In the fourth quarter of the Clippers game, Exum and Austin Rivers played the whole way through. At about 2 minutes in, Exum shuts Rivers down on a couple of consecutive possessions, then gets a little heady and starts to drive on Rivers, possibly to show him up. Everytime he gets the ball, he plays with Rivers, drawing him out so he can blow by him. At the same time, Rivers almost quits trying to do anything on his drive on the offensive end when defended by Exum. At one point Exum takes the ball high above the three point line on the left and starts fancy dribbling, seemingly calling Rivers out. Rivers goes out, Exum turns him around and goes toward the basket I believe bounce passing the assist to a cutter. It was nasty.
Seriously, it is the first time I saw any sort of chip on Exum's shoulder, and it was a beautiful thing to behold. Obviously, Exum needs to set his sites higher than Austin Rivers, but the fact that he realized that a fellow NBA player was no match for him and he could impose his will was like watching one of my children take his first baby steps. In order to succeed like we want him to succeed, he is going to need a bit of nasty. Tonight was the first time I actually saw him bring it. It was also nice to see Snyder recognize what was going on and continue to let Dante do his thing.
More please. . .
