Gordon visits Clipper land
June 16th, 2008, 8:49 pm · Post a Comment · posted by ART THOMPSON III, OCREGISTER.COM
The Clippers began another week of pre-draft workouts Monday by bringing in guard Eric Gordon, who declared for early entry into the NBA draft, after spending only one year at Indiana.
Although the workout was closed to the public, the general consensus afterward among Clipper basketball staff personnel was that Gordon was very impressive in displaying his shooting ability.
“He’s got pro 3-point range,” Clippers coach Mike Dunleavy said.
The Clippers were the third and final team that Gordon planned to audition for. He earlier worked out for the Seattle SuperSonics, who have the fourth overall pick, and the New York Knicks, who are slotted sixth.
HoopsHype.com has the 6-foot-4 Gordon projected to be selected with the seventh-overall pick, which happens to be when the Clippers will make their first-round pick.
Gordon said he believed that he is capable of breaking into the rotation, right away, if the Clippers did draft him.
Although he averaged 20.9 points, while starting all 32 games, Gordon’s production tapered off late in the season. However, he attributed that Monday to a fractured left wrist, which he said he purposely kept as quiet about, as much as possible.
“I put it in a cast and it’s completely healed,” Gordon said.
The Clippers’ most pressing need would seem to be at point guard. They finished th season with journeymen Brevin Knight and Dan Dickau sharing the job. Smush Parker also finished the season on the roster.
Dickau and Parker almost certainly won’t be back next season and there remains a question mark surrounding Shaun Livingston, who missed the entire 2007-2008 season, while recovering from a left knee injury suffered the previous season.
Livingston has been cleared for restricted one-on-one contact work but as far as playing five-on-five, that won’t be happening any time soon.
Livingston will become an unrestricted free agent on July 1 because the Clippers are not expected to tender him a qualifying offer of at least $5.8 million. The Clippers and Livingston’s agent, Henry Thomas, are expected to discuss a compromised deal but so far have not met.
Neil Olshey, the Clippers’ director of player personnel, said the team likely would conduct at least three more pre-draft workouts. Not on that list presently is UCLA’s Kevin Love, whom HoopsHype.com has projected to be picked fifth, by the Memphis Grizzlies.
“We’d like to get him in,” Dunleavy said.
