Blake Griffin: A Perspective

There are worse things than being a Clipper fan tonight.  For many, that's hard to imagine, yet it remains true nevertheless.

The news came swift and sudden. My cell phone chirped.

MYLAC: Breaking News --- Griffin to undergo season-ending surgery. For more info visit Clippers.com.

It was 4:29pm in New York; 1:29pm in the home of Clipper Nation.

According to Clippers.com , in a press release 89 minutes earlier, "Griffin was examined Tuesday afternoon by Dr. Neal ElAttrache in Los Angeles. As a result of that examination, it has been determined that the healing in his left patella area has not improved to the expected required level. Griffin will undergo a surgical procedure in the near future, with a recovery prognosis of four to six months."

My immediate reaction was to forward the bulletin to an L.A. friend of mine with the addition, "Can you say 'Greg Oden'?" There are worse things than the thoughts of a crippled career such as the one Oden possesses in Portland.

Griffin injured his kneecap in the last preseason game against, ironically, tonight's opponent—the New Orleans Hornets—on October 23 last year.

There are worse things than being a Clipper fan tonight.

Let's go back to February 26, 2007. In a game against the Charlotte Hornets, Shaun Livingston dislocated his kneecap following a missed layup. According to Wikipedia , he "injured almost every part of his knee, tearing the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), the posterior cruciate ligament (PCL), and the lateral meniscus, badly spraining his medial collateral ligament (MCL), and dislocating his patella and his tibia-femoral joint." He hasn't been the same player since and another bright career was snuffed out in a Clipper uniform.

There are worse things than being a Clipper fan tonight, worse than being even Blake Griffin himself. Presumably Griffin had a smart agent and/or business manager who made sure that his client would be paid no matter what. So while he sits on the sidelines, I assume that he doesn't have to worry about money, just perhaps about a career doing what he loves.

There are worse things than being a Clipper fan tonight, worse than being an organization that rolled the dice, thought it came up sevens only to learn it came up snake-eyes. You have to wonder what Donald Sterling thinks he has to do to get just a little bit of...not luck...just normalcy. When things like this happen, you have to wonder if the franchise really is cursed. Yet Donald Sterling is a smart businessman and I have to think that the Griffin contract and the player Griffin were both insured.

I know it's hard to imagine, but yes, there are worse things.

There are worse things than being a Clippers fan tonight.

However, it shouldn't be.

You could be buried under rubble with the cries of many people around you in a far off land known as Haiti.

There are worse things; it just takes a little perspective.