The arrival of Paul George and Kawhi Leonard in Los Angeles in 2019 enabled the Los Angeles Clippers to be considered a cardinal franchise. Prior to the pairs acquisitions, the foremost the franchise had accomplished was the Western Conference semi-finals in 2015.
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Although the organization has had several exquisite athletes sport their color such as the ‘Point-God’, Chris Paul, Blake Griffin, and so on and so forth. Yet not one of them had been able to guide them to championship success.
The city of Los Angeles was and is always contemplated to be the home of the Lakers. A large part of this is due to the vast success that the franchise has had which includes a staggering 17 NBA championships and numerous NBA stars that have defined and revolutionized the sport of basketball.
Some of these fine artists include Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Shaquille O’Neal, and Kobe Bryant amongst several other notable names. Although, you would be surprised to learn that Bryant was on the cusp of being branded a Clipper. Puzzled? Let us explain.
Kobe Bryant reveals how he almost signed for the Los Angeles Clippers.
Prior to his unfortunate demise, Bryant had made numerous media appearances following his retirement, divulging a vast range of wealth of knowledge that he possessed pertaining to the game.
During one such media appearance alongside famed talk show host, Jimmy Kimmel, Bryant dislcosed how he was on the verge of imprinting his legacy with the other half of Los Angeles.
Bryant stated-
“I actually had a really good and fun workout with the Clippers. And they told me, they said ‘you know, this is the best workout we’ve ever seen’..So I’m like aw man I’m excited. I’m like ‘Imma come to LA’. I said alright, so you gonna draft me? ‘No.’..So I asked them why wouldn’t they draft me? They said well we wanna turn things around with our organization and we felt like if we drafted a 17 year old kid, then the city of Los Angeles wouldn’t take us seriously.”
In retrospect, it would have been difficult to predict how Bryant would have turned out, but given that he did amass the title of a five-time NBA champion, it would’ve been a risk worth taking.
The perception of the Los Angeles Clippers!
The LA Clippers are not poor by any means, rather they haven’t been substantial competitors for the NBA championship.
Although they have stood tall in the city of Los Angeles over the past two years, they are yet to clinch the pinnacle of the sport, in winning an NBA title.
Having been commonly known as the Lakers’ noisy next-door neighbors since the time of their inception, the franchise might at long last finally see some success with Kawhi Leonard and Paul George at the helm.
