The Boston Celtics have been calling, but Blake Griffin isn’t answering.
Despite the Celtics’ effort to bring him in for the stretch run, the former All-NBA forward has elected to pass on the NBA this season to spend more time with his family, MassLive reported.
Griffin, soon to be 35, played with the Celtics in the 2022-23 season for 41 games after his one-and-a-half-season cup of coffee with the Brooklyn Nets the two years prior.
When asked why he wasn’t with the team, point guard Peyton Pritchard told “Pardon My Take” on Monday, “I don’t know. We begged him to.”
“I think the whole team has been begging him to,” Derrick White also said during their joint appearance on the Barstool Sports podcast.
“I texted him actually a week ago or two jokingly being like, ‘Coming back for one last ride?’ He says he’s enjoying his life,” Pritchard said.
Show host Dan “Big Cat” Katz then called Griffin on the show, who said he’s just enjoying his life right now.
In his 2023 season, Griffin was reduced to just 13.9 minutes per game; averaging a paltry 4.1 points on 34.8 percent from behind the arc.
But Boston might be looking to bring Griffin in to be a locker-room presence instead of a key part of their rotation. The Celtics are hoping to make a championship run this summer as the consensus favorites.
Their trades for Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis undoubtedly increased the talent level of the squad.
It also resulted in long-time and outspoken Celtics Marcus Smart and Grant Williams going elsewhere.
Griffin had been a locker room voice since his time with a Nets team, which was embroiled in chaos with Kyrie Irving, James Harden and Kevin Durant.
Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla confirmed to The Athletic that Griffin had talked about being with his family at the end of last season.
“When he told me at the end of last year that his family was the most important thing, I stopped talking to him about it,” he said, “because I know what it’s like to be away from your kids and away from your family.”
Griffin has played 13 seasons during his NBA career, and despite being a six-time All-Star and five-time All-NBA player, he also had many highlights off the court.
His high-profile relationship with Kendall Jenner began in August 2017, when Jenner was consistently seen sitting courtside at his games as a member of the Clippers.
But they were broken up by March 2018.
Prior to that, Griffin dated and was engaged to Brynn Cameron, with whom the ex-NBA star has two children.
Griffin is likely spending his time with his two kids.
His son, Ford Wilson Cameron-Griffin, was born in 2013, and the second was daughter, Finley Elaine Griffin, the following year.
Cameron also has a preexisting child with ex-USC star and NFL player Matt Leinart.
After the birth of Ford, Griffin told GQ in 2014 that he felt “changed” by fatherhood.
“I wish I was able to be around more,” Griffin said. “The thing I hate the most is being gone for like two weeks and only seeing him on FaceTime. I missed the first time he rolled over, which isn’t a huge thing, but at the time I was like, ‘Man.’ I had—not a breakdown, but I just had a moment where I was like, ‘This sucks!’ You know, just missing stuff like that. But at the same time, it makes the stuff that I don’t miss that much more special.”
Griffin might have just been tired of missing the good stuff of fatherhood.
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