PLAYA VISTA, CA — The Los Angeles Clippers and President of Basketball Operations Lawrence Frank are entering another offseason asking themselves, ‘what if?' This time around, however, it feels like there's even more on the line with regards to Kawhi Leonard, Paul George, and James Harden.

As they did last year, the Clippers fell in the first round to the Dallas Mavericks. Kawhi Leonard missed four of the six games and was clearly not himself in the two games he did participate in. Paul George and James Harden were tasked with carrying the Clippers offense against Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving. While the duo was successful in leading the team to two wins, they ultimately fell well short of winning the series.

Harden had one of his more complete postseason series, but did struggle to get anything going in the critical Game 5. George, meanwhile, had arguably the series he's had since the 2012-13 season when he was with the Indiana Pacers. Outside of his masterpiece that was Game 4 in Dallas, George shot an abysmal 36.8 percent from the field and 28.2 percent from three in the other five games of the series. In fact, Ivica Zubac made more field goals in the six-game series than George did.

All season long, Paul George expressed optimism that an extension would get done. The Clippers signed Kawhi Leonard to a three-year, $152 million contract extension in January, and George's deal felt imminent.

Four months later, the Clippers are a first-round exit, George is without an extension, and his worst playoff series in a decade may leave him without the offer he wants from LA.

“I think we want Paul, we value Paul,” Lawrence Frank said during Monday's end-of-season interview. “Paul's done some tremendous things here. He's an elite player and our biggest thing is we always want to be able to treat players well and pay them fairly and we also have to build out a team, especially this is a new CBA, but in terms of the exact money, I would never go into details other than we've had really, really good conversations over the course of the year and hopeful that we can get 'em to remain a Clipper.”

Considering the optimism that George displaced throughout the season, why didn't a deal eventually get done?

“Every deal has to work for both sides,” Lawrence Frank added. “And I think we got to a point where we just said, ;you know what? We can continue the conversations but let's just table it until the end of the year. So I anticipate that we'll pick up conversations. Everything's been on a very, I'd say cooperative and collaborative measure and he can sign his extension up until July 1st and then he can also test free agency and we're hopeful that we can still bring him back.

I think basically once we got call it past the All-Star break, it was, you know what, ‘I just want to focus on the rest of the season, try to help the Clippers win championship and then we can resume conversations when the season's over.'”

Harden And George To Free Agency?

Now, both James Harden and Paul George (player option) have the ability to test free agency in an attempt to find the max contracts they desire.

Despite being unable to finish each of the last four seasons healthy, Kawhi Leonard remains the team's best player when he's available. And since he took a discount to remain with the Clippers and finish the job of winning an NBA title, it only makes sense that George and Harden do the same as the organization tries to work through the new Collective Bargaining Agreement and some its intricacies.

“Yeah, that's our intent,” Lawrence Frank on re-signing Paul George and James Harden. “We want to retain those guys. We're hopeful we can but also understand and respect the fact that they're free agents. Paul is a decision with his option. James will be an unrestricted free agent, so our intent is to bring him back but also realize that they're elite players and they'll have choices.

“You're always looking to improve the team and number one, we'd like to be able to bring back retain Paul and James. We have a couple other players have player options where the ball's in their court. Paul has a player option as well, and then just I thought last year we probably had too many guys where it made it a little bit confusing in terms of this year maybe we were short, a couple guys of good complimentary reliable players that fit. Now. Part of it was a byproduct of when we traded for James, all our wings went out the door and in order to get, you have to give, but I think there's some things roster wise that we tried to address during the trade deadline that we weren't able to get done and that we're going to need to address in the off season.”

George, 34 years of age, averaged 22.6 points, 5.2 rebounds, 3.5 assists, and 1.5 steals per game. He also shot career-highs from the field (47.1 percent), from beyond the arc (41.3 percent), and from the free throw line (90.7 percent). He played 74 games for the Clippers this season.

In six postseason games, George averaged 19.5 points, 6.8 rebounds, 4.8 assists, and 1.2 steals per game on 41.1 percent shooting from the field and 36.7 percent from three.

In 72 regular season appearances with the Clippers James Harden averaged 16.6 points, 5.1 rebounds, 8.5 assists, and 1.1 steals per game this season on 42.8 percent shooting from the field and 38.1 percent from three. In the postseason, Harden averaged 21.2 points, 4.5 rebounds, and 8.0 assists on 44.9 percent shooting from the field and 38.3 percent from beyond the arc.

Lawrence Frank and the Clippers will not be able to speak to James Harden until free agency begins. George and the Clippers will have until June 30th to get an extension and for George to decide on his player option. Frank says the Clippers want both back, so the next two months of rumors should be fun for everyone involved.