Clippers/Portland
rhinoceros
Senior Member
I see Griffin listed as probable. The line movement suggests otherwise. Any insight?
rhinoceros
Senior Member
Comments
Blake Griffin suffered a sprained left ankle after stepping on Goran Dragic’s foot in the first quarter and never looked like himself after that. He finished with 12 points on 5-of-9 shooting and grabbed eight rebounds, but four Clippers attempted more shots than Griffin. He had only four attempts in the second half as the Clippers tried to close the game out after taking the lead in the fourth quarter, but he could never get going.
“I tried to get him some more,” Del Negro told Prime Ticket after the game. “He sprained his ankle pretty good in the first and was battling through it. He was limping a little bit in the first half but he’s a competitive guy and wanted to be out there. We settled a couple of times when we could have attacked. We didn’t attack the basket as much as I would like.”
Classic GTD
Paul continues to recover from a bruised kneecap and will undergo some further testing. He is expected to miss an undetermined amount of time.
The Clippers don’t want to make any excuses while Paul is out, and there’s certainly a chance he could be out for a week as he was the last time he sat out with a bruised right kneecap. But with the Clippers up by one with 7:45 left in the game, the Clippers sure could have used Paul or at least Chauncey Billups running the offense to close the game out. Eric Bledsoe is a great change-of-pace point guard and can give the Clippers a spark in the second and third quarters, but Del Negro likes to lean on Paul (and Billups when he’s healthy) early and late in games and it's not hard to see why.
“All that stuff changes with Chris or Chauncey out there,” Del Negro said. “There’s no excuse. We were in this game and whoever is out there I have confidence in and they got to make the plays.”