Shaun Livingston's legacy of success (three titles with the Golden State Warriors) overwrote his potential legacy of tragedy (suffering a gruesome knee injury early in his career). It's a triumphant story of adversity overcome, but it's also a bit too simple. To really appreciate Livingston's career, it helps to examine who he was before the injury and how long and windy a road he took to the mountaintop. We need to remember Shaun the Clipper, Shaun the Net, and everything in between. We need to peer inside the Prism.
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00:00 Sean Livingston is a Golden State Warrior for life.
00:04 A champion several times over.
00:07 Forever.
00:08 Livingston became a warrior in 2014
00:12 and quickly established himself as a key cog
00:15 in the Golden State dynasty.
00:17 A reliable bench presence on a team
00:19 that made five consecutive NBA finals,
00:21 winning three of them before Livingston retired in 2019.
00:26 Livingston's calm demeanor and hyper-intelligent passing
00:30 kept flow alive in the second unit.
00:32 His proclivity for mid-range jumpers
00:36 presented a deadly change up
00:38 from Golden State's three-point barrage.
00:40 The dude had some big moments on some very big stages.
00:44 The Warriors wouldn't have been the Warriors
00:48 without Sean Livingston.
00:50 That five-year stretch of glory
00:53 makes the final chapter of Livingston's playing career
00:56 nearly unprecedented.
00:58 He's only added to that glory
01:00 as a member of the Warriors' front office.
01:04 And if you know anything about Sean Livingston,
01:07 you recognize the beauty in this outcome.
01:10 Livingston's legacy could have been pure tragedy.
01:15 As a young rising star with the Los Angeles Clippers,
01:19 he suffered one of the most devastating knee injuries
01:22 in sports history.
01:24 In 2007, Livingston wasn't sure
01:27 he'd be able to walk normally again,
01:30 let alone play winning basketball.
01:32 To really appreciate Livingston's story,
01:36 it helps to understand who he was before the injury
01:39 and who he had to become
01:41 before a rising dynasty would claim him.
01:44 Let's meet these versions of Sean Livingston in the prison.
01:47 Start here.
01:52 Sean Livingston entered the 2004 NBA draft
01:56 straight out of high school.
01:58 So did a lot of people, but Livingston stood out.
02:02 Livingston's choice to bail on his commitment to Duke
02:05 and enter the draft presented some novelty.
02:08 With notable exceptions,
02:11 prep-to-pro prospects tended to be
02:13 dominant power forwards and centers.
02:16 You can't teach height, they say.
02:18 To the extent that non-enormous high schoolers
02:22 made the leap to the NBA,
02:23 they tended to be pure scorers.
02:26 Livingston fit neither of those categories.
02:30 He was only a couple inches shorter than Dwight Howard,
02:33 but so much lankier, and he played a vastly different game.
02:36 Definitely not a big man.
02:38 And Livingston could score,
02:41 but he definitely wasn't a pure shooting guard
02:44 like J.R. Smith.
02:46 When the Clippers picked him fourth in that 2004 draft,
02:49 many called the 6'7" Livingston
02:52 the first ever point guard
02:54 to go straight from high school to the draft lottery.
02:57 First or not, Livingston had court vision.
03:00 This is Livingston as a seventh grader in Peoria, Illinois,
03:05 one of the biggest players on the floor,
03:07 but clearly the point guard.
03:09 You don't see a lot of tall 12 and 13-year-olds
03:11 making this no-look pocket pass to a cutter
03:14 or throwing this bullet of an entry pass for an assist.
03:19 Livingston won two Illinois state titles in junior high
03:23 and then kept filling the trophy case in high school.
03:26 Livingston grew to 6'7", but kept running point.
03:30 He read the floor, managed the game,
03:32 and kept everyone involved.
03:34 That ability to create for others
03:37 is the other thing you supposedly can't teach.
03:41 Livingston possessed the kind of timing, dexterity,
03:45 and spidey sense they say you're either born with
03:48 or without.
03:49 Upon drafting Livingston in '04,
03:52 Clippers GM and NBA great Elgin Baylor
03:55 made the obvious but lofty comparison
03:58 to the greatest tall pure point guard ever.
04:01 And if the opinion of an LA Lakers legend wasn't enough,
04:06 here was Clippers head coach Mike Dunleavy,
04:09 who once coached Magic Johnson, seconding the comparison.
04:12 Shawn Livingston was supposed to be
04:16 the LA Clippers point guard of the future, their Magic.
04:20 Put aside being the next Magic,
04:25 just being the future of the LA Clippers
04:28 was a heavy label to wear in 2004.
04:31 Before Blake Griffin and Lob City and the Super Team era,
04:36 the Clippers were longstanding losers,
04:39 the Lakers' stinky little sibling.
04:42 And the players they'd acquired over the years
04:44 in hopes of turning things around
04:46 kept falling apart.
04:48 Looking back, Livingston is one of many
04:51 who suggests the Clippers were cursed
04:53 by franchise owner Donald Sterling
04:55 being such a piece of shit.
04:57 No argument here, and Livingston is obviously referring,
05:01 in his own case, to the horrible injury
05:03 that ended his Clippers tenure
05:05 three years after they drafted him.
05:08 But here's the thing.
05:09 Before the big one, Livingston overcame
05:13 prior, smaller flare-ups of the supposed Clipper curse.
05:17 11 games into his Clipper career,
05:20 the rookie Livingston had already registered
05:22 some exciting performances off the bench.
05:25 Then, he dislocated his right kneecap in practice.
05:29 After sitting three months to heal his knee,
05:33 Livingston finally returned in February '05
05:36 and tore cartilage in his shoulder.
05:40 It was enough for media observers to at least wonder
05:43 if the Clippers regretted another cursed draft choice.
05:47 Sean missed another month of his rookie year.
05:49 Only after all that rehab
05:52 did Livingston string some games together.
05:55 He got to start at point guard
05:56 and posted some tantalizing masterpieces in April 2005.
06:01 Here he was approaching quadruple-double territory
06:05 against the Bobcats and hitting the buzzer-beating shot
06:08 to win the game.
06:09 So Livingston entered his sophomore year with some momentum
06:13 only to suffer another injury, this time his back.
06:17 It cost him the first 21 games of that season.
06:20 By this point, LA had seen enough to enlist insurance.
06:25 Veteran point guard Sam Cassell.
06:27 Cassell helped his new team get off to an unusually hot start
06:32 in Livingston's absence.
06:33 The Clippers looked different, hopeful.
06:38 The only sign of what J.A. Adande called
06:40 the Clippers' customary black cloud was, oh man.
06:44 By the time Livingston finally debuted that season,
06:49 he had no prayer of reclaiming the starting point guard spot
06:52 on a team leading the Pacific Division.
06:54 Livingston became Cassell's apprentice.
06:58 He watched firsthand how a 36-year-old
07:01 whose body wasn't what it used to be
07:03 could still control the game.
07:04 On the floor, Livingston played some minutes
07:08 as Cassell's backup at point,
07:10 and some as Cassell's running mate, off the ball,
07:13 a secondary creator, a finisher, a versatile defender.
07:18 That marked a meaningful shift for a kid
07:20 who had been billed as the next Magic.
07:23 And yes, this is all foreshadowing,
07:27 but first let's bask in the spring of 2006, wonderful times.
07:32 After missing those first 21 games,
07:35 Livingston played the final 61 without interruption.
07:39 Sean was a great understudy, and when Cassell sat out,
07:45 he hopped right into the driver's seat.
07:47 Livingston outplayed Steve Nash
07:49 to beat the excellent Phoenix Suns on the road in April.
07:52 The '06 Clippers won 47 games and a playoff series.
07:58 The franchise hadn't done those things since the mid '70s,
08:02 when they were the Buffalo Braves.
08:04 Livingston factored heavily into the playoff success.
08:08 His minutes increased steadily
08:10 through the first three games of LA's first round series
08:12 against Carmelo Anthony and the Denver Nuggets.
08:15 In a pivotal game four victory,
08:18 Livingston played so splendidly off the bench
08:21 that Cassell declined to return to the game,
08:24 preferring to just let Sean keep cooking.
08:26 16-6-6 is a well-cooked line indeed,
08:31 enough to draw a comment from Clippers star Elton Brand.
08:34 In game five, Cassell again watched his understudy
08:38 use the lion's share of minutes.
08:41 Livingston set a new Clippers playoff assist record
08:44 with 14 dimes, piloting LA's first closeout victory
08:48 since 1976.
08:49 They fell in the next round, but things were looking up,
08:54 for the franchise and for Sean.
08:57 After previously appearing doomed by the Clippers' curse,
09:00 Livingston was back on the path to stardom.
09:03 We know how that turned out.
09:05 In '06-'07, Livingston played 54 more games.
09:09 He set a new career high for assists on February 24th, 2007.
09:13 On February 26th, Livingston planted his foot wrong
09:17 and tore just about everything in his left knee.
09:20 I recommend never watching video of that injury.
09:26 Adande called it the most heartbreaking scene
09:28 since Bambi's mother got shot.
09:30 The Clippers' curse, it seemed, finally got Sean.
09:35 His description of the injury, the trip to the hospital,
09:38 and the months upon months of rehab is harrowing, genuinely.
09:43 Livingston missed the rest of the '07 season
09:47 and all of the '08 season, healing and rehabbing.
09:50 LA let Sean's rookie contract expire
09:54 and didn't give him a new one.
09:56 So Livingston's Clippers stint will always be remembered
10:00 for its horrible conclusion.
10:02 But don't forget this moment.
10:04 Sean overcame obstacles, adjusted his game,
10:08 and made history.
10:09 He was just starting to validate
10:12 some of that next magic stuff before the bottom fell out.
10:15 So that's the part before.
10:20 What about after?
10:22 How do you get from relearning how to walk
10:25 to winning a fistful of championship rings?
10:28 Again, it's not a straight upward line
10:31 from LA to Golden State.
10:33 In between, Livingston played for seven teams in six years.
10:38 Miami gave Livingston his first chance to re-find his legs.
10:43 The opportunity ended quickly.
10:44 Livingston did a stint in the development league,
10:49 then joined the OKC Thunder for the rest of the '09 season.
10:53 If anything can make you realize
10:55 you need to adjust your game,
10:57 it's running with those youngsters.
10:59 Russell Westbrook calling you old school when you're 24.
11:03 The OKC gig ended pretty quickly too.
11:06 For a period of months, well into the 2010 season,
11:12 Sean had to consider that his career might be over.
11:16 Then a couple Washington Wizards
11:18 decided to bring guns into the locker room.
11:21 That bizarre scandal meant Washington
11:23 suddenly needed mid-season backcourt help.
11:26 A Wizards assistant by the name of, hey, Sam Cassell,
11:30 suggested they give Sean a call.
11:32 10-day deals turned into a rest of the season contract.
11:37 Coach Flip Saunders made Livingston his point guard,
11:40 and Sean used those final few weeks
11:42 of an otherwise dreadful Wizards season
11:44 to hone a new version of his heady pass-first game.
11:49 Livingston still gives the late Saunders
11:52 a ton of credit for helping him
11:54 and the rest of the league realize
11:56 the potential he still had.
11:58 In 2010 free agency, Livingston got a guaranteed contract
12:03 from the Charlotte Bobcats.
12:05 That marked a real comeback.
12:08 But a bit of financial security didn't mean a steady roll.
12:12 Livingston found himself passed from one bad team to another.
12:18 Traded, waived, signed, traded again for years.
12:23 Observers seem to accept that transience
12:27 as Sean's NBA fate, although not with derision.
12:31 Hey, the fact that he's had a career at all is remarkable.
12:34 Maybe he just wasn't good enough
12:38 post-injury to stick somewhere.
12:40 Or maybe he needed a good, stable team
12:43 to give him a real chance.
12:45 In the meantime, Livingston remained a journeyman
12:48 without a real home.
12:50 We know he would find home in the Golden State Dynasty,
12:56 but the Warriors might not have envisioned
12:58 this Sean Livingston without watching this one.
13:03 Brooklyn came first.
13:04 In the summer of 2013, the Brooklyn Nets made a push.
13:10 Brand name stars, brand name coach.
13:12 It was ill-fated, but for Sean's purposes, it was perfect.
13:17 To fill out that stuffed roster,
13:20 coach Jason Kidd wanted a big, heady second point guard.
13:24 Someone to fill the role Kidd himself played
13:26 in his twilight, aka like three months prior.
13:29 Sean played a career-high 76 games for the Nets in 13-14,
13:35 rising from bench to the starting unit.
13:37 Not as the point guard, but in that familiar utility role
13:41 beside Darren Williams.
13:43 Livingston finally enjoyed some consistency,
13:47 the best to date, and he made it count.
13:50 In February, Livingston busted out 24 points
13:53 against the Pacers, the second highest-scoring performance
13:56 of his career.
13:58 And this quadruple-double-adjacent line a couple days later
14:02 is even closer to vintage Sean.
14:04 Livingston played playoff ball
14:06 for the first time in eight years,
14:08 starting five of seven games
14:10 from Brooklyn's upset of the Toronto Raptors.
14:12 He hit the clutch free throws that sealed the series victory.
14:16 He guarded multiple positions
14:18 in the next round against the Heat.
14:20 That was enough for Golden State to swoop in,
14:24 trump all other offers, and make Livingston
14:27 one of the final pieces in what would become
14:29 a multi-championship puzzle.
14:31 It was a long time coming.
14:33 Sean Livingston's injury stopped him short
14:37 of becoming the next Magic Johnson.
14:40 Livingston's contributions to a dynasty
14:42 ensured that injury wouldn't define him.
14:45 That comeback makes Livingston's legacy a triumph.
14:48 These parts in between only enrich
14:51 his one-of-a-kind NBA story.
14:54 (electronic music)
14:56 (electronic music)
14:59 (electronic music)