Vinny Del Negro Publicly Criticizes Baron Davis.

Following Monday’s game against the Spurs, Vinny Del Negro came out and said publicly everything that fans and writers have been saying about Baron Davis since he signed with the Clippers.  From the Orange County Register:

LOS ANGELES – Four games into the season, Baron Davis was not on the court for the Clippers — and not on the same page with Coach Vinny Del Negro, either.

The Clippers’ point guard was scratched from Monday’s 97-88 loss to San Antonio because of a flare-up of the left-knee problems that bothered him in training camp.

Del Negro attributed those problems to Davis’ lack of offseason conditioning work. Davis did not.

“Baron has incredible amounts of talent and ability,” Del Negro said, “but his focus needs to be on staying in condition and playing at a high level. And he hasn’t done that for a while, and I know he’s frustrated with that, but there’s things he has to do to correct that.”

Del Negro said Davis had “gotten out of shape pretty badly” over the summer, and while giving him credit for two months of hard work to get into condition, “that should have been a process right after the season ended.

“It shouldn’t have happened just two months ago. We all know that. And that’s what we’re dealing with.”

Davis, though, did not see the knee — which he said was swollen and did not respond to treatment prior to the game — as a symptom of a conditioning issue.

“If you have four surgeries — a torn ACL, a couple of meniscus tears — that’s just how it goes,” he said.

Davis said he’d prepared for this season as he had the previous six years, gearing up in August, but his old program didn’t work.

“My body wasn’t responding as quickly as it usually does,” he said. “This summer was a dose of reality, as far as maybe you need to start a little bit ahead of time, or just train differently.”

The 31-year-old Davis — with two years remaining on a five-year, $65 million contract — said his usual routine, once he begins working out, is to go to the gym three times a day.

“Sometimes I just get so excited about the season and the game that I sometimes can over-train,” he said. “That may be it. That may be not. Who knows?”

Link to the article.

I have been very critical of the Vinny Del Negro’s coaching thus far, but you will not catch me criticizing him for these comments.  Normally I’m for keeping this type of stuff private, but neither Baron’s conditioning nor his play have been nearly good enough since the day he joined the Clipps.  It was time for someone to do something, and I commend Vinny for trying.  I doubt anything changes, but that’s not Vinny’s fault.

I love how Baron somehow managed to squeeze over-training into his laundry list of excuses as to why he’s out of shape this time.  That was very creative.