First of all I'd like to thank everyone in the Clippers organization for giving me a chance to manage a team and a special thank you to long time head coach "Lionel Hollins" for showing up to work everyday ready to learn, to teach, and to grow into one of the better player motivators and game strategists in the game. I've gone through thick and thin with the Clippers and LA has shown me nothing but love and support. From the Dame days to a new era, I feel I'm leaving the team with a nice young core of players. Russell/Vaughn/Zubac are all 21 years of age (22 next season) and the trio form a young nucleolus that should be ready to compete in a few years. Mickey, the shotblocking phenom, is only 22 (23 next season) and has the versatility to play both frontcourt positions and provide rim protection and rim running on offense. Harkless (28) and Dellavedova (25) provide defense and spacing (39 3P% / 36 3P%) along with the ability to pressure the ball and force turnovers. Young (26) is the favourite for 6th man of the year and averaged 18/4/4 w/ 1.3 stls off the bench. Monroe, the resident veteran and long time Clipper just had a 21/11 on 47 FG% season and should be an elite low post presence for next season - he then expires.
The Clippers are in a good position for next season and the foreseeable future but I take my leave and am already salivating at the chance to take over the mantle for Canada's team.
The roster is as follows:
FA: Thaddeus Young (UFA)
Cory Joseph (RFA)/Jeremy Lin/Seth Curry
Lance Stephenson/Nick Johnson
Kawhi Leonard/Mirza Teletovic
Jordan Bell/David Wear/Arturas Gudaitis
DeMarcus Cousins/Jordan Bachynski
Picks:
2023 1 Raptors
2023 2 Raptors
2024 1 Raptors
2024 2 Raptors
Head Coach:
Lawrence Frank
We are in a position to compete or rebuild depending on 3 factors:
1. Trade Market
If we get great offers with young pieces and/or picks coming in it might make more sense to move Kawhi/Cousins and build around Joseph/Bell and target next years draft class. If it makes sense we could also trade into this draft class depending on the cost of picks (which tend to get pricy around draft day).
2. Free Agency
At this point we only have our MLE to play with but if we can bring in a solid rotational player and maybe resign Thad we'll do it. We have roughly 40M in expiring contracts after this FA class which could be leveraged into a player or two - or we'll target a max player next year.
3. Internal Growth / Landscape of Eastern Conference
If Detroit decides to rebuild and the East opens up some we might go "screw it" and try and position ourselves for a title run and target a 3rd star to pair with Cousins/Kawhi.
The first thing that stands out about this roster is the defensive talent. Joseph/Kawhi/Bell are all potentially elite defenders and even some of the secondary players have the ability to play on both ends of the floor. Kawhi is smack in the middle of his prime and Cousins provides a nice 2nd scoring option and a guy that can really dominant down low. The assets that we'll be holding closely to our chest is our 1st rounders - we've learned that not only are they supremely valuable but they also allow us to rebuild at any time, or if we suffer a severe injury we don't have to worry about giving up lotto picks to other teams.
Kawhi might be the present but CoJo is the future of the franchise - at only 25 he's a supreme talent at the point guard position who plays both ends of the floor...
2028