October 18, 2024
Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Imagn Images
Los Angeles Clippers star Kawhi Leonard will reportedly miss an indefinite amount of time to begin the 2024-25 season.
The latest in a long line of ominous medical updates regarding Los Angeles Clippers star Kawhi Leonard came to the forefront Thursday afternoon, when ESPN's Shams Charania and Ohm Youngmisuk reported that Leonard will be out for an indefinite period to begin the 2024-25 regular season as he continues to manage his often-injured right knee.
Los Angeles Clippers star Kawhi Leonard is expected to be sidelined for indefinite period of time to start the NBA season as he rehabilitates the inflammation in his right knee, league sources tell me and @NotoriousOHM. pic.twitter.com/M5wFYIWGiv
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) October 17, 2024
Leonard, 33, has averaged 38 missed games per year over the last seven regular seasons. On top of that, the six-time All-Star and two-time NBA Finals MVP has only appeared in four of the Clippers' last 19 playoff games. Leonard's ability to hold up physically is very much in doubt, further clouding the already-muddy long-term outlook for the Clippers.
Few teams have a direction as unclear as the Clippers as they move into their brand new Intuit Dome: even before Leonard's latest injury setback, they appeared too thin on talent to compete for anything beyond a Play-In Tournament appearance in a stacked Western Conference. The exit of Paul George, who joined the Sixers in free agency over the summer, was the nail in the coffin of the Clippers' championship contention.
Even appearing in the Play-In Tournament will be a massive challenge if Leonard is not consistently available, as this is now a team built around a 35-year-old James Harden who will likely be asked to carry an enormous offensive burden that he is no longer suited to handle (and Harden himself is far from a safe bet to stay healthy for an entire 82-game season).
The Clippers are not talented enough to meaningfully compete, but are very old and very expensive — Leonard, for example, is under contract for three more seasons worth a hair under $150 million in all — but also have little recourse when it comes to meaningfully improving their long-term standing.
In addition to a future MVP candidate in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander — a promising player entering his sophomore season at the time — the Clippers traded a monstrous collection of draft picks and pick swaps to the Oklahoma City Thunder to land George prior to the 2019-20 season. They still have quite a bit of debt to pay to the Thunder, who have transformed into a true title contender while building around Gilgeous-Alexander. They also traded a future unprotected first-round pick and a lightly-protected swap right to the Sixers early on last season to acquire Harden.
Take a look at the status of the Clippers' first-round picks in each of the next five drafts:
| Year | Clippers first-round pick status |
| 2025 | Owe unprotected first-round swap right Oklahoma City |
| 2026 | Owe unprotected first-round pick to Oklahoma City |
| 2027 | Owe unprotected first-round swap right Oklahoma City |
| 2028 | Owe unprotected first-round pick to Sixers |
| 2029 | Owe top-three protected first-round swap right to Sixers |
Not ideal!
If the Sixers are able to win a championship with their current core, it will happen in the next two or three years. Three more drafts will have come and gone by the time the first pick the Clippers owe the Sixers conveys. Given the Sixers' perceived all-in mentality, it would be a no-brainer for the Sixers to be willing to part with the two assets they acquired from the Clippers in order to upgrade their roster, right?
Not exactly.
There is a multi-faceted rationale here, extending far beyond just the value of the picks and what they can be.
For as long as the Sixers hang onto these Clippers picks, skeptics will compare the situation to the once-prized 2021 Miami Heat first-round pick that swayed the Sixers away from Mikal Bridges before becoming a key piece in the Tobias Harris trade and, by the time 2021 came around, not becoming a particularly valuable asset after a resurgence in Miami. But a situation like that — the Heat were able to return to contention because they found a way to add a superstar in Jimmy Butler despite having negative cap space — is an anomaly.
The Clippers do project to have plenty of financial flexibility by 2027-28, so there is always a possibility that they can lure a star free agent to Los Angeles. But they also have to create the proper infrastructure for such a player to find their organization attractive beyond its location. Franchise-altering talents are judged by the team success they can drive; no star in today's day and age is going to voluntarily join a team without the ability to become championship contenders. There is a long road ahead of the Clippers to achieve that status.
In order to determine whether or not the Sixers' picks from the Clippers should be available in trade talks, one must understand the kinds of players the Sixers are capable of trading for.
The Sixers are over the NBA's first apron in 2024-25, and very well may be in at least each of the next two seasons as well. As an apron team, the Sixers cannot add salary in any trade. If they were to send out $5 million of salary in a trade, for example, the Sixers could not receive one penny more than $5 million in return.
These rules and the nature of the team's cap sheet moving forward combine to severely constrain their capabilities as far as acquiring star-level talent. If the Sixers could add a fourth legitimate star to Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey and George, it would be easy to feel comfortable trading the Clippers picks.
With those three stars all on long-term max contracts, the Sixers simply do not have the ability to take on another massive deal without actually trading Embiid, Maxey or George. At the upcoming trade deadline, for example, their spending power in terms of absorbing salary will probably be capped somewhere around $12 million, potentially closer to $15 million if rookie guard Jared McCain is involved.
Generally speaking, the only star-caliber players in that salary range are the ones on rookie contracts who are almost never even discussed in trade talks. There is always a small group of excellent role players on team-friendly deals in that range — right now, New Orleans' Herb Jones and Minnesota's Donte DiVincenzo stand out — but the Pelicans and Timberwolves have zero incentive to trade valuable, versatile two-way role players under long-term control.
The Sixers have other draft picks available to trade — they control most of their own future picks and have an extra first-rounder in 2026, the least favorable of first-round picks belonging to the Clippers, Thunder and Houston Rockets. Those other picks will carry enough value to help the Sixers add the sorts of players they will be in the market for during the winter.
Of course, there is also the elephant in the room: eventually, the Sixers are going to face life without Embiid. The Sixers' franchise centerpiece will be 31 years old by the time the 2024-25 season is over and he is not a player anyone would make a strong vote of confidence in when it comes to sustaining dominance into their mid-late 30s. By the time the 2028 NBA Draft arrives — when the first of the Sixers' picks from the Clippers conveys — George will be a 39-year-old coming off a season in which he made more than $56.5 million.
If things do take a turn for the worse with the Sixers, holding onto two years worth of chances at lifelines courtesy of the Clippers' potential futility could prove to save the franchise in its very long-term future.
It is easy to say that a team should be all-in, and therefore all of its long-term assets should be fair game in trade talks. But all of the context surrounding these picks — the uphill battle the Clippers will have to return to contention, who the Sixers are actually capable of adding if they use these two assets and the Sixers' own uncertain future at the back end of the decade — makes it a much tricker, more complex decision for the organization.
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