While Rondo was on the roster for only three months, Beverley held a much deeper attachment to the team and its fans, who fed off the guard’s attack-dog defense and chest-thumping confidence. Rondo and Beverley’s expiring deals made each natural trade candidates this offseason, as did Beverley’s history of struggling to remain healthy during four seasons with the Clippers, and Rondo’s failure to improve the team in the postseason, the chief reason why the Clippers traded Lou Williams for the two-time champion in March. Teams are allowed 15 roster spots, in addition to two two-way contracts. The trade trims the team’s bill for the luxury tax from around $125 million next season to about $95 million while also creating a traded-player exception worth $8.3 million and bringing the roster to 14 contracts, not including backup guard Yogi Ferrell’s nonguaranteed deal for next season. He has been dogged throughout his career by his play in the postseason, when he is a career 44% shooter overall, and 25% on three-pointers.īeverley ($14.3 million) and Rondo ($7.5 million) were both entering the final year of their respective contracts. He is also a two-time all-defense honoree, a skillset that will help replace one of Beverley’s key strengths.īledsoe averaged 12.2 points per game last season, his lowest average since his third season, and he shot 49% inside the arc, his lowest percentage since 2017, while his 34% accuracy on three-pointers slightly exceeded his career average. He shot 44.7% on his drives, but more than half ended with a pass, which feeds into coach Tyronn Lue’s desire to create open shots with drives that force a defense to rotate and leave shooters open. Bledsoe’s 9.3 drives per game led all New Orleans guards (and would have led the Clippers’). His addition was a bet on the belief that the Clippers’ ability to spread the floor with three-point shooting will play to Bledsoe’s strengths by opening driving lanes to the rim. In addition to dumping the expiring contracts owed to Beverley and Rondo off their books, the Clippers aren’t locked in long-term with Bledsoe only $3.9 million of his $19 million salary next season is guaranteed. The trade could be wind up being relatively low risk. But at 31, he is durable and more than a year younger than Beverley, and four years younger than Rondo. It is a continuation of the intent that has guided the Clippers’ offseason thus far: turning an aging roster younger in hopes that a mix of core veterans and young, developing role players might extend their ability to compete for a championship once Kawhi Leonard recovers from a partially torn anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee, whether that is late in the upcoming season, or for 2022-23.īledsoe is not in the same age bracket as the 19-year-old Keon Johnson or 22-year-old Jason Preston, a pair of guards selected in July’s draft. The trade involves those players only, the person said, and will not include draft picks. The Clippers are trading veteran guards Patrick Beverley and Rajon Rondo, and center Daniel Oturu, fresh off his rookie season, to the Memphis Grizzlies in exchange for guard Eric Bledsoe, the team’s 2010 first-round selection, according to a person with knowledge of the trade who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the trade is not expected to become official until Monday. With too many guards in their backcourt, contracts on their roster and age amid their rotation, the Clippers on Saturday swung a trade with the hope of solving those problems, in part, by reuniting the team with one of its former draft picks.
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