The Los Angeles Clippers have been a punchline for decades. Why do fans keep coming back? - Toronto Star

The Raptors hit town Monday to face a team that's been under a dark cloud for almost a half-century.

At the Intuit Dome, home of the Los Angeles Clippers, the section known as the Wall — 4,500 seats, 51 rows, including three solely for standing — is full before tipoff. 

LOS ANGELES—You wonder how much one fan base can take.

From one disgraced owner banned from the NBA forever to one banned for just a season. From epic on-court collapses, ruining what should have been the golden era for the franchise, to blown draft picks and bad trades, questionable contracts given and good players allowed to leave.

Lawsuits, suspensions, derision. A never-ending saga that’s lasted for almost a half-century.

And yet still the fans come, drawn perhaps to a multibillion-dollar arena, or because they are inured to the history that has dogged the Los Angeles Clippers since the start of the 1980s. Maybe because they are the anti-Lakers, a workaday fan base in contrast to the Hollywood glitz.

“If you’re a Clippers fan, you get used to it all and you keep hope,” David Rodriguez, a 37-year-old Clippers fan, told the Star here before Monday’s game against the Raptors. “There’s a lot, though.”

The blown basketball opportunities have been just as egregious.

It’s hard to imagine any other franchise in any sport going through such upheaval on so many levels for so many decades.

“Yeah, we’re used to it,” Rodriguez said.

But still, they come. A few hours before the Clippers hosted the Raptors, fans were filling the Intuit Dome. The Clippers played to about 98 per cent capacity through their first two home games of the season. Somehow, the fans keep showing up and caring.

More than two hours from tipoff, the plaza area at the Intuit Dome’s main entrance was humming. The section known as the Wall — 4,500 seats, 51 rows, including three solely for standing — was full before tipoff. There hasn’t been a lot to cheer for, but the excitement hasn’t been beaten out of the fans.

With Leonard a Raptor again, there isn’t a single player left from the Clippers’ playoff team in 2023. The centrepiece of the latest Leonard trade, Brandon Ingram, is in San Diego with the Clippers’ G League affiliate, recovering from an Achilles tendon injury.

The coach tries to put on a brave front.

“I definitely want to be here,” Tyronn Lue, the Clippers’ head coach since 2020, told reporters before the season. “I definitely want to go through this challenge. We’ve been through challenges before, and so this isn’t any different. We’re going to approach it the same way.”

The Clippers’ way, lurching from disaster to scandal and back. Decades of futility and poor management and blown basketball moves are their legacy at this juncture.

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Doug Smith is a sports reporter based in Toronto. Follow him on BlueSky: @smithraptorsbeat.bsky.social.