Down But Not and Out

As if the Clippers haven’t had enough challenges this season, the team was thrown another obstacle when Shaun Livingston went down with a dislocated knee cap during the first quarter of the Clips’ 100-93 win over Charlotte.

Livingston was going up for a layup and landed awkwardly on his left leg, causing a hush to fall over the Staples Center crowd as he was helped off the floor on a stretcher. If you happened to see the replay, you’ll understand how serious the injury is. Livingston will miss the rest of the regular season, though hopefully the injury will not have more long-term ramifications on his career.
Update: Livingston tore his ACL, MCL, and PCL and will require surgery, facing a lengthy rehabilitation of a minimum of a year. Sadly, his career may be in jeopardy.

Since Livingston’s arrival in LA three years ago straight out of Peoria Central High, Clipper Nation has salivated over his combination of size (6’7”), speed, and court vision, dreaming of a point guard that could completely control a game at both ends of the court for many years.

However, like many other Clipper draft picks before him, Livingston’s career has been more notable for its inconsistency and injury than fulfilled potential. He missed 39 games due to a dislocated right knee injury and 13 games with a shoulder injury during his rookie year, then 21 games last year with a stress reaction in his back. All the more frustrating, Clipper brass has refused to include him in any trade discussions for marquee players because of his promise, despite the fact that he’s spent as much time in a suit on the bench as in uniform.

Livingston’s injury comes on the heels of one of his finest performances of the year, a 14 point, 14 assist game against fellow playoff contender Golden St., in which he repeatedly attacked the Warriors’ porous defense in transition to help secure an easy victory for the team. With the aging Sam Cassell continually hampered by various ailments (currently nursing an abdominal injury), the Clippers were resting their playoff hopes on Livingston’s ability to play big minutes and run the offense. Now, in these final 26 games, Cassell will have to play through as much pain as he can, while seldom-used second-year player Daniel Ewing is going to get the call to play significant minutes off the bench.

The Clippers have been constantly criticized in this space for playing with a notable lack of intensity and effort this year, so it will be interesting to see whether the team rallies together and responds to adversity to find their way into the playoffs, or whether they continue to mail it in and fall out of the race. While it is true that the entire Clippers' roster has been in flux throughout the season due to repeated injuries and illnesses, this is the first injury which will cause an extended absence. All they have to do is look across Staples at the Lakers to see a team still fighting in spite of numerous injuries to many of its key players (Lamar Odom, Luke Walton, Kwame Brown, Vlad Radmanovic). That being said, hopefully the Clips won't have any players that are as clumsy on a snowboard as the aforementioned Vlad.

In other team news, the trade deadline passed and Corey Maggette remained a Clipper. Despite the never-ending feud between Maggette and Mike Dunleavy, the coach finally relented and put Maggette in the starting lineup. Maggette has responded by averaging nearly 21 points a game over the last week and even playing a little bit of defense. Dunleavy likes having Maggette being a primary scoring option with the second unit, but with the Clippers' already lean rotation losing Livingston, Dunleavy has little choice but to extend his minutes and keep him as a starter.

The Clippers' win over the Bobcats elevated them into a tie with the Hornets for the eighth spot in the Western Conference. The Clips play a home and home with Seattle on Wednesday and Thursday, then finish the week with a visit from Indiana on Saturday.

AP photo by Chris Pizzello