Blake & DeAndre Convo #1,321

Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan of the Los Angeles Clippers make up the most athletically gifted front court duo of all time. This season, both have shown vast improvement in their respective games.


For Griffin, his offense has become much more refined and under control, and he's been shooting a 17-foot jumper as well as his freethrows, with a lot more confidence and a lot better results than last season. But perhaps more notably, Griffin has improved on the defensive end, active in passing lanes and flying in from the weak side--something DJ already excelled at. On the flipside, Jordan's defense has become more refined, more controlled. He still flies in for monster blocks, but the silly fouls have been cut down, as has his habit biting at the slightest hint of a shot fake. More notably for Jordan, has been his offensive post work. Last year, his offensive game consisted of catching lobs and dunking and grabbing offensive rebounds and dunking. This year, he's got a hook shot (with either hand) and as he showed off last night, some pretty fancy footwork in the post.

Seeing as that they are best buds, it's obvious that the two talk about their games a lot. Jordan used Griffin's spin into an up and under move last night and scored, while Griffin blocked OJ Mayo's shot attempt by swiping at the ball with both arms--a Jordan patent.

I thought it would be fun to suppose their possible conversations. We'll start with the opposite hand bet and why both have been almost exclusively dunking with their "weak hand" this season.

"Yo B."
"What up Dre."
"I was thinking."
"What were you thinking?"
"I was thinking about my right hand."
"Your right hand?"
"Yeah, my right hand."
"What about your right hand?"
"I was thinking, you know, strictly in terms of dunking, that it's better than your right hand."
"Dre, my right hand gave the world Mozgov and Perkins. It even breathed life into Kia."
"Beautiful work too, but what about my Pau Gasol/Andre Bynum flush."
"I knew you were going to bring that one up."
"Come on B, quit talking like I don't dunk with my right on peeps all the time."
"No doubt. But you aren't better than me."
"I think you're wrong B."
"How can you be better when you're not even better with your left hand?"
"HA! It's on now."

And that's my conjecture behind all of the left-handed dunks by the right-handed Griffin and all of the right-handed jams by the lefty Jordan that looked especially lovely last night.