PORTLAND — It took three times for Allen Crabbe to hear it before he believed it. Truth be told, he wasn’t the only one that thought what he’d heard was too surreal to be true.
All he had to do to believe was check the paperwork.
Blazers guard CJ McCollum was a surprise inactive as the Trail Blazers lost to the Los Angeles Clippers 109-98 Wednesday night at the Moda Center. The Clippers’ seventh straight win and sixth without superstar Blake Griffin was overshadowed by a clerical error for the ages.
“Every game we fill out active and inactive lists, CJ was mistakenly put inactive instead of Luis (Montero),” Blazers coach Terry Stotts said after the game. “I signed the paper without really noticing it, but it’s my fault for not looking at it. And, although we caught the error, we thought we caught it in time. Apparently we did not.”
The lights dimmed as the Blazers starting lineup was about to be introduced, with a bizarre scene unfolding on their bench.
Seated on the bench while waiting to be introduced like usual, McCollum, was having an oddly timed conversation with Stotts.
“Coach Stotts made me aware that something happened with the inactive/active list and that was it,” McCollum said.
Crabbe eventually made his way to the bench after being told by assistant coach Jim Moran that he would start.
“He had to tell me like three times and said, ‘No, I’m serious,’ then I look over at Coach talking to CJ,” Crabbe said. “And they were like, ‘Yeah, you’re going to start. There was a mistake.’ ”
Crabbe was then announced as the starting shooting guard to widespread confusion which, until that point, had been quarantined to the depths of the arena.
Few on the team had any idea what was happening. Luis Montero, listed on the active roster and one letter below McCollum, was in a suit when the game began.
It was not until after the game that Stotts addressed the team and apologized for what happened, according to a team source.
Questions began only minutes earlier when McCollum was not initially included in the starting line-up about an hour before game time.
The scoreboards showed Crabbe as the starter roughly an hour before the game, sparking questions from the media and the Blazers.
About 90 minutes after the update stating that McCollum would play, the Blazers sent out another update saying that McCollum was “inactive” due to a clerical error in the “NBA’s active list reporting.”
After the first quarter ended and the shock of the situation wore off, McCollum returned to the locker room to get into more appropriate attire.
Montero was told by a Blazers assistant to get into his gear.
Clippers coach Doc Rivers said he and his staff knew right away that McCollum was inactive and having had the same thing happen to them twice before, knew it too late to change.
“(McCollum) wasn’t on the list and then they came and tried to change it. That’s the last we heard of it.” Rivers said. “We knew you couldn’t change, but that’s not on us. That’s on them.”
The Blazers looked just as shocked as everybody else.
The Clippers jumped out to a dominating start and led 31-18 after the first quarter, with Chris Paul leading the way.
Paul had 21 points and 19 assists.
The Blazers woke up in the fourth quarter, cutting the Clippers’ lead to six points.
Damian Lillard returned to floor Monday night, but it was not a seamless transition back to normal as the Blazers posted a season-low 78 points in a loss to the Grizzlies.
Things were a little bit better offensively for the Blazers and for Lillard, who finished with 20 points but had a rough 7-of-25 night from the field.
Without their best player, the Clippers will gladly take any advantage they can get.
“We’ll take it,” Austin Rivers said about playing the Blazers when McCollum could not play. “He’s a hell of a player.”
