so what. outside of clev, SA is clearly the next in line to play with GS and that's the whole purpose of this, to give yourself a better chance to win and cp3 to spurs does that.
Purely from a positional standpoint: Trading away our 2 best 5s and our starting PG for a decent 4. No. From an basketball purist's standpoint: Trading away an up-and-coming 5, a veteran 5 and one of the best 3-and-D 1s in the game for a stretch PF. No. From an emotional standpoint: Trading away a perfect PnR player and the two players with the biggest balls on this team in Nene and Bev, for LMA who disappeared in games 2-4 of the Warriors series. HELL NO.
Might finally get him out of the second round, though. Amazing that such a player has never advanced to the Conference Finals. This might all be academic. Can the Spurs pay him? Would he give up the money that the Clippers could offer (although it'd be a huge chunk of change for that organization to tie up in an approaching his mid-30's albeit still-very-talented player)?
In the end, no, but playing 38 mpg with no games off, especially when chasing MVP..........he had a similar flame-out two years ago against first the Clippers, when McHale did something right (*cough!* for a change *cough!*) and sat Harden, then Harden hit that wall again in his 12 turnover performance. Yes, I'm making excuses for him, but I think extreme fatigue has a lot to do with these playoff performances. His head coaches put everything on him. Maybe San Antonio and Golden State can better afford to rotate in their bench players. CP3? His playoff performances seem a combination of bad teammates (NO), bad luck (nursing a sore groin; not getting the #2 seed two years ago by virtue of being in the same division as GS), bad whatever. But the collapse two seasons ago was pretty bad.
