On the latest episode of “All The Smoke” with Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson, Paul George went into great detail on how he and Kawhi Leonard teamed up on the Los Angeles Clippers in the summer of 2019.
Leonard was a free agent in 2019, while George was under contract with the Oklahoma City Thunder. PG-13 signed a four-year, $136.9 million maximum contract with the Thunder in the summer of 2018, but after OKC lost to the Portland Trail Blazers in the first round of the 2019 playoffs in five games, many around the league (including the Clippers) knew the Thunder were going to trade Russell Westbrook and George.
That's when Leonard, who was trying to get another star to come play with him on the Clippers, reached out to George and the rest is history.
Via Andrew Grief of the Los Angeles Times on the Clippers' teammates:
“I’m at dinner and so he hit me, he call me now like, ‘Oh yo, good looking bro good looks,” George said. “So he like, ‘What you gonna do?’ I’m like, ‘What? I’m in OKC, like what you mean? I’m under contract I just re-upped, like what you mean?’ He like, nah, ‘What you gonna do?’
“So, I guess some stuff leaked, some stuff was getting out there that trades was possible and somebody was looking to get moved. And so he like, you know, ‘What you gonna do?’ So now my eyebrows go up. I call my agent, like, Kawhi saying this and that, what’s going down? So my agent do his due diligence, he chopped it up with OKC, come back to, actually, the stories that was being said was true, so I’m like OK, well … it’s time for me to go (to the Clippers) like if this is what’s going on.
“I went to Vegas, me and him was on a clock, on an hourly clock like, ‘Yo what they saying on that side? They saying this on my side.’ So we was just hip-to-hip with what was going on. Everybody my side, his side, working together to where ultimately, man, we was able to pull it off. We made it happen (with the Clippers).”
The Clippers acquired Paul George from the Thunder and then signed Kawhi Leonard in free agency. It was a great haul for LAC.
While Leonard and George both played well during the 2019-20 regular season, the Clippers stars came up short in the 2020 playoffs at Walt Disney World. LAC blew a 3-1 series lead to the Denver Nuggets in the Western Conference Semifinals and lost the series in seven games.
Moving forward, Leonard and George are under a lot of pressure to deliver a title to the Clippers, who have zero championships in franchise history.
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