{"id":511210,"date":"2026-01-02T05:37:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-02T05:37:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/511210\/"},"modified":"2026-01-02T05:37:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T05:37:10","slug":"clippers-notes-leonard-hot-streak-dunn-zubac-bogdanovic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/511210\/","title":{"rendered":"Clippers Notes: Leonard, Hot Streak, Dunn, Zubac, Bogdanovic"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kawhi Leonard<\/a> is the reigning Western Conference Player of the Week<\/a> and Mirjam Swanson of The Southern California News Group<\/a> believes it\u2019s time for the Clippers to see what they can get in a trade for the oft-injured star forward.<\/p>\n

Leonard\u2019s tenure with Los Angeles has largely been disappointing, Swanson writes, but he has been on a tear during the team\u2019s five-game winning streak and is having another highly productive season. Even if the Clippers claw their way back into the play-in picture and advance to the playoffs, they may end up having to play the Thunder in the first round, likely resulting in another early exit.<\/p>\n

Instead of continuing with Leonard, the Clips would be better off trying to acquire draft picks or a younger star to expedite the next iteration of the team, since the current group isn\u2019t competing for anything meaningful, Swanson opines.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s more on the Clippers, who are currently facing the shorthanded Jazz:<\/p>\n

Is L.A.\u2019s recent hot streak sustainable? Law Murray of The Athletic<\/a> considers that question, writing that Leonard and James Harden<\/a> have each been carrying an enormous offensive workload after several offseason moves didn\u2019t work out for various reasons. \u201cI\u2019ve never really kind of been in this situation,\u201d Leonard said. \u201cI\u2019m more trying to get guys the ball and just sharing it more than what I\u2019ve been doing. But the coaches need me to be aggressive, all the entire game.\u201d The answer to the question could dictate the Clippers\u2019 trade-deadline plans.
\nAfter a brutal 6-21 start, the Clippers have been playing much better defensively of late in no small part due to the efforts of Kris Dunn<\/a>, writes Janis Carr of The Orange County Register<\/a>. Dunn says the team\u2019s renewed commitment to defense started with the Dec. 20 victory over the Lakers. \u201cEverybody just had that juice that day and everybody went out there and we like to call it a \u2018hit.\u2019 We had been in a rut for awhile and I think everybody just collectively was like, you know what, the only way we are getting out of this is if we do our jobs,\u201d Dunn said. \u201cEverybody went out there and just played their hearts out.\u201d
\nInjured center Ivica Zubac<\/a> has begun on-court work in his recovery from a Grade 2 left ankle sprain<\/a>, according to Murray (Twitter link<\/a>). Zubac is expected to return to action at some point in mid-January. Veteran guard Bogdan Bogdanovic<\/a> will miss at least two more games due to a hamstring injury and his status for next week\u2019s three-game road trip is up in the air, Murray adds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kawhi Leonard is the reigning Western Conference Player of the Week and Mirjam Swanson of The Southern California…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":511211,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3789],"tags":[7,1303,559,532,560,529,528,4034,192,4032,251,135,4033,4031,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-511210","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-clippers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-bogdan-bogdanovic","10":"tag-clippers","11":"tag-ivica-zubac","12":"tag-james-harden","13":"tag-kawhi-leonard","14":"tag-kris-dunn","15":"tag-la","16":"tag-la-clippers","17":"tag-laclippers","18":"tag-los-angeles","19":"tag-los-angeles-clippers","20":"tag-losangeles","21":"tag-losangelesclippers","22":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115823892494498045","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511210","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=511210"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511210\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/511211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=511210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=511210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=511210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}