With the regular season done and gone, it’s time to dish out some awards. Every player won’t win an award (cue Brian Cook sad face) and there will be no punch and pie. This is serious business. Please direct any and all hatred in the comments section my way, as per usual, since it was my decision and my decision alone on whom to give this first award to.
Without further ado, let’s start things off with the Most Improved Clipper for the 2011-12 season:
Photo by Ronald Martinez/Getty Images North America
On March 23rd, the Celtics were three games above .500, grinding their way towards another postseason — perhaps the final one for this core group. They were still fantastic defensively, a cohesive unit well-practiced in Tom Thibodeau’s system, but age had permeated the rotation and a favorable seed was unlikely.
Ray Allen had gone down the night before with an ankle injury, and Doc Rivers had a decision to make. Boston’s offense had struggled all season, but Allen’s ability to use screens and spread the floor was still a vital part of what they did well. Replacing the future Hall of Famer would be difficult.
According to the Clippers official website, Eric Bledsoe will join the Bakersfield Jam for a two-game rehab assignment. Bledsoe is in the final steps of recovering from a torn lateral meniscus suffered during the offseason.
Here’s more from the press release on Bledsoe’s recovery and the plan going forward:
In his first season as coach of the Clippers, you could say Vinny Del Negro was exactly what we expected him to be. His perceived ability to develop players and to “get” his team to play hard through the last whistle were the reasons the Clippers hired him over Dwane Casey, who came with high praise for his tactical acumen and leadership. The Clipper Organization believed in the results they saw from Derrick Rose, Joakim Noah and Taj Gibson under Del Negro in Chicago, and Neil Olshey said as much on the day they introduced him as coach: “We wanted someone who had a history of developing and being willing to play young players, which when you look at [the Bulls'] starting lineup, they certainly did [in Chicago].” As was the case in his last situation, it’s unclear just how much impact he had on the progress of his young players.
By Brian Chan
Special to ClipperBlog
The NBA is the best basketball league in the world. Naturally, only the best college and international players make it, and even the lowliest bench player had his moment at some point. Brian Cook was once Big-10 Player of the Year! With the start of March Madness upon us, I thought it would be fun to look at the top Tournament performances by the current Clippers roster.