The fallout continues for Blake Griffin following the broken hand he suffered after punching a team employee. The forward is already out after having a second procedure to repair his injured hand and now the Los Angeles Clippers are serving up their own punishment to the forward. As he sits out due to a suspension, teams taking interest in a potential trade deal before the league deadline.
The Clippers announced that Griffin would be suspended four games without pay following the punching incident. No other punishment from the league is expected as they assisted in this ruling. According to sources via ESPN's Ramona Shelburne, Griffin's suspension is longer than the one handed to Matt Barnes because of the severity of the injuries sustained. Head coach Doc Rivers told the media that the suspension is a good way for everyone to move on from the issue and the team still had full confidence that Griffin could be a valuable member of the Clippers.
"It's just nice to have it over with, and now we can kind of move on," Rivers said, via ESPN.com. "Obviously, we don't get Blake back yet -- we have a lot of games before that -- and we have to keep trying to get through that. But that [punishment] part of it is over with, and now we can get back to kind of repairing our team."
While Rivers has confidence in Griffin, so do a lot of other teams with the trade deadline getting close. The Clippers have not said they plan on trading Griffin, but others are hoping that the fall out from the punching incident will be too steep and the team will have no other choice. According to Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders, the Orlando Magic would like to chase Griffin as they look to trade Tobias Harris.
The Orlando Magic sit in 11th place in the Eastern Conference with the playoffs a far off dream. As a result, they are trying to sell off some of their high-priced youth in favor of a veteran to add to the mix. Meanwhile, the Clippers are struggling to keep pace with Western Conference powerhouses like the San Antonio Spurs, Golden State Warriors and Oklahoma City Thunder. They could view Harris as a good piece of the puzzle to help push them into the playoff picture.
The chances the Clippers make this deal are slim to none. Dan Woike of the Orange County Register has shot down all reports of a trade coming Griffin. The Denver Nuggets expressed interest earlier and he denied that. As of now, if the Clippers are making a deal for a trade it would likely involve Lance Stephenson or Jamal Crawford and not Griffin who could be valuable late in the season.
