Clippers president of basketball operations Doc Rivers told ESPN’s Chris Broussard that there isn’t truth to the idea that his team offered Blake Griffin and Lance Stephenson to the Nuggets for Danilo Gallinari, Kenneth Faried, Will Barton and Nikola Jokic, as a source who spoke with the reporter had said earlier. Broussard relayed the exchange in an appearance on ESPN Radio’s “Mike & Mike” show (audio link; scroll to 6-minute mark), adding that the source had told him the Nuggets turned down the offer out of concern that Griffin would opt out and leave in free agency after next season. That jibes with an earlier report from Mitch Lawrence of Forbes, who indicated 10 days ago that the Clippers had engaged the Nuggets in talks about Griffin, though Ben Bolch of the Los Angeles Times reported shortly thereafter that the Clippers had no interest in trading their star power forward, a refrain that Rivers repeated in the days that followed. See more from the Pacific Division:
- Kings owner Vivek Ranadive is known to be high on Warriors assistant GM Travis Schlenk, writes Ailene Voisin of The Sacramento Bee amid a piece that argues the Kings should bring in an experienced front office hand to work beneath GM Vlade Divac. Sacramento reportedly interviewed Schlenk for the lead front office role in 2013, and he was believed to be one of the candidates to fill former GM Pete D’Alessandro‘s chair in Divac’s front office this past summer.
- The Kings anticipate making a minor move at Thursday’s trade deadline, Voisin writes in the same column, speculating that such a trade could involve Marco Belinelli or Ben McLemore going out for draft picks or a wing defender.
- Bobby Marks of The Vertical on Yahoo Sports lists Larry Nance Jr. alongside Jordan Clarkson, Julius Randle and D’Angelo Russell among those the Lakers should refuse to trade and instead make the focal point of their rebuilding efforts.
Griffin to the Nuggets is very interesting, I’d take that chance if I was Denver.
If there was a 3 way trade in play why not but Denver cant afford to have Blake skip town and then they gave up all those assets for nothing. Not going to happen
A three team trade under that scenario would either be Blake to Denver or Blake to the third team. There’s no way Denver gets Blake and more assets unless the entire team, essentially, is traded. For the Clippers to give up Blake, they need multiple win-now assets as trading him for future picks and prospects isn’t a realistic scenario for the Clippers. There’s also no way a third team gets involved unless they’re getting something good.
Celtics could provide the Nuggets assets if they snag Galinari. Clippers still get Faried to replace griffin, Barton and Jokic to help fix depth and Nuggets get potential stars in Griffin and Stephenson to become watchable.