Chris Paul is returning to the Los Angeles Clippers, according to ESPN. The decision brings Paul back to the franchise with which he played arguably his best basketball, as Paul spent six seasons with the Clippers between 2011 and 2017, making five All-NBA Teams and six All-Defensive Teams in the process. It’s a one-year deal worth $3.6 million for Paul, per NBA insider Chris Haynes, who adds the 2025-26 NBA season (which will be Paul’s 21st in the league) will likely be Paul’s final one.
In the summer of 2017, however, his first stint with the Clippers ended when he forced a trade to the Houston Rockets so he could compete for a championship alongside James Harden. Now, ironically, Paul will join Harden’s team for the second time, as the Clippers traded for Harden early in the 2023-24 season. Their first partnership ended acrimoniously, with Paul getting traded to the Thunder for Russell Westbrook. “James made this [expletive] happen,” a league source told Yahoo Sports in 2019 of the trade that sent Paul to Oklahoma City. “He wanted Chris up out of there.” Now, the two of them are older and seemingly ready to bury the hatchet as they once again pursue their first NBA championships.
Paul is a lock to eventually reach the Hall of Fame, but even at 39, he was a reasonably effective player last season with the Spurs. He was one of only six players in the entire league to start all 82 games last season, and the other five were at least seven years his junior. He maintained his stellar playmaking and ended the season with almost five times as many assists as turnovers. He shot well from deep and mid-range, though at this stage of his career, he’s not really capable of getting to the basket anymore. He’s lost enough physically that he is no longer the All-Defense guard he used to be, but he’s always in the right place and still generates turnovers at a strong rate.
Paul is, even now, the sort of player who any team could use at least as a backup, but he didn’t want to play for just any team. Ever since the Houston Rockets traded Paul in 2019, his family has lived in Los Angeles while he has been with his NBA team. As he said on “The Pat McAfee Show” in June, he didn’t want to stay away from his family any longer. “I talked to my family about it. My son just turned 16. My daughter’s 12. The past six seasons I have lived without them. I’ve been away from them for the last six years. That’s the conversation. I wanna be dad,” Paul explained. That put two teams at the front of the line for his services: the Clippers and Lakers.
The Lakers were likely a very tempting option for Paul, as he is very close to Laker star LeBron James. However, the basketball fit with the Clippers was far stronger. The Lakers are absolutely loaded with ball-handling between James, Luka Dončić and Austin Reaves, but the Clippers badly needed a backup shot-creator behind Harden. Last year, Kevin Porter Jr. and Bogdan Bogdanović both struggled mightily in that role, and the Clipper offense lagged whenever Harden left the court. The hope is that Paul will be able to keep it afloat when Harden needs to rest, and he’ll fortunately have reinforcements to help on that front.
The Clippers have had a very busy offseason. In addition to Paul, they also locked up another former All-Star, Bradley Beal, to join him in the backcourt. Backup front court was an issue for the Clippers as well, so they signed Brook Lopez and, knowing they potentially had Beal and Paul incoming, traded Norman Powell to land John Collins at power forward. Now the Clippers have one of the deepest teams in the NBA, one capable of playing big or small, prioritizing offense or defense. After winning 50 games last season with Kawhi Leonard participating in less than half of them, the Clippers now seem primed to make their strongest run yet at the Western Conference crown.
The betting odds are a bit skeptical of their hopes on that front. The Clippers will enter next season as a Western Conference underdog. As of Monday morning, the Clippers had the seventh-best odds to win the West at Caesars Sportsbook (+1400). They were knocked out of the first round a season ago, and Leonard’s health is always a question mark. But they were surprisingly competitive a year ago and have gotten significantly better with their moves this offseason. If this is indeed the final stop in Paul’s historic career, it should at least be as part of a competitive team.
