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Philadelphia 76ers star Paul George made his return to Los Angeles on Wednesday night to face the Clippers, who he played for from 2019-2024.
But despite a tribute video from the team, George received a less-than-welcoming greeting from Los Angeles fans.
Clippers fans booed the nine-time NBA All-Star throughout the contest, and George wasn’t very happy about it.
Paul George on if the boos from Clippers fans bothered him:
“I mean it’s stupid. I was a free agent. It wasn’t something that I demanded a trade or went against the team. They presented a team friendly offer and I did what was best for me. There were cheers, those are the ones I… pic.twitter.com/9cl7shVpdz
— Tomer Azarly (@TomerAzarly) November 7, 2024
“I mean it’s stupid. I was a free agent,” George said of the booing. “It wasn’t something that I demanded a trade or went against the team. They presented a team-friendly offer and I did what was best for me. There were cheers, those are the ones I played for. There were boos, I didn’t get it.”
George makes a good point. Los Angeles held his Bird rights. The team could have offered him the exact four-year, $211 million contract that Philadelphia signed him to. But the Clippers opted not to do that, and so George left and took the money elsewhere.
At that point, it’s on the team.
And it’s not like Los Angeles had immense success with George to the point that it made sense for him to take less. Even if he’d returned to the Clippers, they likely wouldn’t have been one of the top two or three favorites in the Western Conference.
But Clippers fans did get some measure of “revenge” on their former star. Los Angeles won 110-98, dropping the Sixers to a lowly 1-6 record to start the year.
George made just his second appears of the year after returning from a preseason knee injury that cost him the first six games of the season. He scored 18 points of 7-of-9 shooting to lead all players for the Sixers alongside Kelly Oubre.