Ramona Shelburne
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- Senior author for ESPN.com
- Spent seven years at the Los Angeles Daily News
Multiple Authors
LA Clippers assistant coach Brian Shaw does not like evaluating anybody to Kobe Bryant. But he is considered one of only a handful of people that each performed with and coached Bryant, so he is reluctantly an authority on the matter.
And he is prepared to confess that he sees shades of Bryant in the latest play of 1 specific NBA famous person, who since Dec. 20 has quietly led the league in scoring and steals, as the Clippers have resurrected their season from catastrophe.
That can be franchise cornerstone Kawhi Leonard. “If I was to make any comparison in terms of what I witnessed with Kobe,” Shaw instructed ESPN, “it’s the work ethic once either one of those two sets their mind to something.”
There are dozens of tales Shaw may inform to make his level, however the one which involves his thoughts was from early in Bryant’s profession when Shaw was considered one of the veterans at the finish of the Lakers’ bench. It was Jan. 7, 2003, and the Los Angeles Lakers had been in Seattle to face Gary Payton and the Sonics.
“We were at shootaround,” Shaw mentioned. “And one of the reporters from Seattle says to him, ‘Yeah, my daughter really loves your game, but she says if there’s one thing missing, you don’t have a 3-point shot.” Bryant turned to the reporter. He instructed him to ensure his daughter tuned in to the sport that night time. “Then,” Shaw mentioned, “Kobe stayed there and just shot 3 after 3 after 3, from every spot on the floor.” That night time, Bryant hit a then-NBA report dozen 3-pointers, motivated to, as Shaw mentioned, “do something that someone said he couldn’t do.”
Which brings us again to Leonard. While the goad is not precisely the identical as Bryant’s twenty years in the past, the talent is — and the outcomes are, too. The Lakers received that night time by 21. And the Clippers, regardless of their 6-21 begin, are the hottest team in basketball.
Leonard — and his huge uptick in perimeter capturing — is the purpose.
Kawhi Leonard helps the Clippers bounce again from their abysmal 6-21 begin in hopes of a postseason berth. (Photo by Luke Hales/Getty Images
FOR NEARLY TWO years, the Clippers’ teaching employees had pleaded with Leonard to broaden his vary. They knew his consolation degree in the midrange, and the way a lot he loved dominating inside, however additionally they knew their offense would explode if he moved exterior. They additionally knew how a lot care he put into his physique and wished to guard him from the fixed contact he endured in the paint.
Assistant coach Jeremy Castleberry has been working with Leonard since his days in San Antonio. Coach Tyronn Lue affectionately calls him the “Kawhi whisperer” as a result of he is aware of how you can get by means of to Leonard.
Finally, in December, as the two males talked about the evolution of Leonard’s sport as he approached his mid-30s, and the unmitigated mess the Clippers’ offense had develop into, Leonard took the cost.
“I told TLue that I’m going to shoot 12 3s and he was like, ‘How?’ and I said, ‘You’re going to see,'” Leonard mentioned.
Then, like Bryant in that Seattle sport all these years in the past, he went out and did precisely what he mentioned he would do.
Leonard is averaging a career-high seven 3-point makes an attempt this season, however almost 9 since Dec. 20 when he took 12 3-pointers in the Clippers’ 103-88 win over the Lakers.
In Leonard’s retelling, he lastly relented to Lue and Castleberry’s nudging as a result of the team was in such dire straits that it was value simply attempting one thing new.
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“We were in a hole,” Leonard mentioned. “So I just tried to see what we needed and I thought that’s what we needed. If I shoot more 3s and I keep shooting even if I struggle and the ball doesn’t go in, it’ll encourage guys to shoot the ball even if it doesn’t go in.” Once Leonard dedicated to capturing extra from the exterior, it unlocked the Clippers’ assault. Before Dec. 20, the team ranked twenty third in offense.
Since then, Leonard has hit greater than 43% of his 3-point makes an attempt, which has pulled defenders exterior and opened up house for him and different teammates to drive or minimize. The Clippers rank second in offense and rating almost eight extra factors per 100 possessions. They are 16-3 in their previous 19 video games.
And it is simpler on his physique, too. Leonard’s profession has been outlined by tantalizingly elite play and devastating accidents. “Ty has been on him since I’ve been here about just trying to get him easier shots where he doesn’t have to grind for it every single time,” Shaw mentioned.
“He already had the work ethic and the methodology of how he goes about things. And now Kawhi has embraced getting up more 3-point attempts and has worked at it day after day with Jeremy. He’s been just really, really focused.” When Leonard is wholesome and taking part in like this, expectations rise for what he and the Clippers may accomplish. It’s why the wager they made on him in 2019 has, thus far, been such a crushing loss — as a result of, in some unspecified time in the future yearly, Leonard has stretches of relative well being and brilliance.
Since his arrival in 2019, the Clippers have received greater than 66% of their video games when Leonard has been on the ground. In video games he has missed, they’ve received simply 49%. “This is my fifth season here,” Shaw mentioned. “Once I saw how good he really was, I felt like each year we would have had a chance to get to the promised land, had not just him, but our team been healthy all the way through.” That is the everlasting conundrum with Leonard, and it’s basically unsolvable. When he is wholesome, he is nonetheless considered one of the most impactful gamers of this era. When he is not, the Clippers’ fortunes are explicitly tied to one thing they will neither management nor absolutely perceive.
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Kawhi goes coast-to-coast with an authoritative dunk
Kawhi Leonard will get down the courtroom in a rush and hammers a dunk for the Clippers.
JAMES HARDEN SITS subsequent to Leonard in the Clippers’ locker room. Recently he has begun to imagine that he could be the closest teammate Leonard has ever had. Which is to not say that they are particularly shut. Neither man has even been to the different’s home in Los Angeles.
“I’m still trying to crack the code,” Harden instructed ESPN.
But in phrases of shared experiences and understanding, Harden thinks he in all probability will get Leonard in addition to anybody else. “Sharing lockers next to him, I think I get the most out of him,” Harden mentioned. “Honestly, I don’t even know, I might have gotten the most out of him since he’s been in the league.”
Lue credit each Harden and Leonard for serving to the Clippers climb out of their early-season gap. According to ESPN Research, out of 146 two-man mixtures which have performed at the very least 700 minutes collectively, Harden and Leonard’s offensive score ranks eighth, and it is fourth finest amongst any duo not on the Nuggets.
From what Harden has gleaned, Leonard’s whole world revolves round optimizing each little bit of the vitality he devotes to basketball, in order that no matter his physique has left may be deployed when the Clippers are taking part in significant playoff basketball.
He eschews sugary drinks and eats properly. Last 12 months throughout the playoffs, he famously eliminated a number of bottles of Gatorade that had been left on the lectern for him at a postgame information convention.
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“Kids don’t need to be drinking that,” he mentioned.
In October, he invited a bunch of 30 native highschool college students to the Intuit Dome for a guided mindfulness occasion, that includes light yoga and a sound tub. “If you practice this every day,” Leonard instructed the highschool children as he demonstrated a reverse warrior yoga pose, “those aches and pains will go away.”
It’s a easy sentiment, however one Leonard actually appears to imagine — or at the very least hope — is true for him sooner or later.
“Most people wouldn’t have the mental capacity to keep coming back [from injury] the way he has, they’d have just given up,” Harden mentioned. “But he keeps at it.”
As he outlines his admiration for his teammate, Harden seems to be over at Leonard’s locker. Sitting on the prime shelf are six fancy bottles of water. Upon nearer inspection, the glass bottles are from a model known as Hallstein, a premium alkaline water from the Austrian Alps. A six-pack retails for $71.
“That’s the best water on Earth,” Leonard instructed ESPN. “It’s naturally alkaline. They don’t do anything to make it alkaline. And it’s in glass bottles so there’s no plastics or bad stuff in it.”
Leonard’s choice for alkaline water dates again to his San Antonio days. He’s particularly keen on sizzling alkaline water with lime juice.
“With him I learn something new every day,” Harden mentioned. “I don’t even know if he tries to be [mysterious] on purpose. I just think that’s what he is. Some people are just off the grid and don’t want people to know them on purpose.”
If there’s one fixed in a profession stuffed with interruptions, it is this: Teammates and people round Kawhi have by no means questioned his value ethic — or his want to do something to return to the sport, from meditation and yoga to wildly costly artesian alkaline water. “He really loves basketball,” Harden mentioned. “And he works his ass off so he can keep playing.”
So far, he has. Since that Dec. 20 sport, Leonard is No. 1 in internet score amongst gamers who’ve performed 500 or extra minutes.
The query, because it all the time is with Leonard and the Clippers, is whether or not all of it can final.
