Paul George-Clippers rift started with ‘disrespectful’ contract offer

Paul George wanted the Clippers to put some respect on his name — and in their contract extension to him.

During his “Podcast P with Paul George” show released Monday, the newly minted member of the 76ers opened up about what had happened between himself and the Clippers during the negotiation process for an extension before signing with the 76ers over the weekend.

George called the Clippers’ first offer that came in October of last year — $60 million over two years — “kind of disrespectful.”

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“I’m like nah, I’m not signing that,” George explained, after saying that there were no hard feelings toward the Clippers.

He went on to explain that the offers kept inching up and eventually reached the $40-45 million range per year, which George still felt was too low.

That’s when he started to hear about the three-year, $153 million extension Kawhi Leonard was given by the Clippers, and George felt that he would just take the same deal since he said that the team “view us the same.”

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“We came here together. We wanna finish this s–t together. I’ll take what Kawhi got, no problem,” George said. “I was cool with that and we were still taking less. … I was like if [Leonard] was going to take less, I’m not going to say I want more than [Leonard].”

George said that the conversation had occurred before the NBA All-Star break, and he decided to table it to keep the talks from impacting his mood in the locker room.

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The Clippers returned to George at the end of the season to continue talks, and they brought him a three-year, $150 offer, which George said he was willing to take but wanted a no-trade clause.

When Los Angeles balked at that, George said, he moved to asking for the full max offer of four years, $212 million.

When that was turned down, that opened the door for him to listen to other teams.

“Through the negotiations, they weren’t budging,” George said. “They weren’t budging. I wasn’t going to budge. I thought I played well enough for them to be like ‘he’s a part of our future.’ I thought I did that, I thought I earned that. … At that point, it didn’t even feel right to come back with that type of energy and be comfortable playing back in LA.”

George eventually signed a four-year, $212 million max deal with the 76ers after putting up 22.6 points per game and shooting 47.1 percent from the field for the Clippers in 2023-24.

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