He’s Glad He’s Gone : Pacers’ Jackson Says Players Must Share Much of the Blame for the Clippers’ Dismal Season

With a scowl and a pretzel, Mark Jackson was in no mood for kidding around. There he sat in front of his locker at the Sports Arena, hearing the latest Clipper joke.

The one about the Clippers losing their television deal with Channel 13? Yeah, they’re moving to the Comedy Channel.

Jackson must have found it quite unfunny because he had this unpleasant look on his face, gosh, like somebody forgot to put some mustard on that pregame pretzel.

“I’m not here to trash that team,” Jackson said. “That’s not my job.

“Everybody knows about management and the mistakes that they’ve made. Everybody knows how that is.”

Yeah, we know. The Clippers aren’t funny.

Winless, maybe, but also humorless. As an Indiana Pacer, Jackson is one former Clipper who isn’t laughing.

The Ex-Clipper Club has a long and glorious roster of those who signed up for any number of valid reasons.

Some were released, some were traded or retired, and some simply got out of town faster than you could say unrestricted free agent. Or the instant their contracts ran out, whichever came first.

Jackson’s membership falls under the trade category. He couldn’t wait to go, though.

“I’m very blessed to be out of here,” he said.

In April, three weeks before the end of last season, Jackson said he didn’t want to be around for more losing and that the Clippers needed to get serious.

They did. They traded him two months later.

The Clippers sent him to the Pacers last June, along with the rights to Greg Minor, in exchange for Pooh Richardson, Malik Sealy and the rights to Eric Piatkowski.

Actually, Jackson is in a three-way tie with Dominique Wilkins and Ron Harper for the honor of newest, most prominent member of the Ex-Clipper Club.

Whatever his stature, Jackson came to play against his former teammates on his former home court in his former home of two years.

Welcome home, Mark?

“This ain’t my home,” Jackson said.

Glad to see your friends, guys you used to play with?

“They ain’t my friends,” Jackson said.

And so it goes for Mark Jackson, an ex-Clipper who does not look fondly upon his two seasons at point guard, mainly because his point is that he didn’t like the majority of people on the team.

“I’ve got some friends on this basketball team,” Jackson said of the Pacers. “It’s not hard to do.

“I was playing with guys in the (1992-93) playoffs against the Houston Rockets and after Game 3, they’re shipping their cars back home and packing their furniture.

“They had no commitment to winning. It was a sad event.

“Management is certainly a big part of why things are so bad, but I don’t even look at that. We just never had 12 guys committed to winning.”

Jackson said only three players on last season’s Clipper team played to win, himself and two more he would not identify.

“Not even five players, that’s sad,” Jackson said.

Clipper management provided the players with charter flights, comfortable hotels, plenty of food and financial rewards, but Jackson said the players came up short in their end of the bargain.

For Clipper bashers, Jackson presents a new target. It wasn’t all management’s fault, it was the players’ fault too.

“You had a few guys busting their tails to win and four or five guys on the bench laughing, hoping someone would eat you alive,” Jackson said.

“They’re still doing it. It’s no secret. Hey, that’s no way to be. Guys had no respect for each other. Last year the second unit told the first unit they could beat us in a seven-game series and they could win in the Western Conference playoffs if they were a team.

“And they were saying this to Dominique Wilkins, a future Hall of Famer; Ron Harper, one of the top guards in the league; and me, and I think I’ve accomplished a few things in this league.

“The level of respect people had for one another and their job, well, you don’t win no championships when the most important thing is to play Ping-Pong in the locker room.”

Jackson’s problems with his peers were sort of lost in the Clipper shuffle last season, mainly because there already was a crowded agenda of Clipper catastrophes.

Principal among them was the Danny Manning saga. Faced with the prospect of losing him for nothing, the Clippers sent free-agent-to-be Manning to the Atlanta Hawks for Dominique Wilkins, a soon-to-be free-agent who wanted $21 million.

The Clippers offered $10 million for three years. Wilkins coughed and eventually signed with the Boston Celtics for $11 million over three years.

Harper, another free agent, wanted $20 million for five years, but the Clippers figured he’d never get it. He didn’t. He got $19.4 million for five years from the Chicago Bulls.

If you mix in the usual trauma associated with the insecurity of being a Clipper coach--which Bob Weiss felt, with good reason--it’s easy to see how Jackson’s complaints might have fallen on deaf ears. There was already too much yelling going on.

Bill Fitch, who inherited Weiss’ job, said he understands Jackson’s plight.

“If he really felt that way about the guys he was playing with, it’s probably good for him that he’s gone,” Fitch said.

“For us, we’re happy with what we have. It would have been a factor of his numbers, his age, things like that.”

Jackson’s numbers were down slightly from the previous two seasons. His scoring average dipped from 14.4 to 10.0 and his shooting percentage fell, but his assist average of 8.6 was eighth in the NBA.

As for age, Jackson and Richardson are both 28. They were born on the same day in 1966.

Larry Brown, who coached Jackson with the Clippers in 1992-93 and now has him in Indiana, said Jackson and others have painted an unflattering picture of last season in Clipperland.

“Guys were more interested with what was going to happen to them than with the team,” he said. “I heard that all last year.

“When your best player comes in and gives you a list of 10 demands like new uniforms, a new arena, new music, then you’re in trouble.”

Brown was referring to Manning, who had an extensive want-list when he was negotiating a contract extension in the summer of 1993, one that was never worked out.

Since owner Donald Sterling had enough problems, General Manager Elgin Baylor wasn’t with the team every day and Weiss was too busy trying to stay on the job, who should have taken care of the player problems, assuming Jackson was right?

“I’ve always said you have to have basketball people making basketball decisions,” Brown said.

In any event, one former Clipper basketball person is making basketball decisions in an Indiana Pacer uniform. Jackson has no friends, only business acquaintances, among the Clippers and may have sent the Clipper Blame Squad off running in a new direction. The locker room.

After the game, won by Indiana, Jackson put the Pacers and Clippers in their places.

“Good teams finish off teams like that,” Jackson said.

He wants you to know which one he plays for now.