Well, that free agent chase was quick. Just when the 5 years and $107 million later, CP3's going to be in the Los Angeles backcourt for a while.

While the composition of the team may not be the same - have fun elsewhere, 82games.com, the Clippers' most used floor alignment during the regular-season consisted of Paul-Green-Butler-Griffin-Jordan. I'm sure that only surprises the people who don't know who the Clippers are, in which case I'm confused why you're reading this article. That group of five held an offensive rating of 115 and a defensive rating of 107, scoring 113 more points than they allowed over just under 700 minutes.

But if Eric Bledsoe replaces Chris Paul? The set of five still doesn't do too badly, with an offensive rating at 113 and a defensive rating at 107, but a closer look at the stats reveals a troubling trend. The Bledsoe-centric five only shot a .479 effective field goal percentage (eFG%), while the Paul-centric five shot .501 eFG%. And while the Bledsoe corps did hold a better defensive eFG% by .008, the slight bump in defense does not do nearly enough to offset the offensive strength.

Then again, it's not just Griffin that Paul helped out. Of the Clippers' 20 most-used lineups last season, seven scored .10 more points per possession than they allowed. All of those seven had either Paul or Bledsoe at point guard. Paul had five (including the most-efficient unit of Paul-Butler-Barnes-Griffin-Jordan), while Bledsoe only had two. And of those five that Paul had, eight different players were featured. The only player who seemingly played better with Bledsoe than Paul is Ronny Turiaf, who does not feature in a single lineup of significant minutes with Paul.