LOS ANGELES – Blake Griffin doesn’t do it with the frequency of his hyperbolic, rim-hurdling youth, but he occasionally adds victims to his disrespectful dunk mixtapes. Draymond Green joined the list Wednesday night at Staples Center, where he stood under the basket, waiting to rebound a DeAndre Jordan miss. Griffin came flying over Green’s back, grabbed Green by the face and neck and pulled him away with his left hand, then jackhammered the ball with his right hand.

The slam was so filthy that the Los Angeles Clippers’ easily excitable owner, Steve Ballmer, shot up from his seat and shouted a few words in Green’s direction as Griffin jogged back down the court. But if not for that one vintage highlight-reel moment, Griffin was truant in a game that could’ve gone a long way toward elevating the Clippers into a legitimate threat to the Golden State Warriors this season. Instead, Griffin probably wishes he could use the same mitt that clobbered Green to cover the faces of those who winced through his forgettable performance – replete with uncharacteristic turnovers, errant jumpers and astonishingly abysmal defense – in a 115-98 loss that only extended his team’s status as a faux contender until proven otherwise.

“At the end of the day, to win a championship, you’re going to have to go through them,” Griffin said of the Warriors.

The Clippers remain the last team from the Western Conference to defeat the Warriors in a playoff series, but that was back in 2014, before Steve Kerr arrived and turned a once-floundering franchise into a perennial title contender, before Curry became a two-time and first-ever unanimous MVP, and before former MVP Kevin Durant decided to eliminate what had been Golden State’s one true threat in the conference – Oklahoma City – by joining forces with a juggernaut.

The urge is not to overreact and place too much emphasis on one regular-season game in December. The Cleveland Cavaliers proved last season that an embarrassing home loss to the Warriors doesn’t mean that all hope is lost for the postseason. Last January, the Warriors drubbed the Cavaliers by 43 points – with Steph Curry producing a soul-crushing steal against LeBron James, and Cavs coach David Blatt getting canned a few days later – but Cleveland won the championship, ending a five-decade title drought for the city, at Oracle Arena in June.

But then again, this is a Clippers team that has now lost seven consecutive games to a Warriors team that still hasn’t fully figured out how good it can be with Durant. Continuity is supposed to be the primary advantage that the Clippers have over the Warriors. But the Clippers appear to be running on a treadmill instead of heading to an actual destination. They have made superficial changes to the roster but nothing substantial, relying on the same core players to suddenly show sides of themselves that they haven’t previously revealed. Every year, the Clippers show up with more to prove, without ever actually improving. They rule the regular season and break down in the postseason, either physically or emotionally, expecting more despite putting out more of the same.

“We’ve got to figure it out,” Chris Paul said, “and I’m very optimistic that we will.”

Clippers coach Doc Rivers refers to his team as “emotional,” and he and his players remain distracted by disputes with referees. They collected two more technical fouls – from Griffin and Paul – Wednesday night. And they can also let those emotions drag them down when things don’t go their way. Rivers and his players repeatedly mentioned how their “spirits” were deflated after a poor first period.

“That’s the scouting report when you play against the Clippers. It’s always been. You play the Clippers, you hit them a couple of times, and their spirit is going to be down,” said Clippers reserve Marreese Speights, who spent the previous three seasons with Golden State. “We’ve got to find a way to get over that hump and do something different. … We need to leave the refs alone. Guys got to sacrifice. Do other things than scoring. Do other things than your personal goals. Try something new. They’ve been doing it for four or five years, and it hasn’t been working. It’s time to try something new.”

On their rise toward surpassing the Lakers as the best team in Los Angeles, the Clippers have carried themselves with the swagger of a champion but while wearing gilded bling. For that to change, the Clippers need Griffin to become what they’ve long hoped to see since taking him first overall in 2009: the MVP-caliber, franchise player he pledged to be after a disappointing season that was plagued by a nagging quadriceps injury and a silly, self-inflicted wound that came as the result of slugging a team employee. Before these teams met, Rivers tried to deflect questions about the new-look, Durant-infused Warriors by mentioning that the Clippers “had a big signing this offseason and no one noticed. His name is Blake. Blake didn’t play last year. We have Blake this year. That makes us better.”

The Clippers are better with Griffin. What hasn’t been proven is whether a humbled, motivated Griffin makes them better than the Warriors. Griffin is versatile and creates mismatches because he has the lateral quickness to ease past larger defenders and the strength to overpower smaller ones. But the advantages that have caused problems for most of the league don’t exist against the Warriors. Green is physical, feisty, agile and relishes in being an annoyance with his constant jousting and yapping. And, the Warriors have added another wrinkle in Durant, whose size and newfound engagement on the defensive end present tremendous challenges when he slides over to power forward. The Green-Durant blender contributed to Griffin missing 15 of his 20 shots and being responsible for half of the Clippers’ 14 turnovers.

“It’s frustrating,” Griffin said. “You know you’re going to have games like this. You don’t want to, but it’s a part of basketball. The biggest thing is, if after an awful game like this, you have to do things in other areas, and I don’t think I did that. If you’re not shooting well, you’ve got to take care of the basketball, get other guys involved. I don’t think I did that well. I’ve got to be better.”

No need to go all in on the Clippers until they’ve provided a reason that extends beyond bluster. Rivers has been able to slip in a few minor digs at the Warriors – such as noting before the game that they’ve only won one title – but Golden State continues to have the final word in this duel. Not only did they win in humiliating fashion on national television, but the Warriors also beat the Clippers last summer by landing Durant, who strongly considered playing with Jordan, his close friend, in the city where the Warriors star maintains an offseason home. Rivers recalled how Ballmer was so confident about the Clippers’ chances of landing Durant that he decided to stick around after their meeting in the Hamptons to await the decision. Ballmer and Rivers bided time by playing golf. Ballmer won. Then Durant announced he was going to the team the rest of the West is chasing.

With Paul on the tail end of his prime and Jordan still limited offensively, Griffin is the Clippers’ best and most dynamic counter to the Warriors. And this is a critical season in determining the actual ceiling of a Clippers team with Griffin. Griffin and Paul likely will be unrestricted free agents this summer, so that partnership is on the clock.

While there is time for the Clippers to prove to be a respectable adversary to the Warriors, the first meeting did nothing to quell the expectations of a Finals three-match between Golden State and Cleveland. If the Clippers can’t beat the Warriors at home, while the Warriors are only 22 games into this dream laboratory experiment, when Curry misses all eight of his 3-point attempts and Durant had more shots than points for the first time this season, how and when are the encouraging signs expected to appear?

Rivers said he wants to play the Warriors 10 more times this season, but the Clippers shouldn’t be considered an emerging and suitable rival. At least not now – and likely never if Griffin is unable to summon a gear he has yet to display and was nowhere to be found in a game the Clippers desperately needed in order to bolster their fragile psyche. “If you want to take a positive away from this, this isn’t the playoffs,” Griffin said. “So, we’ve got some work to do, obviously. I think this is a good lesson for us. I think we’ll be better because we have to allow ourselves to learn from it.”

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