Landon Buford
The Los Angeles Clippers were a sight to see during the early 2010s due to ‘Lob City,’ which featured Blake Griffin, DeAndre Jordan, and Chris Paul.
During that period, the other team in Los Angeles made the playoffs five consecutive seasons from 2011 to 2017 and captured two consecutive division titles in 2013 and 2014. It was the first time in franchise history.
However, despite their success in the regular season, it did not transfer into the postseason and the Clippers failed to make it past the conference semifinals, and are the oldest franchise to never make the NBA Finals.
According to former Clippers’ big man Ryan Hollins, the reason why the Clippers did reach their full potential because Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan could not get out of each other’s way.
“Our Clippers’ team Blake and DeAndre’s spacing became an issue. I think Chris Paul is great, but he is not equipped to lead a team. We had point guards, bigs, but we didn’t have wings. If you look at the championships, it comes with wings. Chris Paul is not dynamic enough like a Steph Curry on the offensive end to have led us where we needed to go,” said Hollins.
“Then the spacing becomes an issue because now there is nowhere he can drive because he has two non-shooters on the floor. We were constructed wrong, and Chris just wasn’t that guy. You have to think of the champions like Kobe Bryant, LeBron James. It is the wing position that does it, and when Curry did it, they were great as a unit. Curry is an outlier, and maybe Chris [Paul] was too much of a traditional point guard. Perhaps we didn’t have enough spacing or star power.”
Hollins was a member of the Los Angeles Clippers from 2012-14.
