Paul George missed Wednesday night’s game for the LA Clippers against the Boston Celtics with right elbow contusion.
Luckily, Nicolas Batum came back from league health and safety protocols and so our depth wasn’t shot.
The number one difference maker, however, was actually rookie Brandon Boston Jr. Boston put on a scoring clinic for the Clips, while nailing nine of 13 shot attempts and five of eight threes for 27 points. He also had FOUR steals defensively.
He was electric, but he’s not expected to perform like that every night. We typically leave the heroics for George, right? Well, we do, but he may be out longer than we thought.
Paul George said he probably won’t play for the LA Clippers in Saturday night’s game.
According to Joey Linn of Sports Illustrated, Paul George said in a Twitch stream that he is likely going to miss the LA Clippers’ next game. Linn wrote that he called his issue a “sprained” elbow, so that makes sense as to why PG13 may need some extra recovery time.
PG’s missed just two games so far this year, so he definitely has taken on a strong workload. For the first time as a Clipper, he’s averaging over 35 minutes per contest.
It would be tough to expect Boston to replicate his performance from Wednesday, but we’d of course rather have a balanced attack where everyone steps up and performs to the best of their abilities. We’ll be playing the 5-21 Orlando Magic, so it won’t be too tall of a task to bring the W home in a strong team effort.
Regardless of who we’re playing, however, it’s never easy to manage without PG. George is having a phenomenal year, putting up 25 points per game, 7.3 rebounds per game, 5.4 assists per game (career-high), and 1.9 steals per game. This is certainly the best year of his Clipper career.
The only area PG’s struggling with is his three-point stroke, where he’s shooting 31.8%. That’s the worst of his career since his rookie season. That was expected, however, with him being forced to carry this team offensively with Kawhi Leonard out.
Playing without the team’s top two players against the Magic will be a challenge, but if they could beat Boston that way, they can of course roll Orlando.