Kawhi Leonard Era Drifting Toward Uncertain End With Clippers

Like a sailboat on the water without any wind, the Los Angeles Clippers are afloat, although seemingly unable to go anywhere.

Kawhi Leonard had been paired with Paul George on the roster to no avail and another partnership between Leonard and James Harden proved fruitless. The 2019 George deal, in particular, is putting heavy stress on the franchise to this day.

George is long gone, having already played two seasons with the Philadelphia 76ers.

It’s easy to see now that trading four first round draft picks, as well as Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, to the Oklahoma City Thunder to acquire George was about as foolish as it can get. It didn’t seem all that bright at the time, either.

But the Clippers were desperate to get Kawhi Leonard a wing man and in theory, it actually should have come closer to bringing a title to their side of Los Angeles than it did.

The Clippers were the No. 2 seed in the 2020 Western Conference playoffs but the squad hardly looked comfortable in the sequestered setting of that year’s postseason, held exclusively in the Orlando, Fla., area because of the pandemic.

Among the betting favorites when the playoffs began, the Clippers failed to win the franchise’s first title when they couldn’t even get out of the second round. Making the collapse even worse was that the title did come back to Los Angeles, only with the LeBron James-led Lakers.

Signing Leonard in 2019 was supposed to be the Clippers’ counter move to the Lakers bringing aboard James in 2018. But injuries and disappointments have kept the Clippers adrift in the Leonard era, and issues continue to mount.

At 34, Leonard had the best offensive season of his career in 2025-26, was one of the highlights of the revamped All-Star Game in his own arena this past February, and yet not much of that production is being remembered now.

Leonard and the Clippers are embroiled in controversy, with the NBA about to decide soon if punishments will be handed out for possibly circumventing the salary cap through alleged payments Leonard received from a now shuttered banking company.

A $28 million endorsement deal Leonard had with the company Aspiration, is nearing the end of a league-wide investigation.

The harshest of punishments could see the league void Leonard’s Clippers’ contract that runs through next season and is set to pay the shooting forward just over $50 million.

It would be an awkward end to a rocky era, that so far has included Leonard playing 331 of a possible 574 regular-season games with the team. He missed the entire 2021-22 season with a chronic knee injury.

The Clippers have reached the playoffs a respectable five times since Leonard has joined the organization, but the two-time NBA champion has been limited in the postseason as well.

These were supposed to be better days for the Clippers and billionaire owner Steve Ballmer. Two seasons ago, the team moved into a new $2 billion arena south of L.A. in Inglewood. The state-of-the art venue makes the Lakers’ former arena, sitting nearby, look like a relic.

Yet, it figures to be a long time before the Clippers can even come close to replicating what the Lakers accomplished in the city during the 1980s when they won five titles in nine seasons.

The first four games the Clippers ever played in the building two seasons ago they lost. This past season, they opened with a 6-21 overall record as Leonard missed 10 of those games with yet another injury.

Once Leonard was shed of his minutes restriction upon his return, he leaned into the role as offensive leader as never before. He averaged 32.7 points over a 13-game stretch from Dec. 20- Jan. 14, including a career-best 55-point game. He finished the campaign scoring 27.9 points.

The team surged just enough to earn a spot in the play-in tournament but lost to the Golden State Warriors. Along the way, Harden and longtime big man Ivica Zubac were traded.

Is an influx of trade talent in Bennedict Mathurin and Darius Garland, not to mention 2006 and 2009 first-round draft picks, enough to put a winner around Leonard? The pick in the upcoming draft is No. 5 overall.

Those odds, as well as the chances that the NBA forces the Clippers to split from Leonard this offseason, seem slim. But maybe the parties eventually part in a trade.

At this point, setting sail on the partnership seems as if it would be in the best interest of all.