Round 1 | Game 3 | Los Angeles (1) @ San Antonio (1) | 4/24 | 6:30 PM | ESPN

[Tudalop]

Lester Hudson can knock down 3's and play defense... why won't we give him a shot over our 3-guard lineup

I really need an explanation for this. How can Austin Rivers play the PG instead of that guy?

I'll give you a hint- him and the coach have something in common. Ok, figure It out no more hints.

Not this one...

[MartinToVaught]

I see the usual "the sky is falling" crowd calling for a mass suicide. yeah it was a bad performance, and my wife is pissed too, but it's still just one game and we still have the game 4 to even things out with the HCA on our side. not like we are looking at an elimination game.

How dare you be rational! You know the season is over! We might as well just fly back to LA now and concede the series

Yeah, because this team has proven to be so mentally strong in the playoffs and able to bounce back after painful losses. Silly us for expecting the worst.

[Quake Griffin]

I'm not giving up on this team.

if they lose, so be it.
I'm not giving up on them. They can play better on both ends of the ball and I know it.

[nickhx2]

there's pretty much no way the team will play this badly in game 4. we might not win it, but i expect to win game 5 regardless. after that we'll really see what the team's made of.

[og15]

I see the usual "the sky is falling" crowd calling for a mass suicide. yeah it was a bad performance, and my wife is pissed too, but it's still just one game and we still have the game 4 to even things out with the HCA on our side. not like we are looking at an elimination game.

How dare you be rational! You know the season is over! We might as well just fly back to LA now and concede the series

Yeah, because this team has proven to be so mentally strong in the playoffs and able to bounce back after painful losses. Silly us for expecting the worst.

Game 1 vs Golden State. They haven't necessarily shown the opposite on any sort of pattern basis either. Losing game 6 to the Thunder didn't mean they were incapable of bouncing back after a tough loss, just meant they lost game 6 to the Thunder.

[mkwest]

According to the Spurs, the Clippers unlawfully won game one, so they beat us like we stole something in game 3. Game 4 is pretty much do or die. Steal that one and no harm has been done. If you lose that one, all you can hope for is a miracle.

[Ranma]

I missed the 2nd half because I had to visit my nephew and help my brother prepare for moving. As suspected, it looks like I saved myself some grief. After catching up on this thread and looking at the box score as well as watching the 1st half, I'm quite disappointed with how the Clippers came back. Champions have pride and resilient intestinal fortitude. They come back after a bad performance and compete. They don't wilt and act like they don't belong.

This organization does so much to defeat itself that it has permeated right on down to the team. Our GM provided a top-heavy roster severely lacking in depth through incompetence, but the coach isn't doing the team any favors by playing favorites and adhering to a narrow view of how things should be done. Our two best players are choking instead of stepping up in the moment. Our owner is just thankful to have a team and will continue to indulge his wayward GM/coach while also looking to rebrand the team with clip art designs.

Instead of giving a hungry guy like Lester Hudson a chance to help with his hard-nose defense and capable offense (like I prefer), Doc would rather play his son Austin for the sake of nepotism, Crawford despite his history as an ineffective postseason player (the playoffs demand consistency and defense), and Turkoglu in the hopes of recapturing his glory days long past gone. While Doc thumbs his nose at first-round draft picks and developing young players, the Spurs team he is trying to emulate is kicking our butts while passing the torch with the likes of Kawhi Leonard and Tiago Splitter, two players drafted in the mid-to-late first round by San Antonio.

The fact that Crawford is on the team is self-defeating because Doc can't help but play him, but now that his value has been lowered, he won't get anything significant in return. While there's still some semblance of hope for Rivers Jr., he's getting the patience, opportunity, and developmental experience that weren't granted to Bullock or Wilcox. Hawes will probably be shipped out and succeed elsewhere; the only question is what we're going to give up in addition, not what we're going to get back.

If Chris Paul and Blake Griffin don't want to have tarnished legacies, then they should come out fighting instead of cowering in the brighter spotlight or making excuses. Has the crowd been loud enough? Still having nightmares about the bogeyman Sterling? What is it this time?

I'm disappointed but not surprised. The team is playing as badly as I've feared. However, I hoped that they would be struck by the epiphany that they are the ones keeping themselves from succeeding. I still believe this Clippers team can beat that Spurs team and go deep into the playoffs. The problem is that the team itself doesn't believe it and thus its performance reflects that.

Seriously, if a close loss in the second game of a playoff series is going to demoralize these guys, they may as well pack it up and go home tonight and start searching for their marbles. I guess I should be glad that I didn't watch the 2nd half. Otherwise, I'd probably be ranting and raving like a lunatic...or at least even more so than I currently am.

[mike3]

This is tough.

Our team doesn't have the hunger and HEART, heart is something we just don't play with. Every team has their bad shooting nights like we did tonight, but effort and energy is something you can still give.

We played like we didn't want it today. Breaks fans hearts cause we can be so promising.

If we lose Game 4, we're done as far as I'm concerned.

So disappointing how Doc plays us sometimes, he doesn't change anything, Hudson is deserving of minutes of Rivers cause of one thing, defense. Dahntay Jones is deserving of minutes of Turk cause of one thing, defense.

WE NEED DEFENSE. I literally don't understand why Blake looks so disinterested when he's such a hard worker. What is it? Arrogance? It's something mental. He's the best player on the court and doesn't try with things like boxing out, defending the lane etc.

I can't see us winning this series, we're just not "there" yet. I don't want to give up hope but I don't know how far this group goes, I don't even know if Doc's the right coach for us. He doesn't seem to motivate our guys at all, for example, how can Blake SO OFTEN be lazy on defense OR not attack and play with energy offensively like he should without being yelled at and put in his place.

I won't be able to watch game 4 but I'd be shocked if we won.

[Neddy]

I see the usual "the sky is falling" crowd calling for a mass suicide. yeah it was a bad performance, and my wife is pissed too, but it's still just one game and we still have the game 4 to even things out with the HCA on our side. not like we are looking at an elimination game.

How dare you be rational! You know the season is over! We might as well just fly back to LA now and concede the series

Yeah, because this team has proven to be so mentally strong in the playoffs and able to bounce back after painful losses. Silly us for expecting the worst.

you wanna expect the worst? go be a redsox fan, especially during the buckner years. you want inferior athletes but mentally strong group to cheer for? go cheer for those north korean soccer players.
I expect the talent that this group has, to eventually find its way. if that isn't this year, I enjoyed it immensely still.

you wanna talk about some miserable clipper squad? why don't you look up Kenny the Snake Norman's rookie year? MIke Woodson the coach was actually playing back then.

this clipper franchise is now owned by the richest man in all sports, and this is his hobby and a passion and don't care to profit from it. you act like this team is still owned by Donald the Conman of skidrow housing plan.

[mattd13]

the fact is pop is out coaching doc by a long shot and the defense of our star players is awful. they can not continue to leave the 3 pt. line. if they do not get jj some better looks and move the ball then the team will have trouble. plus this, Austin should be in the d-league. come on doc fix this.

[Clemenza]

I seriously wish we had a different coach. I even think Doc broke Hawes' confidence. Why doesn't he make his role easier? He's 7 feet tall for crying out loud! Why not change his game to a traditional big man's game. Post him up on offense and box out and rebound on defense. Why in the world does he have to be a 3 point specialist?? We have enough of that already. He should've kept Mullins if all he wants is a 7 foot three point shooter. I know it won't happen in the post season but how much worse would Hamilton, Wilcox, Udoh, and Lester Hudson be compared to Crawford, Hedo, Austin Rivers, and Big Baby? Why is Austin playing over Hudson anyways? That alone is crazy to me. Joe Ingles, Cunningham, Hasan Whiteside... For the situation we're in now, the players were there to be had folks.

-anyways its do or die on Sunday. hopefully we can get it together

[og15]

I'll repeat what I said in the GB.

The Clippers can win but need to make adjustments based on the reality of the roster that has been put together. Defending the Spurs is tiring and the Clippers naturally play a defensive scheme that is tiring in itself, so it's a double whammy. The coaching staff needs to adjust to the fact that you basically have 6-7 guys who you can consider players that should be on NBA playoff rotations, so you really can't play in a fashion that tires out your starters so much.

So we'll see how and if adjustments are made in the next game as to not kill your main guys because they are playing heavy minutes and running around the court all day, but also to figure out something that isn't 'hope CP and Blake kill their matchup" offensively since Leonard is doing the lockdown on Redick.

People are seeing a lack of effort and energy, but might not realize that it's also guys who are getting worn out trying to run faster than a ball can be passed on too many possessions. In terms of Redick, I'm not sure what exactly the team can do if Leonard is sticking to him like glue. Part of what it has meant is that Leonard is occupied and Barnes is getting more open looks since his man is playing as the help man off of him. Sometimes a series like this is won based on whose last option can make more shots, and if the Spurs play the game into that direction, you need Barnes to make his wide open shots, that's just the reality. Again, this is where having another capable SF makes a difference. If the SF rotation was Barnes/insert okay enough SF who can shoot. Then if Barnes is off, you put the other guy in and you're not having to double Leonard on every post catch, and you see if that guy can make those shots Barnes is missing.

I didn't know about Hamilton's concussion until yesterday, but you try out a guy like Hamilton for example. Hedo just doesn't work because Leonard will blow by him all day.

[playaloc916]

I really hope some big adjustments are made next game. Take things one game at a time, but we have much less room for error. Doc needs to give Hudson more burn, he can't be any worse than how scrub-like our current bench is.

[og15]

I seriously wish we had a different coach. I even think Doc broke Hawes' confidence. Why doesn't he make his role easier? He's 7 feet tall for crying out loud! Why not change his game to a traditional big man's game. Post him up on offense and box out and rebound on defense. Why in the world does he have to be a 3 point specialist?? We have enough of that already. He should've kept Mullins if all he wants is a 7 foot three point shooter. I know it won't happen in the post season but how much worse would Hamilton, Wilcox, Udoh, and Lester Hudson be compared to Crawford, Hedo, Austin Rivers, and Big Baby? Why is Austin playing over Hudson anyways? That alone is crazy to me. Joe Ingles, Cunningham, Hasan Whiteside... For the situation we're in now, the players were there to be had folks.

-anyways its do or die on Sunday. hopefully we can get it together

Well to be fair, Hawes has always drifted out to the perimeter on his own accord. Even when he didn't shoot three's, he just shot a lot of mid-range jumpers. What Doc did do wrong is try to use him like a Channing Frye. Hawes is a C that can shoot three's, not a 3PT shooting C. Frye is a 3PT shooting C. The team made his scoring locations almost exclusively pick and pop 3PT, but that should have been one of them, he shouldn't have been pigeon holed into that role.

Still, Hawes was getting wide open looks all season and unless there were extenuating circumstances causing him to miss, he also had a responsibility to be making those shots. Not to mention his FT% dropped too.

In the end though, I actually think the defense was the bigger issue. Hawes just was not mobile enough for the requirements of this defense and that seems to be the bigger player in his reduced role even more so than lack of offensive production, but the coaching staff knowing the physical talents of Hawes certainly shouldn't have thought he could run a hedge and recover defensive system well.

[Clemenza]

I seriously wish we had a different coach. I even think Doc broke Hawes' confidence. Why doesn't he make his role easier? He's 7 feet tall for crying out loud! Why not change his game to a traditional big man's game. Post him up on offense and box out and rebound on defense. Why in the world does he have to be a 3 point specialist?? We have enough of that already. He should've kept Mullins if all he wants is a 7 foot three point shooter. I know it won't happen in the post season but how much worse would Hamilton, Wilcox, Udoh, and Lester Hudson be compared to Crawford, Hedo, Austin Rivers, and Big Baby? Why is Austin playing over Hudson anyways? That alone is crazy to me. Joe Ingles, Cunningham, Hasan Whiteside... For the situation we're in now, the players were there to be had folks.

-anyways its do or die on Sunday. hopefully we can get it together

Well to be fair, Hawes has always drifted out to the perimeter on his own accord. Even when he didn't shoot three's, he just shot a lot of mid-range jumpers. What Doc did do wrong is try to use him like a Channing Frye. Hawes is a C that can shoot three's, not a 3PT shooting C. Frye is a 3PT shooting C. The team made his scoring locations almost exclusively pick and pop 3PT, but that should have been one of them, he shouldn't have been pigeon holed into that role.

Still, Hawes was getting wide open looks all season and unless there were extenuating circumstances causing him to miss, he also had a responsibility to be making those shots. Not to mention his FT% dropped too.

In the end though, I actually think the defense was the bigger issue. Hawes just was not mobile enough for the requirements of this defense and that seems to be the bigger player in his reduced role even more so than lack of offensive production, but the coaching staff knowing the physical talents of Hawes certainly shouldn't have thought he could run a hedge and recover defensive system well.

That's my whole point. During the regular season Doc is doing nothing but running plays for him to shoot threes. Like you said he has it in his arsenal but he's really not a three point shooter. Once he got cold from the three point line his whole game suffered. Doc made a gameplan and adjustments for DJ, don't see why he couldn't do the same for Hawes. He's still a serviceable 7 footer imo if used right.