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Doc Rivers Gets Honest About Shai Gilgeous-Alexander Trade

The LA Clippers did not want to trade Shai Gilgeous-Alexander

Joey Linn

Doc Rivers Gets Honest About Shai Gilgeous-Alexander Trade
Doc Rivers Gets Honest About Shai Gilgeous-Alexander Trade /
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Shai Gilgeous-Alexander has become a superstar with the Oklahoma City Thunder. An All-NBA First Team selection last season, Gilgeous-Alexander is an early MVP candidate this season. Each leap Gilgeous-Alexander takes, more people revisit the trade that sent him from the LA Clippers to Oklahoma City for Paul George.

During a recent appearance on The Bill Simmons podcast, former Clippers head coach Doc Rivers got honest about the trade, and revealed he told Kawhi Leonard that Gilgeous-Alexander would be a star.

"I did say, 'Man, can we give them somebody else?'" Rivers said. "'We cannot give up Shai.' I even told Kawhi when he was saying, 'I need another guy,' and Kawhi will verify, I kept saying, 'You know, Kawhi - Shai is gonna be a star.'"

Rivers said Leonard asked him how long it would take for Gilgeous-Alexander to become a star. While that's a difficult question to answer even with the benefit of hindsight - given how different the situation in LA would have been than the situation in OKC, it has not taken Gilgeous-Alexander long to establish himself as one of the best players in the NBA.

"I don't believe in my heart that Kawhi would have gone [to the Lakers]," Rivers said. "I think he was coming to us all along, but he had all the cards... I was the only house that he came to. He didn't go to anybody's house in Toronto. He met the Lakers in a hotel room, wouldn't even go to their facility. Yet he came to my house. And I kept saying, 'He's telling us what he's doing. He's telling us we have him.' But he had all the leverage and we had to bite."

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Joey Linn
JOEY LINN

Joey Linn is a credentialed writer covering the NBA for Sports Illustrated's FanNation. Covering the LA Clippers independently in 2018, then for Fansided and 213Hoops from 2019-2021, Joey joined Sports Illustrated's FanNation to cover the Clippers after the 2020-21 season. Graduating from Biola University in 2022 with a Communication Studies degree, Joey served as Biola's play-by-play announcer for their basketball, baseball, softball, and soccer teams during his time in school. Joey's work on Biola's broadcasts, combined with his excellence in the classroom, earned him the Outstanding Communication Studies Student of the year award in 2022. Joey covers the NBA full-time across multiple platforms, primarily serving as a credentialed Clippers beat writer.

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