The athleticism of prime Blake Griffin
Young Blake was so wildly entertaining. I remember being like 13yrs old and watching highlights on NBA Tv before going to school and this dude just flying through the air almost nightly
Lob city was the my second favourite team
He played against our tiny highschool in OK once and it was insane. Our poor team didnt stand a chance and the entire crowd including our fans were going nuts when Blake went off. Was like watching the globetrotters play a bunch of 12 year olds.
Does anyone else throw the ball through the hoop without touching rim like Griffin?
Dwight Howard did it in the dunk contest.
Young Blake Griffin was so exhilirating that he made the Donald Sterling Clippers watchable
Far more than just “watchable.” The Lob City Clippers were the most enjoyable team to watch.
It is seriously so tragic they never won a ring. They were legitimately one of the most entertaining teams of all time.
were they ever serious contenders? that’s starting to stretch my memory too much to remember in detail, but griffin+cp3 teams never really came close
JJ and Blake did an interview once where they talked about this and they agreed there was really just one year where they were legit title contenders but they got injured in the playoffs
2015 was the year.
They beat the defending champ Spurs, and had a 3-1 lead on Houston.
If CP3 was healthy, they could’ve gone all the way
God, how many playoff contender runs end with the phrase “If CP3 was healthy”?
Awesome player, but playoff health kept him from the very top of the mountain of all time players.
shows how much impact one great player makes in the league. CP3 was one of those guys where he immediately improves your team.
Weird, I would’ve imagined it was ‘14
Blake’s best year paired with CP3’s prime and a solid overall team, but they ran into prime KD
Man what an insane era of competition. Seven 50-win teams in the West. Any one of them would be solid contender in five years before or later
That Spurs team was too hungry that year
I think there were two seasons where they would’ve been but one year CP3 was hurt in the playoffs and Blake was hurt in the playoffs the other year. They didn’t have many healthy postseason runs, if any, when Blake was near his peak as a player
2015 was realistically the last year. In 2015-16 he injured his quad and then broke his hand (punching the equipment manager). Then he and CP3 were hurt (he re-aggravated the quad injury, CP3 broke his hand) and ruled out in the same game in the playoffs.
In 2017, he hurt his big toe in the playoffs against the Jazz and that was it. CP3 was traded a few months later, and Blake also got moved to the Pistons in January 2018.
Eh, after a while they played like lil bitches. Ultimate floppers and cp3 at his loudest and whiniest
Edit: look man, we all hated them by 2014. This was not a hot take for folks who remember
What? They were like one of the most entertaining teams in the league
This is such a wild comment. Nothing was standing in the way of them being “watchable,” ever, when they had lob city
literally has nothing to do with the video. like why even comment that. what a weirdo
That spin to begin the clip is so nasty.
I think even Giannis might be too old now to pull this off. Who could do that right now in the league?
I love me some Blake Griffin highlights
electric
he reminds me of old school nba video game where you just spam the dunk button anywhere close enough and the dunk animation just starts anyway regardless of defenders in front or if it makes any sense at all
Blake Griffin highlights are the easiest difficulty in 2k
This is exactly it. One of those 2Ks back then had a spin-dunk button combo you could spam back then that’d play out exactly like that Blake clip.
It was one of the 2000s early NBA Live. It introduced weird “signature badge” Playmakers had fancy passes and bigs had “power” badge that basically allowed you to dunk from anywhere under the basket. Amare was broken in that game. I think it was NBA Live 2005 or 2006.
I think Aaron Gordon is the closest to Blake’s athleticism in today’s league for their size.
I agree. May be tough though as the hamstring, calve and ankle injuries add up.
Jalen Brunson is the only one I can think of.
thats a great shout
I still remember when he caught Brandon Knight
Maybe a healthier Zion but that’s really it imo
Never forget Zion dunked from the FT line
Cooper Flagg
Flagg absolutely. Good call
Zion if healthy.
Second time today I say “poor Mozgov”
Funny cuz he’s actually rich af
rich mozgov
Those were the days
Back when sports center used to be live for like 8 hours a day.
Yeah, you would tune in to see highlights like these clips, and then catch them again 30 minutes later
I had to double take at that clippers Sixers score…
Prime processing year seeing as MCW was on the roster that puts us at 2015 at the latest.
Nah, that was 2013 actually, the season that drove them to tanking in the first place. They weren’t horrible, just extremely mediocre.
Edit: NVM, 2014, memories blended in a little bit:
https://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/201402090LAC.html
Yea Thompson joined in 2014. We still had Thad but he was one of the last to be dealt iirc
62-21 lol
Those teams were so fun to watch man omg
Damn Chris Paul knows right where to put a lob
It was cool to see Blake develop his outside in the years he was in Detroit.
Skill set wise, Detroit Griffin was the best. Dude had an amazing all-around game. Wasn’t jumping out the arena as much, but handles, passing, defense, AND was still damn athletic.
Facts. He was hooping.
At first I thought BG was overrated because all he did was dunk. Then I realized how difficult it was to dunk constantly when everyone knows that’s what you’re gonna do. It’s insane how easily he could get to the rim.
He also improved his midrange shot and his passing over the course of his career and didn’t rest on his laurels.
I’d even argue that before his injury in Detroit, he was reaching the perfect culmination of a modern power forward, with his outside shooting, passing, and still being able to bully and punish the rim (with even better footwork).
People forget just how fast the Lob City Clippers can easily blow teams out
It’d be 14-14 and you look away for a bit , it’s now a 20 point lead for the Clippers
Imagine if we had a good 3 and better supporting cast. Stupid Doc thinking he could run and coach the team simultaneously. I’ll never forgive him for a lot of things during his tenure; wasted easily the best era of our teams history.
Great dunks, but still some offensive fouls
At the very least a couple of those should have been no-calls and not and-ones.
Rule of Cool.
He really was that dude for a while.
Prime Blake Griffin was must see television, one of the most entertaining players in recent basketball history. He was great to watch.
“He ain’t even stretch doeeeee” young D’Angelo Russel at a USA training camp reaction to Blake doing an off the backboard windmill https://youtu.be/XthTm8tiWmw?is=RRCKxTHPNvufl1Dn
He didn’t even stretch doe
Fuck the Clippers.
That said, Lob City was fun to watch.
Blake kickstarted the viral highlight era of basketball on social media
Dude was a freak! One of my favorite players to watch.
Violence
Imagine prime Blake Griffin dunking on this generation’s centers
Lob City Clippers were so much fun
That off arm was so powerful
Best dunker since Vince
Lob City was the team to watch. On any given night you might see a Blake Griffin/Deandre Jordan poster or a Chris Paul/Jamal Crawford ankle breaker
Theres no one quite like Prime Blake Griffin
Young Blake was the next Shawn Kemp.
Damn, those boys beat the brakes off that Philly team
Remember when he murdered Mozgov???
I never get tired of seeing this.
Man, CP3 was the perfect point guard to that Lob City Clippers team
Made me a clippers fan. Cp3/blake/DJ was just such an absurd combination. Bummed they didnt win a ring but happy it happened.
Lob city was a lot of fun to watch for sure
Chris Copeland sighting
Nah especially with Wemby here now they need to make the hoop 11.5ft lol these are insane
Peak Ralph Lawler….no one was having a better time calling these Clipper games
The great Ralph Lawler was the perfect announcer for those insaaaaane dunks
SLAM DUNK!
METEOR JAAAAAAAAAAM
how did he keep landing those dunks without getting hurt
Emphatic
Impressive. Almost makes me want to compare him to MLK JR on a t shirt.
what people forget is blake also developed into a legit playmaker by his prime. those last couple years in LA he was basically running the offense from the high post. the dunks got the attention but his game had way more layers
To this day there hasn’t been a more exciting team to watch in basketball since then. Kobe literally said Blake had himself dunking more even though Kobe was getting older at the time. What does that tell you? I’m going to get a BG clippers jersey one of these days. He was my favorite player to watch (next to Steph and LBJ at the time)
Always a highlight ready to pop off
what people forget is blake didnt just jump over cars and throw down posters - when the injuries piled up he completely rebuilt himself as a shooter and playmaker. watching him go from human highlight reel to a guy diving on the floor for loose balls in detroit showed real growth. not everyone with that kinda athleticism is willing to change when it leaves them
I love the way dude yells SLAM DUNK after the dunk, its almost as good as the dunk
I love Blake so much. He lifted the Clippers out of the shadow realm. He was athletic as fuck as seen in these clips, but man, just watch a video of all his highlights. Once he developed his game fully, dude was a menace; he did everything. He could pass, shoot, run the floor, still show off his athleticism, and had some good defense. I felt like he was a dark horse MVP candidate. Really wish we didn’t trade him and that injuries didn’t derail his career so abruptly.
The original run and dunk man
One of the few “must see box office” guys in nba history. I’ll never forget his first two years on the clippers.
I’m a huge fan of the art of the dunk, so every Blake game was must-see TV for me back then in the early years. I think he was the first dunker since Vince Carter to have given me that feeling, where every game had this anticipation of all-time dunk potentially sitting right around the corner.
The good ol’ days. 😢
that last shot of blake… i never realized this dude looks exactly like Kuwabara from YuYu Hakusho
Prime Blake Griffin was fun to watch!
if he had more lay ups and less SLAM dunks, he might of had a couple more good years. I agree his athleticism was impressive to watch.
Can’t believe this the mf tryna sell me Lemon Pepper wings from Wingstop
Oh my god!
One of the most thrilling in game dunkers of my life. When Blake left the ground it was absolutely electric.
Lob city was a special time
This team should have never lost smh too much talent
By far one of the most entertaining teams I have EVER watched. This LAKER fan couldn’t help but root for these Clippers in 2013.
Shame that they couldn’t put it together in the playoffs
I could not be happier that the t-shirt era of NBA jerseys is over
If only prime Vince and Blake existed at the same time. Just a fever dream.
Hard to explain how much he set the league on fire that game against the Knicks his rookie year
He would be dominating the paint in today’s nba
Deandre, Blake, Paul, Harris, Williams, Crawford, Harell i dont remember most guys in starter with those 3 if no mistaken last 4 i mention are bench, i dunno if they play together at the same time or i mess up my head in that two stages of Clippers.
What’s crazy is “Prime” Blake Griffin reminds me of 41 year old LeBron James and that doesn’t get enough attention.