Not having high expectations made the Clippers more fun this year

Last season at the Staples Center, the Clippers, with Chris Paul and Blake Griffin still around, averaged a measly 139 extra seats filled per game than the Kobe-less, Lonzo-less Lakers. At their best, the Clippers could barely outdraw a Lakers’ outfit that was defunct of hope and results.

Nine months have passed since the trade that sent Paul to Houston. Two months have passed since Griffin was dealt to the Pistons. Commemorative pictures, representing the present and legendary past of the Lakers and the NHL’s Kings, line one the wall of the media room at the Staples Center. There is no sign of Paul and Griffin, nothing memorializing Lob City despite six years to leave an impression.

The Clippers were eliminated from playoff contention with just two games left in their season despite trading both stars and enduring a steady injury streak. They’ve plugged the holes with D-Leaguers, the marvelous coaching job of Doc Rivers, and a near all-star season from Lou Williams. They have done as well as anyone could have imagined given the circumstances.

They’re also the only franchise whose every success has the asterisk “but they’ll never be as popular as the Lakers” attached to it. So it is that attendance at Clippers’ games has dropped to 21st in the NBA and local television ratings have declined to 29th, according to Sports Business Journal. Relevancy alone will not sell in this city. Greatness will. And as always, the Lakers will.

Los Angeles is a sprawling mess of separated pockets connected by jammed freeways. It’s a city where entertainment and nature are in constant competition for its residents’ attention. The only thing that bridges every divide is the Lakers. The Lakers are Los Angeles’ most unifying institution. The Clippers are a basketball team, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Saturday’s loss to Denver that eliminated them ultimately defined a season that featured 21 players, a blockbuster trade, a few D-League call-ups, a “secret tunnel,” and the best night on NBA Twitter. With a rotation of guards in Milos Teodosic, Lou Williams, and Austin Rivers who are liable to do anything off the pick-and-roll, and athletic rollers in DeAndre Jordan and Montrezl Harrell flanked by one of the league’s best utility swingmen in Tobias Harris, the Clippers have the recipe for nightly excitement all season long.

Their future, with DeAndre Jordan’s free agency pending, is uncertain, but is decision won’t likely have much to do with their playoff outcome. Even if they had managed to sneak in, they didn’t figure to be much of a threat.

The point of this season has already been made. The point was to have fun.

It’s Serbia Night at the Staples Center, and Milos Teodosic is about to do his variation of Showtime. The Bucks trail the Clippers by 11 and Jordan sets a pick for Teodosic. Eric Bledsoe gets around the pick while John Henson steps up to force Teodosic to his left. For a brief moment, the defense appears successful.

And then, well, I mean, just watch it.

Teodosic later adds flair to a simple chest-pass, swinging the ball behind his back to Wesley Johnson for a corner three.

Playing alongside Teodosic, teammates must be on high alert. Even when a possession appears destined to go one particular way, he’ll break frame and jump-pass out of pick-and-roll shots to cutters who were used to diving in only to get a rebound. Teodosic is shooting 38 percent from three this season, but he inches forward on his release, as though he needs that extra bit of power to get to its destination from deep.

In the second half, Teodosic will limp off the floor and be diagnosed with a left foot injury. Milos has missed over 30 games this season, thanks to a variety of maladies. His unique touch on the game has been more of a privilege than an expectation.

Still, his absences have given way for players like Williams and Rivers to shine. Williams’ quick trigger, surrounded by shooters and hard rim-rollers, has become even more dangerous. When he comes off screens, the defense is put into an impossible position, which is why he’ll likely walk out of this season with his second Sixth Man of the Year award.

Rivers, on the other hand, has spent the season honing his decision-making. Being the coach’s son might have brought him here, but his improved playmaking and deference has allowed him to stick around.

Famous local fan Clipper Darrell is still out in full effect, heckling every Bucks player who steps to the free-throw line. The exception Eric Bledsoe, to whom he simply yells, “I miss you,” a reference to his time with the young Clippers before the Paul trade. It’s an appropriate corollary for a team whose response to every speculative analysis on its future (or present) can be read as, ‘I’m here for a good time, not a long time.’

A new franchise identity is slowly brewing. With Paul and Griffin, the Clippers were stuck in the mud, grasping at championship aspirations while being a smidge short on championship talent. In Los Angeles, that was only ever going to invoke indifference or mockery.

Operating without those expectations, the Clippers feel more at ease. Jordan’s free agency, which could go any direction, will define the Clippers’ summer. If he wants to stay, he will. If he doesn’t, the Clippers can’t exactly drum up a fake retirement ceremony pitch, choir-in-tow, and convince him to stay — at least not without a no-trade clause. If Jordan decides he doesn’t want his photograph hanging from the wall in the media room, there is little the Clippers can do about it.

The Clippers spent the entire season on the razor-edge of the playoff race. Saturday’s loss to Denver was disappointing, but the chances to making the postseason were slim. They would have needed to win out and hope one of their competitors makes a misstep. That didn’t happen.

It would be tempting to dub the midseason decision to not trade Williams and Jordan as a mistake if the Clippers don’t make the playoffs. But really, an extra four or five postseason games weren’t going to move the needle in any meaningful direction.

In the grand scheme of things, a playoff push is merely a vehicle that allows players, coaches, and fans to unite under a common purpose. It gives the games meaning. When the Clippers end up with the No. 10 seed, that shouldn’t retroactively revoke the liveliness and real stakes that have defined 79 games thus far. By the end of the season, the Clippers played 80 important games.

There is little else one can ask of a Clippers season that began with the loss of a franchise cornerstone, was defined in the middle by the loss of a franchise cornerstone, and might end in the loss of a franchise cornerstone.

The 2017-18 Clippers won’t put up any banners. They’ll be lost to history, but not to memory.

This story was originally published on April 6, before the Clippers officially got eliminated from playoff contention.