Before Los Angeles Lakers The Los Angeles Clippers met in the two-team’s opening game in the season opener Friday night, and MVP Montrezel Harrell went on to speak with two of his former teammates, Lou Williams and Patrick Beverly, and exchanged pleasantries with his backup teammates. Lots of singles success over the past three seasons.
The rest of the players and staff with whom he has spent the bulk of his NBA career so far? Well, he went and talked to them after the match, but he didn’t take the extra steps down the aisles of Staples Center, bypassing his new spot in the Lakers locker room, to going to the Clippers locker room he called home last year. Harel admitted after the match that he still had “a lot of feelings” for him The team he feels does not want his return.
“But nothing matters,” he sure added.
Even though it was just a pre-season game, he’s trying to focus on his new job with his new team.
“I came here with the mindset that I have a job to do tonight.” Harrell said, “I’m here with my team, which is the Los Angeles Lakers team.” “This wasn’t going out,” Hey, how are you guys? ”Laughing at him. Nah. I had a job, and I have a mindset of what I came here to do. “
This is what Harel did, It served as a standout in the Lakers’ 87-81 victory With 19 points and 9 rebounds, while he was shooting 5-13 from the field. His indefatigable intensity popped up on screen in a match involving loads of players who would not play regular minutes for either team, as well as veterans trying to put their legs underneath. But Harrell doesn’t have an average setting. When he’s on the court, he’s all his energy all the time.
Beverly was trying to make Harel’s job more difficult – among other things. The seats of both the Lakers and the Clippers had enough rubbish for the players on the field to be noticed in the broadcast, but the most memorable moment was Beverly, showing his utter lack of coolness by celebrating the loss of the pre-season jump from Harrell as if it were Late shot in a competitive match against the Portland Trailblazers.
But Harrell didn’t let that – or Kawhi Leonard is doing the same – You pester him. Shot straight into the clippers, it was captured unforgettably by a particularly heated edge microphone screaming “Hell no, F — no” during a missed transition from Terence Mann.
Once again, this was Before the start of the season Game.
But it’s not just some talent in Harrell’s sharp laser focus that has allowed him to constantly adjust Beverley’s bark. He’s been a teammate with Beverly for years now, so in addition to seeing him always on the sidelines, he’s been playing against him in countless matches and practices, and so he’s used to his former teammates’ fire.
“It doesn’t bother me, man. It’s the same Pat who used to do that when I’m filming and being on the other team (in quarrels) with Lou and misses jump shots, or misses a throw-up or something like that, man. It doesn’t bother me man. He said.” Harel. “If we weren’t in a pandemic and the Clippers match was at home, the fans would be shouting at me and it wouldn’t be any different, man.
“I’m not worried about what Pat is doing on the sidelines. Everything he’s doing on the sidelines … It’s nothing different from what I knew Pat brought to the table, but it didn’t bother me,” Harrell continued. “I’m a basketball player, like these guys.”
Harrell and Beverly She explained on Twitter that she was great after the match, But that doesn’t mean Harrell still has some great love for the Clippers. More telling, in Harrell’s last question after the match, he was asked a softball about developing the Clippers players in his second year. Instead of doing what most players would do in this situation – throwing some clichés and keeping them moving – Harel wanted to take the moment to clear the line between him and the team he used to play on.
“There is no disdain, but this is not my prerogative to argue. It’s not up to me to really give my opinion.” “How they came into their growth has nothing to do with me… I’m not disrespectful, but honestly I don’t really care. I am no longer in a team with these men, and this is not the locker room I walk in. So how these guys get ahead in their growth or how they take the next steps in their career really have nothing to do with me.
Harel continued, “I wish these men all the best of luck.” “(But) we have guys on our team who still have to grow. (Devontae) Cacok, Talen (Horton-Tucker) is young, Kostas (Antetokounmpo) is young. So we have guys on our team and we have to grow too. So as I said, what Being in the locker room is not up to me. I focus on my place and my team. “
He was talking about the guys out there, but he could easily have also talked about the clippers as a whole, if you read the second part without knowing the question. But while Harrell may say he wants to move forward, to focus on his new team, it may not always be possible. If a pre-season match were that cool, some already-fraught regular season matches between these two sides would probably make him think a lot about the Clippers as well. And if that stale show is any indication, Harrell’s advantage in those matches may prove to be quite an asset to his new teammates as they confront the organization he clearly doesn’t like.
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