Los Angeles Clippers: J.J. Redick Makes Preseason Debut

Los Angeles Clippers guard J.J. Redick made his preseason debut Wednesday night against the Utah Jazz. Redick scored 14 points on 4-of-12 from the field and 3-of-7 from long range in the Clippers’ 103-99 win. Redick returned to practice earlier this week after missing some time with a left quad injury. After many successful days in practice, coach Doc Rivers felt Redick was ready to return to game action. Redick suffered the quad injury on the first day of training camp and with continued pain, he decided to sit out and begin rehab as an MRI revealed he had a partial tear in his quadricep. Redick was involved in a three-team sign-and-trade that brought him to the Clippers this offseason.

This progress should be very encouraging for the Clippers, who will rely on Redick (and Jared Dudley), for a majority of the outside scoring. With Redick healthy, the Clippers become that much more intimidating on all facets of the game. Redick could potentially be one of the best shooters in the league this season, but he can’t do that in a suit and tie on the bench. Last season the Clippers shot 35 percent from 3-point land, ranking No. 16 in the league. Redick’s ability to consistently knock down jumpers should help this percentage as he shot close to 38 percent by himself and took more than 50 more 3-pointers than Jamal Crawford, who led the Clippers in 3-point attempts last season with 396. With Redick ready to go for the season opener, the Clippers become that much more of a threat to any team they face as they will have the very difficult task of slowing down Chris Paul, preventing the best pick-and-roll tandem in the league in Paul and Blake Griffin and challenge the many 3-point shooters they possess, best of all Redick. A healthy Redick means good things for the Clippers.

The Clippers should expect something like this from Redick this season …

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