Clippers not only flamed out, they may have punched Lakers’ Finals ticket too https://t.co/GWeVx4nJoq
— LakerTom (@LakerTom) September 17, 2020
This is certainly not the matchup the Lakers expected, but after taking care of their own business in the first two rounds, the West’s top seed sat back and watched as the Clippers collapsed and handed the Denver Nuggets a golden ticket to the conference finals.
It was the sudden culmination of a year in which the Clippers had won the free agency battle for Kawhi Leonard and fired repeated shots across the bow in the form of a thinly veiled marketing campaign that included a billboard near the Lakers’ training facility in El Segundo. The message was clear: The Clippers were the anti-Lakers, encroaching on the turf of the establishment.
So, of course, on Tuesday night and into Wednesday, there was no small amount of schadenfreude within the Lakers’ fan base and the organization itself. Players like Jared Dudley and J.R. Smith seemed to make subtle jabs on Twitter. Following Wednesday’s practice in Orlando, Kyle Kuzma insisted the Lakers had not derived any particular pleasure from the Clippers’ demise before casually landing a zinger of his own.
“We’re not focused on the Clippers, and we never really were,” he said. “It’s all about who is in front of you. When you focus on other teams instead of taking care of your food, shit happens like that.”
Nailed the dismount.
Because as appealing as an all-L.A. conference finals may have been, it always meant more to the challenger than it did the incumbent. In an organizational sense, the Lakers had little to gain from a series against the Clippers. A win would only reinforce the status quo, whereas a defeat would fan the flames of the idea that Steve Ballmer and his billions pose some kind of existential threat to the Lakers’ hold on Hollywood. The hierarchy of Los Angeles basketball has been preserved.
Instead of the Battle for L.A., all the Clippers won in the bubble was the Race Back to L.A.
Great line: “Instead of the Battle for L.A., all the Clippers won in the bubble was the Race Back to L.A.”
Hahaha!!! Love that last line. That’s funny as hell. Honestly, it wouldn’t have mattered had the Clippers made it to the Conference finals. The Lakers are the superior team and would have send them home anyways. The Clippers have been stumbling all along like drunkards since the first round and it was only a matter of time before somebody swatted them off their tracks. The Nuggets did just that while the Lakers were waiting just in case the job wasn’t finished.
Right on, Buba!
Race back to LA, Lol. Well as Jack Buck used to say, “That’s a winner folks.”