all-defender this year. Meanwhile, our bench doesn't have one big man who has any business being on a NBA team's rotation and Doc doesn't seem at all worried about it. I guess he's convinced DJ can play 38+ minutes at a high level and Blake can play some C. I've been trying to convince myself of all that and I wanna be hopeful, but I wish I was half as sure as he seems to be...

I keep getting this idea that he's going to give Blake about 37 MPG, DJ about 34 MPG and play Barnes as a PF in small lineups.

So we could see this type of rotation:
Paul (35) / Collison (13)
Redick (27) / Crawford (21)
Dudley (27) / Barnes (11) / Bullock (10)
Griffin (24) / Mullens (14) / Barnes (9)
Jordan (32) / Griffin (12) / Hollins (8/DNP)

9 minutes at PF is a lot for Barnes though. The reason I think this is like you said, he doesn't seem worried about the backup big men, but you also see that he said "We've still got some holes to fill, and it may take another year to do that", so maybe he is to trying to rush in filling the gaps. The other reason is that he keeps talking about playing Bullock, and if you look at the players, it doesn't make sense as to where minutes would come at SG/SF. So in order for Bullock to play, one of the SF's will have to play a bit of PF.

Mullens and Hollins are low minute backup / situational guys, so he might be planning to use them that way. I'd personally prefer 12 MPG of Blake with Barnes at PF to either Mullens or Hollins playing because I think even at C he'll defend better than them, and he rebounds better already and is far superior on offense to both.

og15 wrote:It's good to see, and like I've said before, I really think the best thing he can do is to bring out the defensive potential of DJ and Blake. Blake doesn't have the ability to be an anchor like defender, but he has the mobility and athletic ability to be a high impact defensive player who covers a lot of ground, similar to what Lebron does on defense for Miami.