Due to a “clerical error”, C. J. McCollum could only watch as the LA Clippers took down his Portland Trail Blazers 109-98 Wednesday night.
Head coach Terry Stotts mistakenly left McCollum on the inactive list prior to the game, and by the time he noticed, it was too late.
The Clippers pushed for McCollum to suit up …
I believe the Clippers fought the Blazers correction and won. As a result, CJ McCollum, Portland's second leading scorer, can not play
— Jason Quick (@jwquick) January 7, 2016
… but didn’t seem too broken up after getting the W …
CJ McCollum and Doc Rivers postgame pic.twitter.com/kUE2bCtgbD
— Casey Holdahl (@CHold) January 7, 2016
From the team website:
Trail Blazers starting guard CJ McCollum due to what the team is calling a “clerical error” was left off the active list for Wednesday night’s 109-98 loss to the Clippers. Each team is responsible to list the 13 of their 15 players who will be active for the upcoming game roughly 60 minutes before the game is schedule to start. The list is usually delivered by a designated member of the basketball staff, which is hand delivered to each coach, who then signs off on the list for that particular game.
But somehow, McCollum was left off the active list in place of rookie Luis Montero. Trail Blazers head coach Terry Stotts signed off on the roster after which it was delivered to the official scorer, with Clippers head coach Doc Rivers doing the same for his team. Once the list is signed by both coaches, as was the case Wednesday night, the active list is set. The Trail Blazers public relations staff sent out a notification pregame that there was a “error” made to the active list and that McCollum would be available to play, though evidently that would not be the case. […] “Every game we fill out an active-inactive list,” explained Trail Blazers head coach Terry Stotts. “CJ was mistakenly put inactive instead of Luis. I signed the paper without really noticing it but it’s my fault for not looking at it.”
“Although we caught the error, we thought we caught it in time, apparently we did not,” said Stotts. “CJ was ruled inactive and that was that.” […] “I went out to warmup, before we were able to do starting lineups Coach Stotts just made me aware that something happened with the inactive/active list,” said McCollum. “That was it… It’s unfortunate but it’s over with. Just moving on to the next game.”
