Everybody comments on the fact that the Rockets have taken the concept of “small ball” to its absurd conclusion, but nobody really mentions that the Clippers are on their way to doing something similar. Or if they are mentioning it, I’m not seeing it because I don’t actually read any NBA journalism other than my own. I’ll just assume I’m the first person to realize these things.
Ivica “Zu Tycoon” Zubac is the only “real” center who played for the Clippers tonight, but he only got 24 minutes. Joakim Noah was out for some reason (probably couldn’t get his crazy hair in time to be considered active for the game), but he hasn’t been playing that much anyway. Montrezl Harrell is still dealing with some stuff outside the Bubb. So who was playing the five position for the rest of the game? It had to have been somebody. The rules of basketball state that there have to be five players on the court and one of them has to be the tallest (thereby becoming the de facto center).
Was it JaMychal Green? Probably (I don’t care enough to re-watch this game and find out). The only other option is Patrick Patterson, who once got tricked by a “ligma” meme while asking Twitter about up-and-coming watch brands. So the Clippers aren’t ridiculously undersized, but they’re one of those teams that don’t really care about having a ton of 6’10″+ dudes on the roster. If they cared about that, they would play Zubac the whole game and he would drop 30/20 games on a nightly basis.
Wait. Is there a reason Doc Rivers doesn’t want that? Can Croatia please invade the US to rectify this situation?