Clippers coach Doc Rivers didn’t expect Lou Williams to be ‘’this good’’
“When we traded for Lou (Williams), I was not having Lou,” the Clippers coach Doc Rivers admitted to Jeff Goodman of Stadium and Bob Ryan of The Boston Globe in a recent podcast regarding the trade that took place in summer 2017 and sent Chris Paul to the Houston Rockets and Lou Williams to LA. “I saw it obviously from afar, the obvious. I saw a guy that kept getting traded, right. I appreciate his offense, but I never thought he was this good” he added.
Just for the sake of information, in this trade, along with Williams, the Clippers received Patrick Beverley, Sam Dekker, Montrezl Harrell, Darrun Hilliard, DeAndre Liggins, Kyle Wiltjer, a 2018 first-round pick and future cash considerations.
You see back then, Chris Paul wanted to join Houston, because as Adrian Wojnarowski had reported Paul “had a strong desire to play with Rockets All-Star guard James Harden,” leading to the trade. Wojnarowski also stated that Paul and Harden spoke about playing together “at length,” adding they believe they can “thrive together.” We all know how all this played out and how this duo didn’t work out very well and that’s why we saw Paul getting traded to OKC in exchange for Russell Westbrook during the summer of 2019.
Williams, from the season 2013–14 to 2017–2018, got traded to a couple of teams (he was with the Atlanta Hawks for two seasons, then in 2014–15 joined the Toronto Raptors, the following season he played for the Lakers, later for Houston and the last three years he is with the Clippers. A great guy, who is unbelievably underrated and with such a low salary for all the things that he adds to the team coming off the bench. He is such a great leader, communicator, a pure soul, a man who has earned everybody’s respect. He is also the guy that has won back-to-back the award Sixth Man Of The Year, well-deserved of course.
According to Basketball-Reference, in his time in LA: He has been averaging 20.6 points per game, 2.8 rebounds, 5.4 assists, 0.9 steals and 0.2 blocks in 29.6 minutes. The last three seasons he has been shooting 42.7% from the field, 36.1% from the perimeter and 87.4% from the free-throw line.