LOS ANGELES CLIPPERS MEDIA CONFERENCE

August 20, 2020

Doc Rivers

Press Conference

Q. Considering he just joined the team in the bubble, how much of an X-factor has Trey Burke been?

DOC RIVERS: He's been good, but he's played well throughout the bubble. Just gives them great speed. He's taking off and shooting the ball pretty well, as well. He's always been an offensive player, and that's what he's doing.

Q. In the last seeding game you guys had, you did a terrific job of neutralizing Boban when he was in the starting lineup. What went wrong in Game 2 where he was able to go off efficiently?

DOC RIVERS: Just caught the ball deep into his spots. He's capable of doing that, and then on the other end I thought he was very effective, as well, clogging the paint. I thought our spacing actually in both games have been pretty much poor, offensive spacing, and so I thought we really helped Boby be a great defender.

Q. Did Pat do anything today, and is he available tomorrow, or is tomorrow like a game-time decision type of thing with him?

DOC RIVERS: Yeah, it's probably game time. We haven't practiced yet, but I don't anticipate him participating in practice.

Q. What's it like as somebody who's coached Boby to kind of coach against him? He's so unusual. Do you need to design stuff just for him?

DOC RIVERS: No, I mean, you've just got to know how to attack him on both ends. But if you're going to let him catch it deep, there ain't much you're going to do because you're not going to grow any much -- once he gets it, you're shorter than him, it's guaranteed. You know what shoulder to take away. I thought JaMychal had one great one where he took his shoulder away, and then I thought the other three we went to the wrong shoulder, so again, we made a lot of mistakes. But Boby is a match-up. We used him the same way. When he goes well, you keep him in. When he doesn't, you take him out. It goes both ways with him. It really does.

Q. It seems like based on Dallas's reactions, he was a guy who really fired them up. Do you kind of remember that effect?

DOC RIVERS: He's just a good guy. Whenever a guy, a team favorite plays well, everybody gets excited for him. But you see that on every team. There's certain guys, Sham is one of those guys on our team. When he's making shots, playing well, you know, everybody enjoys it because they see -- like in our case with Sham they see how hard he works, how young he is, how much he wants it, and when good things happen for him, it kind of lifts the entire team.

Q. As a decorated coach yourself in the postseason, I'm curious when you look at Rick Carlisle on the other side, what do you see from his coaching and how he approaches these postseason series?

DOC RIVERS: I mean, I don't know. I see Rick Carlisle. He's a good coach. But I mean, I don't know what the answer is there. I look at more the teams and what you're doing than the actual coach. I hope he's not down there looking at me.

You know, but I love him. I love him as a coach. I love him as a guy. But other than that, I see that their teammates are executing their butts off, and that's usually what Rick's teams do pretty well.

Q. Question that started with the neutral environment and the fact that because you guys don't have home court that you didn't lose home court but also there may be role players who may not play so well on the road that don't have to deal with the road the same way. How do you feel like that's affecting play?

DOC RIVERS: I have no idea. That's a good question. I've heard it bounced around a bunch. I do think it has some kind of impact. I just don't exactly know what it is. But there's definitely an effect with some players and some not. I don't think any of us are bright enough to know which ones it's affecting and which ones it's helping. But you're seeing a lot of players play well, and that's obvious. If you had your home crowd there, would they? I don't know the answer. Or when you're struggling a little bit, if your home crowd was behind you, would that help? I don't know the answers to that. I really don't.

I thought coming in it was just going to be a competition, and it still is, but there are other factors. I just don't think any of us actually know what the factors are, what the impact on our guys are.

Q. In Trez' second game back, what did you see from him and where does he still need to get a little bit more comfortable in the flow of things?

DOC RIVERS: Just everywhere. His rhythm is not great, his conditioning is not great. It's just a tough place to try to integrate a guy. I don't know who said it, but they're right. It's not that Trez has been off a month, it's he hasn't played basketball in five months when you think about it. I think we keep saying a month. Well, he never played in any of these games, so he's been off five months of real basketball.

You know, I don't know. It's a tough one for us, I can tell you that. We need him. But it's tough to throw him in in a competition. I feel for him. I just -- life gets involved sometimes, and you've just got to make the best of it.