The Los Angeles Clippers got off to a hot start to the season. They looked to be an early season favorite to win the title, with the trio of Chris Paul, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan all looking like their peak selves. But the Clippers have cooled off since, capped by a 115-98 loss to rival Golden State Warriors Wednesday, which have dropped them to 16-7 and just 5-5 in their last 10 games. This might be the Clippers’ last chance to take a shot at the title with Paul entering free agency next summer. Recently, the veteran point guard spoke about the possibility of teaming up with buddies LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony.
“Anything’s possible. Definitely, anything’s possible,” Chris Paul said on the “Open Run” podcast. “We’ll workout together and stuff like that sometimes. The last time [we played together] was 2008, some time around the Olympics. D-Wade was coming off his injury. He hit us up and said, ‘I need to see what it’s like to play for real.’ We all met in Chicago. I’ll never forget that. We went to a gym in Chicago and we played pickup with some other guys just to give him some of that real feel, what it was like. Then, I don’t know if you remember, at the 2008 Olympics, [Wade] went off. That’s what you do for your real friends and your real brothers.”
As noted by a Yahoo Sports report, LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony have the option to be free agents two summers from now, while Chris Paul will be a free agent this summer. While there is no clear path to a potential team up with one or both of his close friends, the new NBA free agency climate has made anything possible. There have been rumblings about a strained relationship between Phil Jackson and Anthony in New York, so that could be something to build on if Paul wants to.