Doc Rivers says champion Warriors can talk all the trash they want

Doc Rivers/Photo by Associated Press

 

The Clippers on Tuesday night at Staples Center will take on the defending-champion Golden State Warriors in exhibition play. Coach Doc Rivers and some of the Warriors have been going back and forth because of a recent comment made by Rivers, who told Grantland.com that a team has to have some luck to advance out of the West. As proof, he noted the Warriors did not have to play the Clippers or the Spurs in the playoffs on their way to the title.

The Warriors took that as Rivers saying they were lucky to win the NBA title, and Rivers has said several times that his comment was not meant like that.

“I don’t pay much attention to all that stuff,” Rivers said Monday at practice. “I was on that side before and you can almost say what you want. You won, so you have the right to say whatever you feel like saying.

“To the victors go the spoils. They can talk trash, they can walk with a swagger, they can do whatever they want. They’re the champs.”

Rivers coached the Boston Celtics to the title in 2008.