Austin Rivers Rumors
All NBA Players
Position: G
Born: 08/01/92
Height: 6-4 / 1.93
Weight:199 lbs. / 90.7 kg.
Salary: $12,650,000
Born: 08/01/92
Height: 6-4 / 1.93
Weight:199 lbs. / 90.7 kg.
Salary: $12,650,000
A man whose confidence has been abundant since adolescence, whose words usually match whatever swagger he shows on the court, whose middle initial of “J” has always seemed perfectly appropriate, will no longer shoot a basketball. And he won’t say why. “That’s a great question. I can’t answer that for you,” Rivers said when asked about his dwindling shot attempts. “If I say something, I’m gonna get in trouble. [I’ll] figure it out. I’m gonna have to figure it out.”
“With John and Brad, they’re so good, and they demand so much attention. They can play-make,” Brooks said. “When we have Austin out there, we gotta figure out ways that we can give him more opportunities. And like I said, that’s on me. I gotta do a better job.”
The Magic used that same ball to spur a 52-23 run, jump to an eventual 25-point lead and close out a 117-108 victory. The Wizards cut the deficit to one point in the fourth quarter, but once again, dropped oft-used buzz terms after the game. Pride. Passion. Effort. They didn’t have it, they said, after falling to 2-9. “I’m not taking no more moral victories, bro. We’re 2-9,” Austin Rivers said. “There’s no more, ‘We played well the second half.’ We just lost to the Magic. We’re 2-9.”
Justin Barrasso: Over the summer, the Clippers traded your son, Austin Rivers, to the Washington Wizards. Was it difficult to coach your son in the NBA? Doc Rivers: Coaching against him is strange, I’ll say that. Austin is an extremely competitive kid, which probably gets him in trouble sometimes. I remember when I first coached against him, he begrudgingly came over to me before the game for a hug, then he wanted to beat my butt. I never envisioned coaching my son in the NBA, but it taught me a lot. He told me once, ‘You’re always harder on me.’ And I thought that was probably true. But I asked him for something good I do for him, and he said, ‘I know, whenever you’re hard on me, that you’ve got my back. There is no way you’ll try to screw me.’ Players believe that sometimes, even though it’s not true. So that made me realize, in order to be really good at what I do, I need to get to the point where every player knows I have their back. Then they’ll play free and be willing to sacrifice.
Rivers spoke out after a third straight loss dropped the Wizards to 1-5, just two days after team leaders Bradley Beal and John Wall publicly called for greater effort and responsibility. “The road ain’t going to get easier,” Rivers said. “Nobody’s going to feel bad for us. People are laughing at us. We have to play with (urgency), otherwise, like anything, (expletive) can get ugly.”
Candace Buckner: Corrected tweet #Clippers Doc Rivers on facing his son, Austin, after coaching him for the past 4 years in LA: “From a purely parenting father-son relationship, we’ve never been closer … but now, you really want to beat him.”
