The Clippers quickly trumpeted the deal in a tweet. Then Doc, along with owner Steve Ballmer and players Chris Paul, Blake Griffin, J.J.
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The meeting itself on Thursday didn’t last long, since Jordan was already leaning on a return to Los Angeles, according to reports. The forward agreed to a five year max deal instead of the four he had with the Mavs. We’ll have to wait and see if Jordan will make one of the craziest move in free-agency history, but the next few hours will surely be a whirlwind.
But sources told ESPN.com that the change of mind has convinced the Clippers that they need to stay close to him until he can sign a deal.
Jordan was scheduled to take a trip to the Caribbean later today.
DeAndre Jordan has revoked his deal with the Dallas Mavericks and rejoined the Los Angeles Clippers, league sources say. And Griffin sent out a tweet on Wednesday night with a picture of a chair underneath the handle of a door.
Cuban was so confident that he had landed Jordan that he went on a Dallas radio show this week and spoke about the role Jordan would have in the Mavericks’ offense. “The moratorium period exists for both players and teams to thoughtfully weigh and consider options before signing any contracts”, the statement said.
And this from Chris Paul, referencing his well-publicized banana boat ride with LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Gabrielle Union earlier in the week. Rivers reached out to various players to help him fly to Houston to convince Jordan to return to the Clippers.
With their current roster, the only players who could step up in the place of Jordan are Glenn Davis and Ekpe Udoh, who have proven to be reliable.
“I thought I had a good pump fake”, Mavericks forward Chandler Parsons wrote on Twitter, another thinly veiled reference to Jordan changing his mind and spurning the Mavericks.
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A Clippers contingent of players and executives meant to stay at the Houston home of Jordan until he signed with the team at midnight Eastern time Thursday, one National Basketball Association executive said. “There’s nothing you can do about it”, Cuban said Thursday when asked about the ordeal at a Presidential Leadership Scholars graduation ceremony at SMU. At the very least, Jordan owed Cuban an explanation for why he had a change of heart. The NBA’s moratorium period at the start of July every year is designed to allow the league to calculate the precise new salary-cap and luxury-tax figures for the coming season.
