LA Clippers

[BaltimoreFan]

If you don't know, don't say anything about it... We've had this argument before but anyways

Geez, I was just making a suggestion based on someone else's post. I never said that that's the way it should be. If anything I was just asking if that move would be better. I didn't expect to get my head chewed off. Next time I better just stay out of the basketball conversation, since I don't watch enough NBA anyway.

Actually, this is an interesting question for discussion - what exactly are the differences in the fan bases of teams in two sport cities? Mostly location within the city?

Well for baseball, the two leagues play very different styles of the game. The only real rule difference is the DH, but it makes a huge difference. The National League plays small ball and is based alot more on strategies. The American League is usually a higher scoring league. So, I think alot of fans in two team cities "choose" their team based on which style they perfer. As for other sports I don't know.

[Hat Boy]

The National League plays small ball and is based alot more on strategies. The American League is usually a higher scoring league. So, I think alot of fans in two team cities "choose" their team based on which style they perfer.

I think you are looking too deep into it. I doubt a little kid in NYC analyzes the merits of the suicide squeeze vs. sac fly in driving in a man on 3rd with less than 2 outs in order to choose his baseball team. Fan allegiance is more likely passed on from older family members or by who the kid sees on TV.

[chakfu]

The National League plays small ball and is based alot more on strategies. The American League is usually a higher scoring league. So, I think alot of fans in two team cities "choose" their team based on which style they perfer.

I think you are looking too deep into it. I doubt a little kid in NYC analyzes the merits of the suicide squeeze vs. sac fly in driving in a man on 3rd with less than 2 outs in order to choose his baseball team. Fan allegiance is more likely passed on from older family members or by who the kid sees on TV.

Yeah, though maybe some kids veer towads one or the other based on tastes. I bet a lot of it's generational based on who was good when a kid is young - I bet there was a baby boom of Mets fans in the mid to late 80's whereas the Yankees are more dominant most of the other times?

That's probably more applicable to bandwagon fans nationwide - there are a lot of Bulls fans out there. As much as I like to disparage them...I'm a Celtics fan for the same reasons. But in my mind the 80's Celtics were somehow morally superior to the 90's Bulls, so my bandwagoning (as much as you can accuse a 4 year old of bandwagoning) was more morally defensible.

I'm kind of surprised that there aren't more situations like Clippers/Lakers - that's the only one that doesn't seem totally unbalanced. But, there aren't many teams as historically bad as the Clippers, and, I hate to say it, as historically good as the Lakers.

I read an article about Sterling, apparently he was friends with Buss, and Buss helped convince him to buy the San Diego Clippers? Lends more credence to the Clippers logo as a Lakers ripoff and Clippers as a discount version/ little brother of the Lakers franchise theories.

I would suspect that Clippers fandom is combination of cheaper / more available tickets, and rooting for an underdog/contrarian personalities. I bet a lot of Clipper fans are real contrarian types. But if it's some sort of anti-Laker protest, I fully support them!

[chestnutz]

Never mind

[Still MIGHTY]

Oh my God, can one thread that's talking about a Los Angeles/California team go without having this stupid conversation. Seriously, everything has been said that needs to be, there are at least a dozen other threads talking about this. I can't open any Cal thread without reading about this argument!

That lasted maybe like 3-4 posts in this thread... We got over it pretty quickly this time lol. No one is gonna budge either way. We agreed to disagree. The thread has moved on pretty smoothly since then. You didn't have to bring it back up

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Chakfu, that is true. It mostly depends on what you grow up in. It can either be just bandwagoning that gets you absolutely hooked, or just your upbringing.

I'm a Ducks fan because the movies came out when I was like 3 or 4 and the cartoon show came out too, and my grandfather was a hockey fan from when he grew up in New York, so I went to games and I saw WildWing at the games and I was hooked.

I'm an Angels fan opposed to a Dodgers fan, because again when my grandpa was growing up in New York, he couldn't stand the Dodgers or Yankees. He hated them both. So when he moved out here, he couldn't root for the Dodgers so we all became Angels fans.

I'm a Lakers fan based on early bandwagoning that has turned into fandom lol. Who in their right mind would actually choose the Clippers? Like I said before, I haven't ever met someone that could even claim they were a Clippers fan. When I started to play basketball in like 5th grade through 8th grade, thats when Kobe and Shaq first came to the Lakers and I was hooked on them. And during those same years they had their 3-peat, and I haven't looked back since.

I'm a Colts fan because they were the first team I ever watched on TV and with no team in my immediate area I had freedom to choose (I would go the Chargers games one a year, but they never really caught on with me. They were the terrible Chargers when I first started to catch on to football.) and my favorite color was blue, like the exact shade of Colts blue, so it was only natural.

I'm a USC fan because, well let's face it they are the dominant football team here. There was a time when I liek USC football and then UCLA basketball, but as I grew up and actually started to look at colleges, USC had all what I wanted and they were tops in what I wanted my major to be, so I gravitated to them.

I'm a Manchester United fan for the stupidest reason lol. I had never really paid attention to soccer. Then I saw the movie Eurotrip, and there was that band of crazy ManU fans. They were hilarious and I thought they were awesome. I didnt know ManU actually existed, but when I learned they were real I was like "thats the team I'm going to follow!" I had no idea about their history, and then ESPN started showing soccer games and the World Cup came and gone, and eventually I fell into being a soccer fan and a Man U fan.

We all have our strange reasons one way or another

[chestnutz]

haha my bad, just saw the first few posts about it and got sick of it

[FiddySicks]

They should just move to Anaheim and use the logos above, but just tweek them a little.

I know nothing about California, but wouldn't San Diego be a better place to move. Anaheim is just a suburb of Los Angeles, while San Diego is a completely different city. "Moving" the team to Anaheim, would basically just be changing the team name slightly (like the Angels did). While moving to San Diego would actually bring a whole new fanbase into the equation and might actually encourage some change.

If you don't know, don't say anything about it... We've had this argument before but anyways

The Pond in Anaheim is about a 45-60 minute drive (given the traffic situation) to Staples Center in LA.

Anaheim is not a suburb of LA. They may be close, but I would not consider it a "suburb" of LA. It wouldnt be "moving" it would be actually moving. and it would be a slight change like the Angels. If they came here They would probaly either have to be the Anaheim Clippers (Orange County Clippers? OC Clips? OCC?)

Normally I don't think this would be a problem, but considering the vicinity to Anaheim, I'd assume Orange Coast College would have a bit of a problem with another major Southern California business using OCC for branding.

[Still MIGHTY]

They should just move to Anaheim and use the logos above, but just tweek them a little.

I know nothing about California, but wouldn't San Diego be a better place to move. Anaheim is just a suburb of Los Angeles, while San Diego is a completely different city. "Moving" the team to Anaheim, would basically just be changing the team name slightly (like the Angels did). While moving to San Diego would actually bring a whole new fanbase into the equation and might actually encourage some change.

If you don't know, don't say anything about it... We've had this argument before but anyways

The Pond in Anaheim is about a 45-60 minute drive (given the traffic situation) to Staples Center in LA.

Anaheim is not a suburb of LA. They may be close, but I would not consider it a "suburb" of LA. It wouldnt be "moving" it would be actually moving. and it would be a slight change like the Angels. If they came here They would probaly either have to be the Anaheim Clippers (Orange County Clippers? OC Clips? OCC?)

Normally I don't think this would be a problem, but considering the vicinity to Anaheim, I'd assume Orange Coast College would have a bit of a problem with another major Southern California business using OCC for branding.

Would a community college really have that much standing against a NBA team?

*Insert joke about OCC's team could beat the Clippers*

Possibly I guess, OCC is in Costa Mesa by the OC fairgrounds... Clips would play at the Pond... meh, I guess so. Only about 10 minutes apart on a good day.

But I don't think OCC could challenge the Clippers in any sort of authority, unless OCC has a legitimate copyright to that branding or in similar use of logos. I doubt it though.

That's really the only use of OCC. They are the pirates and use a bad version of Bucco Bruce and a recolored Buccaneers flag logo.

[CubsFanBudMan]

I've always felt the Clippers uniforms were simple and classic, despite the teams history in them. But maybe it's because I always liked the Bulls' Chicago-script roads.

Still, I have to think had the Clippers done like so many teams in the '90s and gone trendy with that teal-orange combo and some updated look, there would be many here celebrating when the Clippers changed back to what they have currently, which they would have undoubtedly done by now. To me, the Clippers were smart to avoid that era, even if it was unintentional (or lazy). They did what the Pistons probably should have done with a similar old look and seemingly similar options for an update.

As far as the logo, I agree it should be updated and "de-Lakered."

[MadmanLA]

I'm a Clippers fan, and if you care, you can give some of my own perspective on things regarding this team. I started rooting for around the time Larry Brown came here in '92 (the first year I truly followed basketball closely). Beforehand, I always knew the Clippers horrifically bad, and I guess like many, I wanted to root for the underdog. For awhile, I rooted for the both L.A. NBA teams, but my #1 preference was the red, white, blue. But in the later years, after coming across the ignorance and arrogance of many (but not all) Lakers fans and the Kobe-Shaq feud pretty much turned me off to the team.

It's hard to defend Donald Sterling, because he has been such a horrible owner and even worse man (ESPN Magazine has a great article about him right now on ESPN.com--very interesting read). One thing I could say about him, and it isn't much at all...he doesn't overpay for marginal talent. People always wanted to blame him for not keeping their young players...I always blame Elgin Baylor for not scouting and drafting the right players in the first place, no matter how much control Baylor had. Outside of a couple of cases, none of the other players that the Clippers drafted after leaving the organization did anything of signifigance, so let's put to rest the myth that the former young Clippers went on to the dominate the league after leaving.

Someone mentioned that Jerry Buss convinced Sterling to the buy the Clippers...while that's true, we can go back a step. In order to complete the purchase of the Lakers, Kings, and the Forum from Jack Kent Cooke, Buss need an additional $2.7 million, so he sold his apartment buildings in Santa Monica to Sterling (who still to this day owns a lot of property on L.A.'s Westside), and the rest is history.

As for the uniforms...I've always loved them. But I will agree that the primary logo has to go. In recent years, they have pretty much deempathized the main logo, and have gone with either the cursive "Clippers" or "LAC" logos.

[Quillz]

I'm sure that in my lifetime, the Clippers will be a decent team. But not anytime soon.

It must be really hard playing in the same arena as the Lakers. One is arguably among the best teams in the NBA, the other is among the worst. I know around here, the Clippers are often just "that other team."

[Sport]

I'm sure that in my lifetime, the Clippers will be a decent team. But not anytime soon.

What's your definition of "decent"? I ask because they made the second round of the playoffs three years ago. I'd say that's decent.

[Quillz]

I'm sure that in my lifetime, the Clippers will be a decent team. But not anytime soon.

What's your definition of "decent"? I ask because they made the second round of the playoffs three years ago. I'd say that's decent.

How about consistently making the playoffs, instead of once every 3-4 years?

The Clippers do have a lot of talent, they just have awful management. Much like the Detroit Lions. If the Clippers could secure good management that knows what they're doing, then the talent that already exists on the team could likely do very well.

[Sodboy13]

I'm sure that in my lifetime, the Clippers will be a decent team. But not anytime soon.

What's your definition of "decent"? I ask because they made the second round of the playoffs three years ago. I'd say that's decent.

Really? I thought that kind of crap only happened in the Eastern Conference.

[chakfu]

I've always felt the Clippers uniforms were simple and classic, despite the teams history in them. But maybe it's because I always liked the Bulls' Chicago-script roads.

Still, I have to think had the Clippers done like so many teams in the '90s and gone trendy with that teal-orange combo and some updated look, there would be many here celebrating when the Clippers changed back to what they have currently, which they would have undoubtedly done by now. To me, the Clippers were smart to avoid that era, even if it was unintentional (or lazy). They did what the Pistons probably should have done with a similar old look and seemingly similar options for an update.

As far as the logo, I agree it should be updated and "de-Lakered."

Except teal/orange would kind of be a return to the San Diego Clippers colors for them, so they really could have re-established that as an identity.

[chakfu]

I'm sure that in my lifetime, the Clippers will be a decent team. But not anytime soon.

What's your definition of "decent"? I ask because they made the second round of the playoffs three years ago. I'd say that's decent.

Really? I thought that kind of crap only happened in the Eastern Conference.

Don't look now, but the Eastern Conference could be considered better than the West now...3 of the top 4/5 teams are in the East. The West is packed with pretty good teams 3-9, but they also have the worst teams in the lottery.

Remember last year, the Lakers had a cakewalk to the finals while the Celtics ran a gantlet - it was just like the 80's again.

[Jamikel]

Blake Griffin will help to re-shape that team

having some fun today:

^clicky!^

...and before someone mentions it, they will trade or force camby to relinquish his #

That's a great looking wallpaper..

Ugh. I mean, It's incredibly well-done, but ugh. That really makes me wish players wouldn't be allowed to declare for the draft until after the lottery, so that potential #1 picks knew exactly what they were getting into.

[rams80]

I'm sure that in my lifetime, the Clippers will be a decent team. But not anytime soon.

What's your definition of "decent"? I ask because they made the second round of the playoffs three years ago. I'd say that's decent.

Really? I thought that kind of crap only happened in the Eastern Conference.

To be fair, it would have been a Conference finals appearance if Dunleavy wasn't a complete dumba$$ in game five.

Really? Daniel Ewing on the court in crunch time, let alone guarding an on fire Raja Bell? Really?

[gingerbreadmann]

I'm sure that in my lifetime, the Clippers will be a decent team. But not anytime soon.

What's your definition of "decent"? I ask because they made the second round of the playoffs three years ago. I'd say that's decent.

Really? I thought that kind of crap only happened in the Eastern Conference.

To be fair, it would have been a Conference finals appearance if Dunleavy wasn't a complete dumba$$ in game five.

Really? Daniel Ewing on the court in crunch time, let alone guarding an on fire Raja Bell? Really?

You just saw that on ESPN Classic, didn't you?

(at least I admit it!)

[rams80]

I'm sure that in my lifetime, the Clippers will be a decent team. But not anytime soon.

What's your definition of "decent"? I ask because they made the second round of the playoffs three years ago. I'd say that's decent.

Really? I thought that kind of crap only happened in the Eastern Conference.

To be fair, it would have been a Conference finals appearance if Dunleavy wasn't a complete dumba$$ in game five.

Really? Daniel Ewing on the court in crunch time, let alone guarding an on fire Raja Bell? Really?

You just saw that on ESPN Classic, didn't you?

(at least I admit it!)

I don't have Classic on my plan. That was just a very entertaining series and I still vividly remember screaming at my TV when that play went down. (was rooting for the Clippers and my former classmate Shaun Livingston)