ROUND 1, GAME #3 SUNS @ Clippers—THURS 7:30 PM NBA-TV/Bally

[madmaxmedia]

So what to believe. Is he done for the series and it’s a lie like last time? Or just an excuse to buy him some rest before game 4?

Too bad they were satisfied with the split on the road.

Actually if he sprained his knee in Game 1 and they were satisfied with the road split, you'd think he would've just sat out Game 2- save it for the 2 home games where they have a better shot.

[madmaxmedia]

So is this actually a load management thing or is he legit hurt?

I doubt he's 100%. Whether he could have played is a different manner, and I guess a strategic decision. If he got hurt in Game 1 then I'd have preferred he sit out Game 2 instead.

[mttwlsn16]

Russ tonight

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[Bobbymcgee]

Well, that's a wrap then huh? Oh well.

[donemilio21]

Here are the announcement from Clippers FO we can look forward to:
- today: Kawhi is out for game 3 and is day to day.
Saturday: Kawhi is out for reminder of first round
1st of May: Kawhi is out indefinitely
September: Kawhi had a successful surgery on his right knee in July, we are just letting you know now. Out 3 to 12 months.

[nickhx2]

I think it’s due to the scheduling, his body just needs at least two days of rest if he’s playing such heavy minutes. But yeah, glad I didn’t buy tickets when I was about to. Ready for this era to be over man, title or no title, I’m becoming apathetic towards the franchise.

Gotta hope PG and Kawhi are back for game 4 and we can even it up.

not that the kawhi/load management haters could ever understand logic but this pretty much shows that it was always a legitimate thing keeping him from playing as many games as he wanted to.

[Cyclips]

The entire Kawhi situation is actually going to be quite interesting. Clips obviously choosing between playing Kawhi today or on Saturday. So, they choose to rest that knee tonight. A loss tonight with him in the line-up and him sitting Saturday could put us down 3-1. Instead, the Clips make the chess move today on the Suns and screw up all of their game planning.

So, tonight, Phoenix is facing a lot of questions:
1. How much do they play their stars tonight because they still have the same matinee game on Saturday?
2. What is their defensive strategy?
3. Who will they see? Could Marcus Morris be making an appearance to body up Ayton?
4. Do they try to blow us out in order to get their stars on the bench by the 4th? Could their bench hold up?

If Suns take us too lightly, we could go lights out from deep on them and pick up the win. If we head into Saturday up 2-1, Phoenix is going to be demoralized. If we lose, we go into Saturday down 1-2 with a rested Kawhi coming back. In the end, 2-2 after 4 games is where the Series would be if both teams held their home court.

This latest development leads me to believe that PG isn't coming back until Game 5. Clips gambling they go back to Phoenix tied 2-2, steal game 5 and then crush the will of Phoenix in Game 6. Everyone knows how Chris Paul and Booker handled a 3-2 series lead last season.

Someone drank a tall glass of the Clipper kool-aid. I'll have some of that too please.

[MartinToVaught]

I think it’s due to the scheduling, his body just needs at least two days of rest if he’s playing such heavy minutes. But yeah, glad I didn’t buy tickets when I was about to. Ready for this era to be over man, title or no title, I’m becoming apathetic towards the franchise.

Gotta hope PG and Kawhi are back for game 4 and we can even it up.

not that the kawhi/load management haters could ever understand logic but this pretty much shows that it was always a legitimate thing keeping him from playing as many games as he wanted to.

I'm not a Kawhi/load management hater, but after the most frustrating season in a long time, in year 4 of this era, when Kawhi still gets injured right away in the first freaking game of the playoffs, I think it's fair to start questioning what the point of all this is. Like, all this dysfunction would be a lot more tolerable with a championship, but we already blew our best chances at one years ago. And the team's not very fun to watch in the meantime. Kawhi and PG are just going to keep getting older and more injury-prone, so this is how it's going to be every year until Ballmer and the FO realize how futile it is to keep running it back with the same core.

[Ballings7]

Just found this out.. goodness wtf

Gotte be back for Game 4 (Kawhi at least).. and then maybe PG and put an avalanche on them in Game 4 and 5

Anyhow, I think G3 tonight is still winnable with a well-rounded giving from the crew by committee - and will probably get to see Covington prove to Lue he should be playing!

A couple guys gotta step up tonight past the usual support guys: Powell, Zubac, Gordon.

Russ has to play a balanced game, and potentially a monster one like at Memphis in late March. Will need a game like that from Russ -- will be huge for him if he does, I'd love to see it, even in a close loss.

Mann, Bones, and one of Covington/Batum need to step up and have above-average games. And hey, if its Marcus Morris, then whatever.. Morris is a tough guy and won't have any jitters.

No blow out, though - I'd be surprised if so

Lets see what this team has tonight

[clipperlover]

I just want to see them be as competitive as possible. Russ will have them fired up. Keep Phoenix playing hard as long as possible. In actuality, all of the pressure is now on Phoenix. Last year's collapse is still fresh in the mind of everyone. We get to the 4th and it is close, Booker and Chris Paul might melt down.

Will be interesting to see if Monty tries to keep the minutes down for Booker, Durant and Paul tonight.

[og15]

The entire Kawhi situation is actually going to be quite interesting. Clips obviously choosing between playing Kawhi today or on Saturday. So, they choose to rest that knee tonight. A loss tonight with him in the line-up and him sitting Saturday could put us down 3-1. Instead, the Clips make the chess move today on the Suns and screw up all of their game planning.

So, tonight, Phoenix is facing a lot of questions:
1. How much do they play their stars tonight because they still have the same matinee game on Saturday?
2. What is their defensive strategy?
3. Who will they see? Could Marcus Morris be making an appearance to body up Ayton?
4. Do they try to blow us out in order to get their stars on the bench by the 4th? Could their bench hold up?

If Suns take us too lightly, we could go lights out from deep on them and pick up the win. If we head into Saturday up 2-1, Phoenix is going to be demoralized. If we lose, we go into Saturday down 1-2 with a rested Kawhi coming back. In the end, 2-2 after 4 games is where the Series would be if both teams held their home court.

This latest development leads me to believe that PG isn't coming back until Game 5. Clips gambling they go back to Phoenix tied 2-2, steal game 5 and then crush the will of Phoenix in Game 6. Everyone knows how Chris Paul and Booker handled a 3-2 series lead last season.

The way to play chess would have been to rule him out after game 1 and then have him back for both games at home. This certainly wasn't some planned thing.

[clipperlover]

The entire Kawhi situation is actually going to be quite interesting. Clips obviously choosing between playing Kawhi today or on Saturday. So, they choose to rest that knee tonight. A loss tonight with him in the line-up and him sitting Saturday could put us down 3-1. Instead, the Clips make the chess move today on the Suns and screw up all of their game planning.

So, tonight, Phoenix is facing a lot of questions:
1. How much do they play their stars tonight because they still have the same matinee game on Saturday?
2. What is their defensive strategy?
3. Who will they see? Could Marcus Morris be making an appearance to body up Ayton?
4. Do they try to blow us out in order to get their stars on the bench by the 4th? Could their bench hold up?

If Suns take us too lightly, we could go lights out from deep on them and pick up the win. If we head into Saturday up 2-1, Phoenix is going to be demoralized. If we lose, we go into Saturday down 1-2 with a rested Kawhi coming back. In the end, 2-2 after 4 games is where the Series would be if both teams held their home court.

This latest development leads me to believe that PG isn't coming back until Game 5. Clips gambling they go back to Phoenix tied 2-2, steal game 5 and then crush the will of Phoenix in Game 6. Everyone knows how Chris Paul and Booker handled a 3-2 series lead last season.

The way to play chess would have been to rule him out after game 1 and then have him back for both games at home. This certainly wasn't some planned thing.

I don't think so. I think you have to expect your role players to play better at home, So, if they are going to steal a game without Kawhi, tonight would be the time.

That said, I remember when Kawhi was hurt vs Utah. It seemed like no big deal. He sat on the sideline and rubbed his knee some. It was like a month later we learned he had torn his ACL. If he sits out 3 and 4, then we know the issue is more serious than expected.

Here is an interesting perspective:

Watch on YouTube

[Clemenza]

If Kawhi is out game 4 then its serious. If he plays on Saturday then its looking like this is load management since he's played over 40 minutes in games 1 and 2 and we have a quick under 48 hour turnaround for game 4 which has a 12:30pm start time

[MartinToVaught]

Read on Twitter

Season's over, from the sound of things. Another wasted year.

[playaloc916]

I wonder who will be the leading scorer for the Clips... Hopefully it isn't a start to finish blowout...
What a damn disappointment.

Only had one year where both Kawhi and PG were healthy, and the entire team choked. This is reminding me of the T-Mac-Yao Rockets...

[og15]

The entire Kawhi situation is actually going to be quite interesting. Clips obviously choosing between playing Kawhi today or on Saturday. So, they choose to rest that knee tonight. A loss tonight with him in the line-up and him sitting Saturday could put us down 3-1. Instead, the Clips make the chess move today on the Suns and screw up all of their game planning.

So, tonight, Phoenix is facing a lot of questions:
1. How much do they play their stars tonight because they still have the same matinee game on Saturday?
2. What is their defensive strategy?
3. Who will they see? Could Marcus Morris be making an appearance to body up Ayton?
4. Do they try to blow us out in order to get their stars on the bench by the 4th? Could their bench hold up?

If Suns take us too lightly, we could go lights out from deep on them and pick up the win. If we head into Saturday up 2-1, Phoenix is going to be demoralized. If we lose, we go into Saturday down 1-2 with a rested Kawhi coming back. In the end, 2-2 after 4 games is where the Series would be if both teams held their home court.

This latest development leads me to believe that PG isn't coming back until Game 5. Clips gambling they go back to Phoenix tied 2-2, steal game 5 and then crush the will of Phoenix in Game 6. Everyone knows how Chris Paul and Booker handled a 3-2 series lead last season.

The way to play chess would have been to rule him out after game 1 and then have him back for both games at home. This certainly wasn't some planned thing.

I don't think so. I think you have to expect your role players to play better at home, So, if they are going to steal a game without Kawhi, tonight would be the time.

That said, I remember when Kawhi was hurt vs Utah. It seemed like no big deal. He sat on the sideline and rubbed his knee some. It was like a month later we learned he had torn his ACL. If he sits out 3 and 4, then we know the issue is more serious than expected.

Here is an interesting perspective:

Watch on YouTube

Yes, you expect your role players to play better at home, you also expect that Phoenix will go all out to win game 2 and not go down 0-2 as the home team, so the chess move is to save the star for games 3 and 4 where he will get more help from the role players and look to be up 3-1 after 4 games. There's no explanation that makes playing him in game 2 if it was planned a good plan.

Of course I don't think it was anything close to planned, but just for the sake of argument.

[UKClipperfan]

Well this sucks

Gonna be so funny if Russ unleashed wins us this game lmao

[Scoundreldays]

If it is truly serious, one of the Kawhi or PG has to go in the offseason unfortunately. You can't have 2 injury prone super stars and expect to make any deep playoff run.

Edit: naw f that if this is the case just blow it up

[Clemenza]

Read on Twitter

Season's over, from the sound of things. Another wasted year.

That means Kawhi hasn't told them as to whether he'll play or not. This ain't the team's call. This is all Kawhi

[Ballings7]

On the other hand..

https://youtu.be/NDXmIMrZi_0?t=102

1m45s of:

Watch on YouTube

I'm goin with 'dat.. (game 4 return because not enough time to rest due to Saturday earlier start ; ) ).

And yes, I watched the FTF broussard/wright, balanced perspective, not slamming Kawhi like a lot of people do. People just don't get it and Kawhi is legitimately not healthy with his condition. Been a fan and supporter since his rookie days and will continue to be -- he's maximizing his capabilities I believe.

And he'll be back.