After starting out the year with an 8-2 record, the Los Angeles Clippers have officially hit their first skid of the 2012-2013 season. Their loss to the New Orleans Hornets on Monday night was their fourth straight, and some slight finger-pointing is already underway. Blake Griffin seemed to pin the blame on head coach Vinny Del Negro, while Del Negro thought Griffin and company were at fault.
According to the L.A. Daily News, Griffin felt as though the Clippers should have stuck with their game plan down the stretch against New Orleans instead of making too many adjustments.
“I think we tried to change some things, tried to change our schemes and some things we have been successful at and that hurt us,” he said. “I think we should play teams how we play every team. We made adjustments down the stretch when certain guys hurt us and I think we should have stuck with what we had been doing and what has made us successful.”
Del Negro, on the other hand, said he went with a small lineup because DeAndre Jordan and the rest of his big men were not getting it done. Griffin, who scored a season-low 4 points on 1-for-9 shooting, is one of those big bodies.
“(Jordan) wasn’t involved,” Del Negro said. “It wasn’t just ‘D.J.’ It was all of our big guys. They weren’t active. They weren’t physical. They didn’t set the tone for us from the start. It’s not just one guy. It’s everybody.”
Hopefully a home game against the 6-7 Minnesota Timberwolves on Wednesday night can get L.A. back on track. We wouldn’t want a divide between head coach and his superstars this early in the year.
H/T SLAM Online
