Doc Rivers has had enough, man. He’s done with the media. All of us. The man has clearly had it up to *here* with everyone’s questions about blown leads and everything else.
It’s been like that all season from the moment when the 76ers blew a big lead to the Clippers in January up until now. He’s just had enough of talking about blown leads.
To be fair to us, he’s done it all throughout his career. He blew a 3-1 lead with the Magic against the Pistons in 2003, he blew one with the Clippers against the Rockets in 2015 and then he did it again with the Clippers in 2020 against the Nuggets.
There’s a history there. But, let Doc tell it, that’s far from the whole story.
Doc Rivers got a little defensive when discussing his past teams' collapses 👀 pic.twitter.com/88PqjDDUZa
— NBC Sports Philadelphia (@NBCSPhilly) April 27, 2022
“I wish y’all would tell the whole story with me. My Orlando team was the 8th seed — no one gives me credit for getting up against the Pistons, who won the title…The Clipper team that we lost 3-1, Chris Paul didn’t play in the first two games and we didn’t have homecourt. The last one, to me, was the one we blew. We blew that. But that was in the bubble and anything can happen in the bubble. There’s no homecourt. Game 7 would’ve been in LA. It just happens.
To be fair to Doc, those are all valid points when you look back at the history of those series. There were certain circumstances that led to things playing out the way they did.
That Magic team probably shouldn’t have been where they were and wouldn’t have if not for the brilliance of Tracy McGrady. That first Clippers team? Chris Paul was hurt. And that last Clippers team? Well, yikes.
But, still, these are 3-1 leads. And you probably shouldn’t be blowing 3-1 leads.
This isn’t something that “just happens,” as Rivers said. It’s something that actually rarely happens. It’s only happened 13 times in NBA history and the league has been around for a long time.
So, sure. It’s probably annoying to hear about. But reporters are absolutely right to ask these questions of Doc when he’s got 3 of those 13 blown series leads under his belt.
The only way to make that go away is to win. So, hopefully, he’s got his 76ers prepared and ready to go for Thursday night.
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