As most of you are aware at this point, Chris Sheridan reported yesterday that Dwight Howard has added the Clippers to the list of teams he would be willing to play for. While this is significant in that it represents another major milestone in the reimagination of the Clippers as an elite NBA franchise, it doesn't mean that Howard is going to be wearing red, white and blue any time soon.

First, let's look at what was said in Sheridan's story. The answer is, not a lot. According to a source, Howard has "been watching them a lot. He's intrigued by the Clippers." As such, the Clippers have joined the Lakers, Mavericks and Nets on Howard's list of preferred destinations.

So that's great, right? Next season we'll be cheering for Chris Paul, Blake Griffin AND Dwight Howard! That trio would be better than any other big three in the league by a wide margin. Start ordering the banners!

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This thread is fast becoming a tradition around here.

The story being pushed by Marc Stein and Chris Broussard at ESPN now is that the Lakers are back in the discussion. I fail to see how the Lakers could possibly make an offer of interest at this point; they offered Pau and Odom before, but Odom is now gone, and they're not going to include Bynum or Kobe. And there is literally nothing else on their roster of interest. They do have two first round picks next year (their own and Dallas' in the Odom trade) but very late first round picks (as the Lakers pick and the Dallas pick are likely to be) have little to know value - teams sell their late first rounders for a couple million dollars all the time. That's just not going to fix the Hornets. I'm baffled by this subplot, as I have been by several subplots throughout this saga. As John Hollinger suggests, this may just be an attempt to bluff the Clippers into thinking the Lakers are making an offer of interest. Unfortunately for the league, it turns out the Clippers front office is not stupid. They can look at the Lakers roster as easily as I can and see that there's no way they can come up with a competitive offer. I have to say: I have really despised Stein/Broussard's coverage of this whole thing. They've pushed what seem to be bogus details throughout the ordeal.

Broderick Turner of the LA Times agrees with them on at least one point: the two sides are talking tonight. I'm not sure what there is to talk about. The league should be pretty well aware of what's acceptable to the Clippers at this point, right?

Obviously, this story is not going to go away easily. Stein and Broussard of ESPN have an updated take on it this morning. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on it, but thought I'd get it on the front page for everyone to discuss.

Stein/Broussard are back to insisting that both Gordon and the Minnesota pick were in the deal Sunday night/Monday morning. Frankly, I just don't think that passes the sniff test. Let's assume the Clippers did offer that. Why would the Hornets not take it? Why in the world would they hold it up over the likes of Eric Bledsoe?

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Well, all I can say is I'm in new territory on this blog. Never has a story moved this quickly. I don't have time to put anything on the front page, because by the time I finish typing, the story has changed! I'm torn as to whether to post on the front page, or toss up FanShots, or just comment. It's nuts.

But apparently the Paul story has now changed again. The NBA was asking for too much - we may never know exactly what it was, but we know that it was too much - and the Clippers have apparently said no, as indeed they should. So as of now, the trade of Chris Paul to the Clippers is dead.

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Note: Between the time I started this and when I finished it, I noticed that citizen LJ Hann (whose been doing a great job tonight getting important info posted on this story) had posted an open thread for discussing the trade. I'm stepping all over that post, and suggesting that we move the conversation here.

When the NBA lockout was settled and the league announced that free agency would open on December 9th, a mere 16 days prior to a Christmas opening day, we knew it was going to be crazy. And maybe we should have known it was going to be this crazy. But it's hard to imagine this kind of insanity until you're in the middle of it.

I won't bother with the backstory of the potential trade of Chris Paul to the Los Angeles Clippers. If you need to know it, click on the link, but seriously, if that's the case, what are you doing on my blog?

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It's a crazy new world we live in. It's midnight in LA. It's after 3 AM on the East Coast, where people like David Stern live. You know, the people who actually have some inkling of what actually happened earlier tonight when the NBA disallowed the New Orleans Hornets trade of Chris Paul to the Los Angeles Lakers. Yet here we are, glued to our computer monitors, arguing with each other over what it all means. We're not even sure what happened, and we want to know what it means!

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Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue.

[Note by Steve Perrin, 12/08/11 10:00 PM PST ] Thursday is my basketball night and I dashed off this post and rushed out the door to my game. When I got back, I saw that there were zero comments and was stunned. Then I saw that it was closed for comments - I have no idea how that happened, but it's open now. [End note]

During a week when it looked like Chris Paul might very well end up being a Clipper or possibly a Warrior, he was traded to the Lakers today - until that trade was put on hold because of the objections of the other NBA owners.

I'm going to say up front that I haven't been around the computer much today, and that all of you probably know more about the details here than I do. Nonetheless, I feel like I need to try to put some context around the day's events. But bear in mind that this thing is far from over.

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NBA basketball has just suffered through a five month lockout. Twenty percent of the games will not be played, and the season will be fully eight weeks late when it finally tips off. That is assuming of course that the new collective bargaining agreement actually gets written and ratified by both parties by next week.

Among the highest priorities for the owners were competitive balance in the league, and helping small market teams succeed financially and competitively. Oh yeah, and money was something of a priority as well. And here we are, in the first week after the announcement of the deal, and all anyone is talking about is how Chris Paul will force his way out of New Orleans and Dwight Howard will force his way out of Orlando. Oh, and so far they're not demanding to go to smaller markets.

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