John Wall believes he can be the LA Clippers missing piece

The LA Clippers might not seem like a favorite to win the 2022-23 NBA Championship, considering the franchise is coming off a 42-40 record the year prior and hasn’t won at least 50 games since Chris Paul was on the roster. But looking ahead, a string of poor injury luck over the years appears to be going away as the Clips are now lurking as a potential 55-win team this coming season.

Vegas is already all-in on the Clippers’ NBA Finals hopes. Could John Wall be the one who takes LA over the top?

Wall recently signed a two-year, $13.2 million deal with the Clippers after the Houston Rockets bought out the final year of his contract, which netted the former Kentucky Wildcat $47.4 million. Now 31 years old, Wall has played sparingly over the last five seasons, even sitting out the entire of the ’19-20 and ’21-22 seasons for different reasons. Terribly timed injuries have prevented him from looking like his old All-Star self, but he also sat out all of last season despite being cleared to play.

No one is exactly sure which version of Wall will return to the hardwood once he finally does. The last time we saw him play was with the Rockets for 40 games in ’20-21, where he looked spry in the open floor but lacked his typical explosion while his shooting percentages slumped. It’s clear he’s beyond his prime at this point, however, there is still a 15-point per-game scorer inside of him somewhere.

Playing alongside the likes of All-Stars Kawhi Leonard and Paul George should help Wall slide into a comfortable role.

“I don’t have to do it every night, I don’t have to be Batman every night for us to win,” Wall said on Saturday at the Las Vegas Summer League, according to ESPN. “That’s the ultimate goal for me is [at] this part of my career, I don’t want to have to be the Batman every night to try to win. On our team that we have, I think anyone can be Batman.”

ESPN story: John Wall says he doesn’t have to be “Batman every night for us to win…I don't have to be the John Wall from 2016 and have to carry the load and have the pressure on me” alongside Kawhi + PG. He believes he can help fill missing piece for LAC https://t.co/Jd7ni13QF3 pic.twitter.com/y1lRPNEPgF

— Ohm Youngmisuk (@NotoriousOHM) July 10, 2022

At this stage of his career, it would unreasonable to expect Wall to perform at “Batman” levels on a game-by-game basis. With the Clippers, that should rarely be the case, although the upcoming season will depend on just how healthy Leonard and George actually are. Leonard, now 31, sat out all of last season with an ACL injury but is fully expected to enter the season at 100 percent strength. George played just 31 games in ’21-22 with an elbow injury, but like Leonard, he’s also expected to be healthy come the fall.

Defending two All-Star caliber players is going to be an issue for any opposing defense. The idea in LA is that Wall can help ease the load even more alongside Reggie Jackson, another ball-dominant guard who performed well as the Clippers’ go-to scorer in the wake of injuries last season.

“It is going to be harder for them to defend,” Wall told ESPN. “For me, I’m happy because I don’t have to have the best player guarding me every night like I have had my whole career. You tell me the third-best defender is going to have to guard me? Good luck.”

If Wall can tap into a similar version of himself pre-injury, then there is no reason to believe he can’t make a significant impact for the Clippers. The injuries and everything else he went through off the hardwood are behind him now. Now, it’s time to hoop.

“My last three years, I was in the darkest place I have ever been,” Wall added. “I don’t think a lot of people could have gotten through what I went through — losing my mom, losing my grandma, tearing my Achilles’, going through all that adversity and just trying to find myself and then getting some of that love more than anything taken away from me.”