While the Clippers beat up on the Lakers in the final game of the season, Kevin and I chatted about what transpired this year and what lies ahead for the Clippers this offseason.

Kevin Arnovitz: So what have we learned this season?

D.J. Foster: I think we’ve learned a lot about the roles chemistry and stability play in building a winning team. There were just too many uncertainties this season — when would Blake Griffin return? When would Dunleavy get fired? Fact is, before the news came out about Griffin’s injury being season-ending, the Clippers were hovering right around .500 and were actually playing a pretty good brand of basketball.

Arnovitz: I think we also learned that:

Note: The original publication of this post incorrectly listed the score of the game Dallas 109, Clippers 80.

Dallas isn’t a team that’s predisposed to running — they rank only 17th in pace. But the Mavericks can identify free points when they see them, and with the Clippers’ season only 51 hours from the final buzzer, the opportunities are plentiful against a team missing three-fifths of its starting lineup.

Shawn Marion leaks out at every opportunity (1st, 9:04; 1st, 8:35) and rookie Roddy Beaubois runs a clinic, knifing through what can’t in good conscience be called the Clippers’ transition defense. Such an appellation would be insult to the legacies of Cuttino Mobley, Elton Brand, Corey Maggette and Quenton Ross. In a 56-second span, Jason Kidd hits Beaubois for two easy, but glorious alley-oops that display all 40 inches of Beaubois’ vertical leap (1st, 7:21; 1st, 6:25). A few minutes later, Beaubois splits two defenders on the break to finish at the rim yet again (1st, 3:44) … and the foul.

“Our wings struggled getting back containing dribble penetration,” Hughes says in the postgame press conference. “Our philosophy was not to go to the offensive boards, but sometimes that memo didn’t get across. We had three men going to the offensive boards — maybe looking for points, I hope not — but then not getting back on defense.”

Dirk Nowitzki remains one of the truly undefendable forces in the game. To the extent he can be bothered, DeAndre Jordan doesn’t display the focus to get the job done. Throughout the first quarter — when Nowitzki logs 11 points on 5-for-6 shooting, 5 rebounds in nine minutes — Jordan affords Nowitzki far too much space for his fall-away jumper. It’s a difficult matchup for Jordan, because Nowitzki can toy with defenders at the high post and Jordan still isn’t comfortable in the hinterland away from the basket.

The Clippers cough up 37 points in 26 possessions (142.3/100) in the first quarter, maintaining their position as the League’s worst defensive team over the past eight weeks. They tally 20 points in the paint — precious few of them of the traditional, back-to-the-basket ilk. These are easy buckets generated over a disinterested Clippers’ defense by a Dallas team led by a floor general in Kidd who can detect space and movement with the precision of motion capture technology. The Clippers’ dispirited personnel simply has no chance.

By the third quarter, the Clippers are visibly dejected. Steve Blake’s gesture of solidarity — a reach for his teammate hand with an extended arm — goes unreturned. Lawler’s Law is invoked in the first thirty seconds of the fourth quarter when the Mavericks top 100 on a couple of J.J. Barea free throws.

As any responsible public safety official would tell you at the scene of a disaster, I urge you to keep moving.

There’s nothing to see here.

If tonight’s game felt familiar to you, there’s a reason for that. You’ve played in this game before.

Let me explain. From the arc of the game right down to some of the characters in it, tonight’s matchup felt a lot like a glorified pickup game.

Take Corey Maggette for example. Ever play with someone that calls every single foul? Even if he’s the one that charges in to you at full speed? Well, that’s Maggette. He does his bull in the china shop routine and completely ignores teammates once he puts the ball on the deck. Everyone hates playing with the guy who calls every foul, and I have a hard time seeing anyone getting any joy out of playing basketball with Corey Maggette. To wit, Maggette went into full blown black hole mode en route to a three-for-16 performance from the field tonight.

Baron Davis is that guy who has the most talent on the floor, but there’s always something missing. Whether it’s his jumper or his defense, there’s always something that you can point to with him and say “that’s the reason why he’s not elite.” Tonight, Baron plays as close to a perfect half of basketball as possible, going seven-for-10 from the field for 19 points, five rebounds, five assists and zero turnovers. But then Baron injures his wrist late in the first half, and he eventually has to leave the game because of it. It’s a shame. Even when Baron does everything right, something eventually goes wrong.

With Eric Gordon, Drew Gooden, Travis Outlaw, Craig Smith, and Baron Davis all out of action, the pressure fell squarely on the shoulders of Chris Kaman (or, the one guy taller than everyone else) to lead his team offensively. Kaman responded well against the Warriors small front line, scoring easily throughout the game on the inside and totaling 27 points on the evening.

Steve Blake plays the role of gym rat tonight, logging an outrageous 46 minutes due to the Clips being shorthanded at guard. It’s always fascinating to watch players like Blake in the midst of chaos. Blake’s that guy that passes, cuts, screens away from the ball and all that other nonsense. It looks out of place at the park, and it looks out of place at Staples tonight.

There are a couple of funny moments in the fourth quarter of this one. Devean George brushes off the cobwebs to hit a few shots, and both times he runs down court screaming and pumping his fists. It’s hard to tell if he’s being sarcastic — I have no idea how serious of a person Devean George is, but it’s hard not to picture George as the ridiculous old dude down at the park who once a month turns back the clock and hits a few shots and simply has to let everyone know about it.  Between George’s theatrics and the slightly insane enthusiasm of Ronny Turiaf, the Warriors at least provide entertainment value down the stretch.

The Clippers win this one behind the late game scoring of Rasual Butler (or, that guy who tries to do way too much) and DeAndre Jordan (that one kid that can dunk). After three straight buckets right at the rim by Jordan, Butler knocks down a mid-range jumper and then a big three to pull the Clippers within one at the 6:22 mark of the fourth quarter.

From there, the game plays out like both teams are locked up at game point. Suddenly, the defense ratchets up about 40 notches, and the previous Laissez-faire approach to defense goes out the window. Mike Smith actually mentions at the three minute mark that the “next bucket wins.” He’s referring to Lawler’s Law of course, but you could have fooled me.

The play of the game comes in the clutch at the [2:02, 4thQ] mark. Chris Kaman gets the ball on the left block, and DeAndre Jordan ambles over to the left wing to act as a kickout for Kaman should he get in trouble. Aside from the hilarity of DeAndre Jordan acting as a spot up shooter with Kaman having the ball in the post, the play works wonderfully. After looking confused for a bit, Jordan gives a quick basket cut and Kaman delivers a beautiful pass (!) to Jordan for the easy dunk. The Clips lead goes to five, and they hang on the rest of the way.

April basketball for the Warriors and Clippers isn’t much different from the pickup game for us regular scrubs. The more experienced players on both sides won’t remember this game for any reason, as it will just blend into the thousands of other games they’ve played. Neither team cares much about the result really, as wins and losses don’t really matter at this point.

But then there’s the kid who can dunk. He isn’t experienced yet, so these wins mean something. It’s confidence. It’s matching the second highest total for rebounds in your career (15). It’s a game deciding bucket. Maybe to the bitter veteran those things don’t mean anything, but you don’t survive as a young player in the NBA if you don’t enjoy the small victories when they come your way.

How do you begin to assess a team that’s abdicated any sense of accountability on the defensive end of the floor?

Sacramento is able to conjure up whatever it wants in the first half, putting up 63 points on 47 possessions (134.0 efficiency). Early on, they shred the Clippers in the pick-and-roll. At (1st, 5:55), Udrih dribbles off a Carl Landry screen to a wide open swath of hardwood 13 feet from the basket on the left side. It’s an atrocious display of PNR defense that gives the impression that neither big nor small has any inkling of the other’s intentions. 30 seconds later on the very next possession (1st, 5:26), Landry slips a screen for Tyreke Evans when Kaman steps high to contain the rookie. Drew Gooden, the big man behind the action, is completely unprepared for the rotation. Evans lobs a pass to Landry over the disoriented scrum of Clippers, giving Landry a clear path to an easy slam.

The Kings get good mileage on the Evans-Landry pick-and-roll throughout the night. (1, 3:19) is another good example. The Clippers choose to trap Evans (Baron Davis and Gooden), which means Kaman picks up Landry as the former Rocket forward dashes to the rim. This stretches the Clippers because Rasual Butler is the sole remaining defender on the right side. He’s caught between Andres Nocioni in the corner or Jason Thompson at about 20 feet just beyond the right elbow. The pass goes to Thompson, who drains the 20-foot face-up jumper. Thompson is 39 percent from that distance, just a hair below league average, though that number is probably a bit higher when he gets as much time and space as he does here.

When the Kings aren’t picking the Clippers apart on these sets, they’re sniffing out obvious mismatches. After the Clippers pull within four at 29-25, Sacramento goes immediately to the mismatch – Nocioni on the left block posting up Baron Davis (Mardy Collins has entered the game to pick up the Evans assignment). All it takes is a couple of dribbles by Nocioni, then a spin for a turnaround right-hander over his left shoulder. (1st, 0:58).  The Kings go right back to Nocioni against Davis again for the final possession of the period. Same spot, same result.

Nocioni vs. Davis is only one example. In that instance, it’s advantage Sacramento on account of size. But when the Kings post up Landry against Kaman off the left block (2nd, 3:20), it’s to leverage quickness. Kaman is no match for a nimble Landry off the dribble one-on-one.

When the Clippers aren’t failing defensively in the half court, they’re completely lost in transition. These aren’t fast breaks in the classical sense. The Clippers get back, but they lapse entirely when figuring out defensive assignments. Francisco Garcia spots up unattended on the wing for a 3-pointer to give the Kings their first double-digit lead at (2nd, 10:42).  He earns another easy bucket in transition at (2^nd, 4:46) when he runs hard down the left sideline off another Clipper miss. This time it’s a jumper inside the arc.

86 NBA players have attempted greater than 200 shots from beyond the arc this season. Baron Davis ranks dead last among those 86 in 3-point percentage (27.7 percent), which is why Garcia is more than happy to run underneath the screen and yield Davis the shot at (2nd, 10:27). Davis’ brick rims short, and produces an easy coast-to-coast run-out for Evans, who knives through the Clippers’ skeletal transition defense (2^nd, 10:19).

Incapable of defending Sacramento’s rudimentary pick-and-roll game and unable to fend off mismatches that yield substantial advantages to the Kings, the Clippers resort to a zone for stretches of the third quarter. A look at the game log might lead you to believe the strategy worked, but watching Sacramento’s possessions again, it appears the Kings missed some easy opportunities — i.e. Nocioni passing up a wide open corner-3 at (3rd, 8:54), Landry missed 5-footer (3rd, 8:01). If you’re feeling generous, credit the zone for luring Beno Udrih into a couple of ill-advised, long 2s.

After whittling the Kings’ lead down to eight, the Clippers surrender 32 points on 22 possessions in the final frame. After a Landry miss to start the quarter, the Kings score on each of their next nine trips down the floor. The Clippers aren’t getting outwitted. A good number of these buckets occur in one-on-one situations — far less creative stuff than we saw in the first quarter. The Kings are bouncy, while the Clippers are listless, wholly willing to afford Sacramento all the space they need.

After losing to Golden State, Toronto, and Denver in recent games, you’d figure the Clippers would have a pretty decent idea of what was in store for them Sunday night against Mike D’Antoni and the New York Knicks. Since all of the aforementioned opponents play at a quick pace and feature big men who can step out and knock down jumpers, you would certainly think the defensive game plan would be fresh in the minds of the players.

Instead, the Clippers keep on keepin’ on and fall into the same bad habits that have led them to become the worst post-trade deadline defensive team in the entire NBA.

Despite shooting over 70% from the field, the Clippers end the first quarter down one to the Knicks. Not surprisingly, it’s David Lee and Al Harrington carrying the offensive load for the Knicks. Chris Kaman and Drew Gooden, perhaps hampered by years of playing against traditional big men, seem to almost forget at times that Lee and especially Harrington are capable of knocking down outside shots. Al Harrington isn’t going to beat anyone off the dribble, but he’s rarely forced to do that in the first half. Harrington and Lee combine for 32 of the Knicks’ 59 first half points on 13-for-25 shooting. Good defenses routinely strive to take away opposing offenses primary options, but the Clippers, whether by forgetfulness or bad habit, give the Knicks precisely what they want to get.

It’s a shame too, because the Clippers game plan on the offensive side of the ball is executed pretty well. Chris Kaman gets quite a few touches in the post and attacks the smaller Lee as much as he can before the Knicks swarm and double down. Kaman’s best work in the first half is done off the ball, whether it’s rolling hard to the rim off a screen or cutting to the hoop off penetration.

The prettiest play of the night [4:43, 1Q] comes from an Eric Gordon isolation on the left wing. Gordon drives with his left hand to the baseline, but Toney Douglas gets his body in front of Gordon and cuts off penetration about 8 feet from the rim. Feeling the contact, Gordon pulls off a great spin move to the middle of the floor and delivers a beautiful shovel pass to the diving Kaman who finishes at the rim.

The play has everything you want to see in a late season game: Gordon attacking the rim and working on his playmaking abilities, and Kaman moving without the ball and finishing at the tin.

As pretty as the play is, it’s followed up a disastrous play coming out of a timeout a few minutes later [1:36, 1Q]. Rasual Butler stands with the ball on the left wing, directing traffic. The Clippers look confused — no one is quite sure where they are supposed to be, and it’s unclear whether Rasual wants a clearout or not. Eventually, Rasual calls over Drew Gooden for a high pick. Rasual jab steps towards Gooden and his screen, but then inexplicably dribbles away from his pick. After a couple of bounces, Rasual picks up his dribble and floats a skip pass to the opposite wing, which is easily picked off by Toney Douglas and sent the other way for an easy two. Throughout the course of a game these things will happen. But coming out of a timeout, that’s what you get?

It’s errors like this that ultimately cost the Clippers the game. When you don’t play any defense, the margin for error in the other aspects of the game become very slim.

Never is this more evident than the fourth quarter. After being down five headed into the fourth, the Clippers get some big threes from Rasual Butler, who breaks Terry Dehere’s record for most three-pointers in a single season as a Clipper. The Clips do a nice job of utilizing their advantages in the post, putting Craig Smith in iso situations and positioning DeAndre Jordan at the rim to swallow up any misses. Offensively the plan works pretty well, as DeAndre gets some putback dunks and the Knicks start to get in a little foul trouble. But as often is the case, DeAndre’s good works on the offensive end get nullified by silly some mistakes. Whether it’s the goaltending or leaving Earl Barron (who does his best Johan Petro impersonation) all alone, Jordan gets lost a little easily and gives up some easy hoops defensively.

Maybe because they were able to step away and see the success of Smith and Jordan offensively, Kaman and Gooden emulate their performance after checking back in late in the fourth. Gooden comes in and right away positions himself right at the front of the rim, and as a result gets two huge tip-ins to tie the game.

But back come the mistakes on the ensuing possessions. Kaman takes way too long to make a move in the post and probably travels, but Drew Gooden is whistled for the three seconds in the key. The next possession, Kaman commits an offensive foul. Still tied due to a cold stretch of shooting by the Knicks, Baron Davis gets whistled for trying to take the charge in the post against the much bigger Al Harrington. After knocking down both free throws, Gordon comes back and tries to answer with a deep three over two defenders, despite having Kaman open on the roll. The shot misses.

Now up two, the Knicks go right back to their advantage in the post with Harrington, and Baron tries to sell the charge again and gets no whistle. Harrington ends up finishing on an easy shot in the paint, and the Knicks take a four point lead with :36 seconds to go.

Here’s where it really gets silly: Chris Kaman gets a quick easy bucket out of the timeout. The Clippers are now down two and there are :31 seconds on the game clock…but Eric Gordon fouls. It’s a rookie mistake from a second year player, and it dooms the Clippers. Toney Douglas knocks down both his free throws, and Rasual Butler misses a three-point attempt on the other end. And that’s your ballgame.

Do the mistakes hurt? Of course, but you expect them every now and then from the younger guys. What really hurts is that the mistakes wouldn’t have even mattered if the Clippers had played intelligent defense throughout the game. Instead, Baron Davis’ near triple-double (23-11-8), Rasual Butler’s record breaking night, and a 49.4 percent outing from the field go unrewarded, and the Clippers fall to small-ball yet again.

How do the Clippers build a 21-point first-half lead?

Denver, which ranks in the bottom half of the league in defensive efficiency, opts to run aggressive double-teams at the Clippers inside the perimeter. This gives the Clippers a barrage of easy shots from beyond the arc (Eric Gordon, 1, 9:33; 2^nd, 10:30) (Steve Blake, 1^st, 7:04; 1^st, 5:07). The Clippers drain everything. They shoot 76.5 percent from the field in the first quarter. Kaman moves decisively in the post, spins baseline down low away from the help, works the pick-and-pop to perfection and dishes to the aforementioned open perimeter shooters with confidence.

Gordon has a strong showing. As reassuring as the stroke is, the effective playmaking offers even more encouragement. For Gordon to rise from his current plateau, he needs non-binary numbers in the assists and rebound columns (and preferably a binary one in the turnover column).

The Clippers go up 47-26 when Travis Outlaw converts a 4-point play after he’s fouled by Chauncey Billups. Denver then stops screwing around.

The Nuggets feed Carmelo Anthony at the foul-line extended, where he works one-on-one from the against Rasual Butler and gets to the hole with ease (2^nd, 8:26). Then Bobby Brown happens. He misses wide-open 3-point attempt (2nd, 7:10), which precipitates a run-out by Denver that culminates in Brown’s fouling Ty Lawson at the basket. The problem runs deeper than Brown. The entire squad gets careless. We generally equate sloppiness to turnovers, and the Clippers accumulate plenty of those  — nine in the second quarter and 23 for the game. But it’s the Clippers’ scattered decision-making on the defensive end that opens the door for Denver.

An example: A slow defensive rotation at (2^nd, 5:23) sticks Craig Smith with Billups on the perimeter. That’s just asking for trouble. I suspect if you simulate that scenario 100 times, Billups draws the foul on Smith going on a dribble-drive 85 times. Billups puts up a rare miss on his second attempt from the stripe, but Anthony flies in untouched from 18 feet for the easy putback. The Clippers’ lead is cut to 14 – a pittance against a team like the Nuggets.

On the two trips downcourt for Denver that follow, Anthony goes coast-to-coast against the hapless Clippers’ transition defense (2nd, 4:55). Gordon throws the ball away on the next Clippers possession, resulting in another fast break by Denver during which Anthony beats everyone downcourt. All it takes is an easy outlet from Billups (2nd, 4:33). The Clippers’ lead is down to ten. With more than 28 minutes remaining on the road, it’s the kind of game in which you’d take Denver straight up if forced to make a bet — even with a double-digit lead.

The Clips go braindead in the third quarter. On a half-court possession at (3^rd, 8:36), Anthony breezes past Butler with a clear path to the rim. Here’s one of the game’s three best players off the bounce, but there’s absolutely no Clipper help from the weak side.  On the ensuing Denver possession (3rd, 8:01), Gooden gets stuck with Billups early, which means no one is accounting for Johan Petro. Although Petro doesn’t have much of an offensive game, he’s a professional basketball player. If you feed him on the move at the elbow, he will finish the majority of the team. Petro finishes the third quarter with 12 points, leading all scores in the period. The Clippers manage only 16 across the board in the third.

Petro’s effectiveness has a compounding effect. On the next trip down (3^rd, 7:35), Billups runs a side screen-roll with Petro. At this point, the Clippers have had enough abuse at the hands of the big Frenchman. This time, Gooden quickly rotates onto the rolling Petro, while Kaman and Blake trap Billups. But this means Nene (Gooden’s initial assignment) is now free underneath the weak-side glass. Credit Kaman for hustling over as quickly as possible, but by the time he arrives, his only recourse is to foul Nene.

The Clippers make a few shots in the fourth quarter to keep it close, but ultimately get shredded by the Nuggets’ bigs working off high ball screens (Nene, 4^th, 6:33). There’s either no rotation to the basket or, in the aforementioned possessions, it’s in the person of … Bobby Brown. At least Bobby shows up, even if he’s rendered helpless against Nene flying to the rim with the ball.  When it’s not the Denver big men abusing the Clippers, it’s Carmelo Anthony. He draws a mismatch in the 1-3 pick-and-roll – the Nuggets’ bread and butter at (4^th, 5:28). Once the switch occurs off the right block, Blake is defenseless against Anthony. The sad thing: Anthony actually passes out once the double-team arrives – but he gets the ball right back. Given a chance to switch in that narrow window, are the Clippers able to do so?

Nope.

The Clippers’ defense isn’t atrocious tonight. Denver gets a good number of their points on run-outs off Clippers turnovers — but the Clippers also get lucky. Billups and J.R. Smith miss a slew of open shots they frequently bury.

Are the Clippers phoning in their effort on the defensive end?

I don’t think so. They’re moving, just without any plan or purpose. Watch a good defensive team that lacks a back-line menace — Charlotte, Cleveland or Oklahoma City. Presented with an offensive action, those defenses respond coherently. The Clippers have passable defenders, but no discernible program. If the Nuggets’ perimeter shooters hit at their normal clip, we’re talking about another defensive night with a rating of greater than 110.0/100, which is what the Clips surrender in the second half even with the misses.

Injury Note: Outlaw leaves the game in the fourth quarter with a strained right groin.