Clippers’ Griffin, Jordan and Paul are excited about new ownership

Chris Paul, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan unanimously expressed relief that the Donald Sterling controversy is over and the Clippers are now owned by Steve Ballmer.

“Well, I mean the first time I met him, he bought me dinner, so after that I really liked him a lot,” Jordan said of Ballmer. “No, I’m kidding around. Steve is a great guy. He’s really hard-core, he’s really spirited. You can tell he really cares about the game, and he cares about us as players, and he only wants to make this organization move forward, and take those steps to be a championship organization, and I think he’s doing the right things.”

After Ballmer bought the team, he extended Clippers Coach Doc Rivers’ contract, a move that the players said helps create a sense of continuity.

“I think it’s stability moving forward,” Griffin said. “To be honest, I don’t know a lot about people’s individual deals, and how long they’re locked in for, but I think it just shows that he’s committed to making the right moves to try to win a championship, and it all starts with Doc, and it starts with having somebody who has had that type of experience. It was a very smart move on his part.”

The Clippers were thrust into the spotlight during the playoffs last season after a recording of Donald Sterling making remarks about blacks was released to the public. Although it was a big distraction, the players emphasized that the ordeal had nothing to do with why they were eliminated from the Western Conference semifinals by the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 6.

“We feel like when we lost, we made mistakes ourselves,” Griffin said. “We felt like it was the small things and that’s something that Doc talked to us about all during the year. It’s the small things that end up being the big things that make you lose. We can’t sit and draw on what happened last year during the playoffs, we’ve got to be all about this year, this year. This year we’re going to really harp on those small things and really stay on each other about the mental side, talking care of the little things and letting everything else take care of itself.”

Twitter: @melissarohlin