Glen “Big Baby” Davis spent much of his eight-year NBA career playing under Doc Rivers, but the relationship between the two soured toward the end of their time together. While there are many theories as to why, Davis says the falling out ultimately came down to one thing.
Doc didn’t care that he was playing hurt.
Davis signed with the Clippers in February 2014 after he was bought out by the Magic. After averaging 12.2 points and 6.3 rebounds per game in two-plus seasons with Orlando, he never became a big contributor in L.A. But Davis told Colin Cowherd on Wednesday that he had a very legitimate excuse for averaging just 2.9 points and 1.9 rebounds during the 2015 playoffs.
Glen "Big Baby" Davis sets the record straight on his strained relationship with Doc Rivers pic.twitter.com/fE7s5OHkyb
— Herd w/Colin Cowherd (@TheHerd) May 10, 2017
“I broke my ankle Game 6 against the Spurs. I played Game 7,” Davis explained. “When we played Houston the next series, I’m telling Doc my ankle’s hurt. He’s telling me, ‘Suck it up, you’re not playing the way you need to play.’ In my exit meeting he told me I didn’t play the way I needed to play this year and lost focus against Houston.
“I go the whole summer not even knowing my ankle’s broke, but I’m like something’s wrong. We won a championship together (with the Celtics), I broke my ankle, and you just don’t say anything. You just say, ‘Oh, Glen, well sorry…’ Nothing. No phone call, no nothing. That really turned me the wrong way.”
It’s unclear why Davis never got an X-ray or an MRI if he was in significant pain. What we do know is that there was an incident between him and Rivers during the previous season, so there’s probably more to the story than Rivers being disappointed with the way Davis played down the stretch in 2015. It seems like the issues were brewing long before that.
