I really can’t wait until the Pre-Season starts and we can stop talking about this. Yes it made the NBA interesting even though the Finals were nearly two months ago, yes it was fun to watch. But now it’s just being strung out simply because there’s no news. Summer League has finished, the Draft and free agency has come and gone. There’s nothing to look forward to until Pre-Season.
So we now go back to that night, the night where emoji’s truly took over social media, where Mark Cuban was lied to and ultimately where DeAndre Jordan signed with the Clippers instead of the Dallas Mavericks.
Blake Griffin who was the comic relief for the evening has taken to The Players Tribune to share his side.
For most of Wednesday, July 8, a lot of the information coming from social media on DeAndre Jordan’s contract talks was pretty far off-base. When we woke up that morning, a few of the Clippers players and staff took a charter bus to a hotel, to meet with DeAndre. It was the business stuff — the pitch, or re-pitch in this case. I jokingly tweeted a photo of Hawaii, and some emojis of a plane, helicopter and a car in response to Chandler Parsons’ airplane tweet. But the truth is that I was already in Houston. DeAndre had been having doubts about his decision to go to Dallas since Monday.
By Tuesday morning, I knew he was really struggling with it. He really didn’t want to disappoint people, but I could tell his heart wasn’t in it. We text every day. It’s not always about basketball. Mostly it’s about life. I’m his friend above all else. I stuffed some clothes into a bag, ran through LAX and got on the first flight to Houston. My intention wasn’t to go down and sell DeAndre on the Clippers. We promised each other a long time ago that we’d never do that stuff. I just wanted to be there for my friend and hear him out.
All of it was wrong. When people were tweeting “Sources: Clippers to meet with DeAndre in the next 3 hours,” we were already back at DeAndre’s house and I was nodding off watching a Clippers Summer League game on the couch. When I woke up an hour later with drool on the pillow, my phone was a bloodbath of notifications. People were literally tweeting things like, “DeAndre is a grown-ass man! Stop holding him hostage!” and “You should all be arrested for this! I’m calling the cops!”
I didn’t tweet to Blake, but that was where I was thinking. DeAndre Jordan, in my mind, is very impressionable, he went out with Chandler Parsons, had meals with Cuban and was loving it. Then when the Clippers showed love, he went back to them. Of course LA is the better team but there was no point in committing to Dallas and not being 100% about it. That was a waste of time.
Blake also talked about what they ate and how Steve Ballmer gave the team his credit card and went.
“Alright, anything you guys want. Anything.”
Are you kidding me? If I’m ever in that position my brain would overflow. I’d truly take the mick and cop myself a couple of shoes or something. And all these guys got were chicken fingers!?
