NBA Daily Preview, January 18: Sinking Clippers
These are the kind of posts that I hate to write — analysis of how an injury to a key player can destroy a team’s hopes. Last night, Chris Paul injured his hand, and is slated to miss the next six to eight weeks during recovery. This is a massive blow to the Clippers’ season, but one that might not be quite as bad as it initially looks.
To start, LA is definitely going to slip in the standings. As good as they’ve been without Blake Griffin, they consistently struggle without Chris Paul. A quick glance at the NBA standings shows the Clips in fourth place in the West, two games ahead of the Jazz, and two more ahead of the Grizzlies and Thunder. While nothing is guaranteed, I would expect Utah to pass LA, and I would give Memphis and OKC each a decent chance of doing so as well.
Even without Paul, it’s hard to see LA falling much further than this, though. That this team could miss the playoffs is almost impossible, especially with the huge gap between the seven and eight seeds (6.5 games). However, falling to sixth or seventh opens up the potential for a first-round matchup against Houston or San Antonio, a series that would understandably be very difficult to win.
However, this outcome wouldn’t be the end of the world for the Clippers. Finishing below the 4/5 bracket allows them to forestall a potential matchup with Golden State until the Conference Finals, and a series against the Rockets or Spurs seemed almost inevitable anyways. The main problem is that LA could conceivably have to play Houston, San Antonio, and then Golden State for three playoff series, a road that is tortuous and brutal to say the least.
Any way one looks at this, losing Paul is devastating. However, he should return well before the regular season ends, and there’s still the potential for the Clippers to get fully healthy before the playoffs begin.
Predictions
4–1 for the week so far (1–1 last night). ESPN has two pretty interesting games for tonight:
Milwaukee at Houston: Houston
This is an interesting matchup, especially because the Rockets are coming off of a disappointing loss in Miami last night. Even though the Bucks will be rested though, I expect Houston to win tonight. The Rockets can’t afford to drop multiple games like this, and their talent (and home-court advantage) should be enough to hold off a hungry Milwaukee team.
Oklahoma City at Golden State: Golden State
Until the Warriors play a game in OKC, this matchup doesn’t interest me as much as it probably should. I do think that the Thunder will beat the Warriors this year, but it’s hard to see it happening in Oakland. At home, Westbrook can feed off the fans, and hopefully more energy from his teammates. But in Oracle, all of that is so much more difficult. I think the Warriors win this one fairly easily.
