During the numerous reports and attempts to work out a deal between the Celtics and Clippers there was a side deal that would bring Kevin Garnett to the Clippers to join Doc Rivers and send DeAndre Jordan to the Celtics. The deal was nixed due to league rules about multiple consecutive trades between two teams. Well it turns out Doc was adamant about keeping DeAndre Jordan anyways and didn’t want the deal to happen. Read more after the jump.
From Arash Markazi of ESPN Los Angeles:
Doc Rivers said he never wanted the Los Angeles Clippers to trade DeAndre Jordan to the Boston Celtics for Kevin Garnett last June when the two teams were working on a deal for the head coach. …
“[Jordan] is just too young and too gifted to let walk out your door, bottom line. He’s a game changer defensively. He can single-handedly change a game with his defense. There’s five guys, and that number maybe too high, that can do that single-handedly with their size and athleticism and he’s one of them. When you have one of those guys, you want to keep them.”
Rivers has praised the Clippers’ 25-year-old center during the team’s training camp in San Diego. He has called Jordan the team’s defensive captain and a candidate for the NBA’s Defensive Player of the Year this season.
