LA Clippers swap Patrick Beverley for familiar face in monster trade

The LA Clippers have traded Patrick Beverley, Rajon Rondo, and Daniel Otutu to the Memphis Grizzlies for one of their former ‘Lob City’ guards in Eric Bledsoe.

A lot of strange feelings are hitting right now. Beverley was a big part of establishing the current Clipper culture, and was a guy that really benefited the Clippers in most matchups he drew defensively. He was a major part of this core.

Oturu didn’t get much playing time with the team, but the Clippers only have a couple of centers signed through this year. As for Rondo, however, it’s pretty great that he’s now gone. We should have never traded Lou Williams for him in the first place.

As for Bledsoe, he’s a bit of a confusing player these days. He went from being one of the better up-and-coming point guards in the NBA in Phoenix, to quitting on his team after demanding a huge pay day for the Suns, to watching the Milwaukee Bucks win an NBA Finals the very next year after he left the team. It’s a little perplexing as to what this move means, and what it will bring.

All in all, the LA Clippers made this move to free up a surplus in roster/guard space on the team.

The LA Clippers had too many guards on the roster. They had to trim that down, and while we aren’t necessarily thrilled that Bev had to go, he was a really valuable trade piece for the Clippers this offseason.

Rondo, on the other hand, was a guy we wanted to trade. After trading for him for his history of strong playoff performance, he had a rather terrible playoff performance for us this year. He was pretty nonexistent for us after the first game of the postseason.

We likely thought we’d be okay to trade Beverley due to his struggles in guarding bigger guards. He was eaten alive by Luka Doncic in the first round of the postseason. While the three-time All-Defensive selection is still absolutely a legit defender in this league, he’s not invincible.

With the Clippers’ bigs getting healthier for next year, and Kawhi Leonard going to be back eventually, there may not be a ton of opportunities for him to start this year. That’s not to say he’s not a quality player, as he absolutely is. It would just appear that this was what the Clips’ thought process was in making this move.

Bledsoe has certainly been recognized for defense before in his career. He’s a two-time All-Defensive selection. Beverley is a three-time selection, though, so I doubt the Clips wanted Bledsoe back just for D.

They probably like his offensive skillset. He’s athletic, and plays bigger than he is at 6’1.” His skillset (not performance, but skillset) is actually very similar to LeBron James’s, hence why many have called him ‘Mini-LeBron’ throughout his career.

However, his offensive numbers did drop this year with the Pelicans. He went from putting up 14.9 points per game in the 2019-2020 year to 12.2 points per game this year. He went from averaging 5.4 assists to 3.8 as well.

His field goal percentage dropped from 47.5% to 42.1%, so the hope would have to be that he gets back on track now that he’s back with a franchise that he’s familiar with.

Much of this move was likely to unload Rondo, which is absolutely what the Clips’ needed to do. However, Bledsoe hasn’t progressed recently in his career, and they better hope that he performs better than what Pat Bev has been for us. Trading an important part of this core better return some good value.

For what it’s worth, Bledsoe’s contract wouldn’t guarantee a ton for the 2022-2023 season, so it may not be as big of a risk as it seems initially. Regardless, we’re not going to know if this trade was worth it until we see how this new-look backcourt fares in the postseason.