The Los Angeles Clippers and sympathy for the devil

The Clippers make it easy to hate. They preen and wrap themselves in thick voluminous entitlement, barely muffling their screams of righteous indignation at every call that doesn’t go their way. They have never committed a foul, ever. They have never attempted a shot without being fouled, ever. Their backup point guard is the incarnation of nepotism, even if he’s become somewhat respectable. Basically, they walk around like they own the place. Or at least they used to.

I think most of us were comfortable with those obnoxious Clippers. For fans of the team and a few others, being very good for a long time was more than enough to justify the grating aesthetic. If you liked precise and efficient basketball, you have probably been able to stomach everything else the Clippers brought with it. For everyone else, we have an emotional schema for those kinds of jerks. We’ve all met a bully or two and developed coping mechanisms.

*****

For a stretch early this season, the Clippers looked like they had reached another gear. Through November, they had the best defense and the second-best point differential in the league. The bench looked more capable than it ever had in the past. Austin Rivers became useful. Chris Paul, DeAndre Jordan and Blake Griffin were doing the damn thing.

And then…all the old problems reappeared — injuries. A paper-thin wing rotation. The endless erosion of Jamal Crawford. The meanest kind of mean regression. Oh, and an old familiar foe.

Read More: How does Kawhi Leonard get so many open shots?

Once upon a time, the Clippers and Warriors were a rivalry. In the 2013-14 playoffs, they played a beautiful seven-game series with the Clippers advancing. That series established that both teams were going to be serious Western Conference players over the next few years and that each team was going to carry a healthy dislike of the other. Since that series, the Warriors have ascended — winning 11 of 12 regular season games against the Clippers, a title and setting some records. This season, the Warriors won all four of their matchups with the Clippers by a combined 103 points. The last two came in February — as the Clippers were drowning, the Warriors tossed them a cement life jacket.

Now matter how you feel about the Clippers, it was uncomfortable watching the Warriors take the Clippers apart this season. It was some serious bully stuff — snatching the Clippers lunch money, kissing their ex-girlfriend on the mouth in the middle of study hall, pantsing them at the monthly honors assembly.

You already know about the personal measuring stick for these Clippers (getting to the Conference Finals and beyond) and about their closing championship window (J.J. Redick is a free agent this summer, Paul and Griffin both have player options and could join him). You already know that, realistically, there is no path to redemption for the Clippers that doesn’t run through Golden State. Those obstacles have been fairly static for the past few seasons but the Clippers have never seemed less prepared for them than they do right now, let alone getting through the maze of rising contenders it would take to get a matchup with the Warriors or a chance to break new playoff ground.

Since the middle of January, the Clippers are 11-15, getting outscored by an average of 3.4 points per 100 possessions. That stretch overlaps with the absence of Paul but the numbers are ugly nonetheless and haven’t looked dramatically different since he returned — 5-7 record, -2.2 point differential. Los Angeles has slid all the way to the No. 5 slot in the West standings and have a 4-8 record against the four teams ahead of them in the standings (2-8 since the end of November).

Los Angeles looks fragile and vulnerable in a way I’m not sure we’ve really seen before. Some of the swagger has been rubbed off. They look like a bully dealing with a bully of their own. The curtain has been pulled back and all that bravado and suffocating righteousness suddenly looks like insecurity, an emotional defense against a top-tier of opponents who have been able to push Los Angeles around when it really matters. The Clippers feel doomed and it’s kind of sad.

The Clippers may be able to pull things together. In theory, Paul, Jordan and Griffin still have all the tools to undo the Spurs or the Warriors. In the playoffs, the rotations shorten. The impact is greater for those immovable object players, the ones whose game can transcend matchups and adjustments. On paper, their strengths are the same as they’ve always been. That paper is just a little more crumpled and creased than it was earlier this season.

Maybe the Clippers have actually begun disintegrating for good. Maybe they’ll collectively rise to the occasion in a way they haven’t really been able to before. Or maybe, they’ll will finish somewhere in the middle, not nearly as bad as they’ve looked lately but still far short of their ultimate goal. Selfishly, I hope it’s more of the latter. The NBA needs good guys and bad guys. It needs characters you can sympathize with and others that you can (sports) hate. I’m not sure I like watching a Clippers team that’s flawed and sad, laid bare and exposed as their darkest basketball fears inch closer.

Next: Goran Dragic has found his voice

The NBA is better when everyone plays their best. It’s better when the Clippers can puff out their chests and strut and stare-down their enemies without acknowledging the reality of their situation. It’s better when you can cleanly love or hate the Clippers, without getting lost in the sympathetic muddle in-between.