Clippers basketball president Lawrence Frank posed a rhetorical question last week while discussing the selection of 19-year-old point guard Keaton Wagler<\/a>: \u201cHow are we going to get our group from competitive back to contention? And just making sure every step we take is directly aligned to that.\u201d<\/p>\n Frank elaborated a bit more later as it related to Leonard, saying, \u201cPlan still is to win with Kawhi.\u201d<\/p>\n There was a but coming, right?<\/p>\n \u201cBut the bigger plan is \u2014 we understand we\u2019re not a contender. We\u2019re competitive. How are we going to get back to contention?\u201d<\/p>\n Can Keaton Wagler coexist with Darius Garland with Los Angeles Clippers<\/p>\n Zach Harper and CJ Moore<\/p>\n It was the widest use of the word competitive maybe since the Indeed commercial<\/a> was out. This self-awareness on the part of the Clippers has tended to be a sticking point in certain negotiations. This is the same organization that let Leonard\u2019s 213 co-star Paul George walk two years ago, with the ink on the extension Leonard signed five months earlier barely dry. That turned out to be a good decision, mostly because the Clippers had a plan and the personnel in place to execute it, even with Leonard dealing with a postseason injury for the fourth year in a row.<\/p>\n Frank foreshadowed after the February trade deadline that the Clippers could revisit avenues traveled in 2024. The Clippers didn\u2019t want to trade All-NBA point guard James Harden, especially after winning 15 out of 18 games to recover from a 6-21 start and forcing Rich Homie Flom to eat a tweet<\/a>. But once they traded Harden, it made sense to trade starting center Ivica Zubac for a package that ultimately included the draft pick that was used to select Wagler. Chris Paul was also traded into retirement<\/a> after the worst farewell tour in league history<\/a>.<\/p>\n The Clippers had stocked their roster full of expectant veteran contributors for years. Yet at the deadline, Frank said the quiet part out loud about how the Clippers used to build the roster to kowtow to Leonard, but the time for those maneuvers was over.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s not much left in the piggy bank prior to this trade in terms of premium picks,\u201d Frank said when discussing the dilemma of trading Zubac. \u201cWe\u2019ve kind of gone all in, all in, all in. We\u2019ve made a bunch of trades to kind of please today\u2019s team. \u2026 OK, how are we gonna bridge this era to the next era? And with it is, guys who are part of the team now can also be part of the next era. But if everyone is part of the team, there\u2019s a cliff. And \u2026 it could take years, years to get out of it.\u201d<\/p>\n The Clippers completed the regular season turnaround to get to 42-40, the franchise\u2019s 15th consecutive winning regular season. But in the Play-In Tournament, the Clippers failed again, and Leonard requested space to grieve.<\/p>\n
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