This sort of thing would happen to the Clippers, wouldn’t it? With nine minutes left to play, the television feed for the game drops out completely. I’m left only with Mike and Ralph giving me a play by play account of what is happening on the court. No big deal – the duo is so good that I’m willing to accept the loss of vision as only a slight hindrance to my overall experience. Of course, as soon as the whole radio bit starts to grow on me, the sound feed dies. Great. Now my only option is the intertubes, but unfortunately I can only find a simple play by play to follow along with. Do not worry though. After following the play by play, I have a pretty good idea of how it (probably) all went down.  More...

The Clippers spent a good part of Tuesday’s practice working on defensive rotations. During the team’s 5-on-5 scrimmage, the coaching staff would have one practice squad run a high pick-and-roll, with a direction by Mike Dunleavy to go left or right off the action. The defensive unit was then ordered to trap or “red” the point guard, which means the PG’s primary defender would crowd him directly on his shoulder, with the screener’s defender joining his teammate out on the perimeter.  More...

From the Clippers’ release:

The Los Angeles Clippers today announced that the team has re-signed restricted free agent forward Steve Novak. Per team policy terms of the deal were not announced.
In 71 games played for the Clippers last season, Novak averaged 6.9 points in 16.4 minutes per game. Completing his third NBA season, the sharpshooter out of Marquette connected on 119-286 three-pointers (.416) on the year.

Novak personifies specialism.  He’s one of only 21 players in the NBA whose true shooting percentage exceeded 60 percent in 2008-09, and he was top in that category and in turnovers among the league’s 60 qualified small forwards.  More...

The release of Mark Madsen is just another move in what has been an unpredictably busy offseason for the Clippers. Madsen was scheduled to make 2.8 million dollars this year, but his release will save the Clippers an unspecified amount off that figure. This move was not made for monetary reasons however, regardless of the actual dollar amount that the Clippers saved. The motivation behind releasing Madsen is that it creates another open roster space, bringing the Clippers roster down to 12 players. That leaves 2 open spots for Dunleavy, who typically enters the season with a 14 man roster.  More...

The Clippers extended Steve Novak a qualifying offer Tuesday, which makes him a restricted free agent. The Clippers will have the opportunity to match any contract offer made to Novak by another team. Novak’s number is $1,030,189. Given the reasonable price tag and the fact that there are only a handful of players in the league with true shooting percentages greater than 60%, it’s very likely Novak will get a bite from a team in need of some perimeter shooting.  More...