Austin Rivers to join father on Clippers?
Austin Rivers may be on the move now as well. For the past few days, the Boston Celtics and Memphis Grizzlies have been negotiating a trade for small forward Jeff Green. Their negotiations had already reached the stage where they had brought in the New Orleans Pelicans as a third trading partner to make the money work.
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The Celtics would send Green to the Grizzlies. The Grizzlies would send Tayshaun Prince’s expiring contract and a first round pick to the Celtics. They would also send forward Quincy Pondexter to the Pelicans. The Pelicans would send guard Austin Rivers to the Celtics and guard Russ Smith to the Grizzlies all according to Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports.
Yet the story does not end there. The Celtics seem to have an understanding with the Los Angeles Clippers to send Rivers in that direction once the first trade is completed. The Clippers are thin at the point guard position behind Chris Paul.
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So why would the Clippers want Austin Rivers? The coach and president of the Los Angeles Clippers is one Doc Rivers, father of Austin. While Rivers has been unspectacular in his first years in the league, there could be no one more suited to bringing out his best than Doc Rivers.
Austin Rivers is a combo guard, which should mesh decently with the bench unit of the Clippers. Jamal Crawford is also a combo guard so Rivers would not need to dominate the ball. You could even play Rivers and Paul together in certain lineups.
The trick to any Rivers trade is what the Clippers would have to give up to make it work. They do not have a lot of movable assets and the Celtics are not just going to take anybody. Danny Ainge has getting his house in order for the next team build.
New scenery should be good for Rivers, who is buried behind guards in New Orleans.