InfoSearched
Kawhi Leonard and Paul George stepped onto a South Los Angeles stage as Clippers, and the balance of power in the NBA shifted with them.
On Wednesday, July 24, 2019, the Los Angeles Clippers held their introductory press conference at the Green Meadows Recreation Center, officially welcoming Southern California natives Kawhi Leonard and Paul George to the franchise. The event capped off a wild 48-hour stretch of NBA free agency that reshaped the league’s contender landscape overnight. Team president Lawrence Frank opened the proceedings before owner Steve Ballmer, alongside head coach Doc Rivers, delivered an energetic welcome to the two new stars.
- Kawhi Leonard, fresh off winning the 2019 NBA championship and Finals MVP with the Toronto Raptors, signed a three-year max deal with the Clippers that includes a player option.
- Paul George arrived via a blockbuster trade from the Oklahoma City Thunder, with the Clippers sending back Danilo Gallinari, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and five first-round draft picks.
- George called teaming up with Leonard “destined,” tying the connection back to the 2011 NBA draft, when Indiana selected Leonard before shipping him to San Antonio.
Two Hometown Kids Come Home
Both Leonard and George grew up in Southern California — Leonard in Riverside, George in Palmdale — and both framed the move as a homecoming as much as a basketball decision. Ballmer’s introduction leaned into that local angle hard, treating the pairing less like a transaction and more like a reunion the city had been waiting on. Rivers, who has coached the Clippers since 2013 through several false-start rebuilds, stood beside Ballmer as the visible proof that ownership finally landed the stars to match the vision.
Leonard’s arrival alone would have been the biggest story of the offseason. He walked into Green Meadows as a two-time Finals MVP, having beaten Golden State in six games with Toronto just weeks earlier. Adding George, a six-time All-Star, turned the introduction into a doubleheader the Clippers front office had been chasing for years.
The George Connection Traces to 2011
George’s comments on stage centered on the idea that this partnership had been building for nearly a decade. He referenced the 2011 draft, when the Indiana Pacers selected Leonard 15th overall before immediately trading his rights to San Antonio for George Hill — a move that, in retrospect, kept Leonard and George’s careers linked long before either wore a Clippers uniform.
George described teaming up with Leonard as feeling “destined.”
The Cost of the Trade
Getting George cost the Clippers dearly on paper. Oklahoma City walked away with Gallinari, the electric young guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and five first-round picks — one of the steepest prices ever paid for a single star in modern NBA trade history. For a franchise that has spent its history chasing legitimacy in a city dominated by the Lakers, the price was treated as a rounding error against the payoff of landing a top-five two-way player.
A Roster Built to Win Now
Leonard’s résumé — two rings, two Finals MVPs, a Defensive Player of the Year award — put him in rare company the moment he sat down at the podium, the kind of championship pedigree that gets a player’s name mentioned alongside Clippers-adjacent Los Angeles legends for decades, the same way debates still follow guys like Dennis Rodman. Rivers now inherits a roster with two All-NBA-caliber wings, giving the Clippers a two-way frontcourt pairing that instantly reset expectations across the NBA offseason chatter about who could realistically challenge the Warriors’ era.
Both players signed off on the introduction by promising a title, not just a playoff run. Leonard’s deal keeps him flexible with that player option, while George’s trade acquisition locks the Clippers into a two-star core immediately. The next real test comes in training camp, when Rivers has to figure out how to fit Leonard’s load-management history and George’s shoulder recovery into a rotation built to peak in June.
Man Learns His Sister Is Actually His Mother | TODAY
“Tiger King” Star Carole Baskin Is “In Da Club”
Celebrities Losing Their Minds In Quarantine
This Ultra Modern Tiny House Will Blow Your Mind
ONLY IN NEW YORK COMPILATION #5