Mike Malone had verbal altercations during Tuesday's game with both Emmanuel Mudiay and Blake Griffin.

With 1:53 left in the fourth quarter, Malone laid into Mudiay for what he thought was a subpar performance.

Mudiay had a few words of his own in retort back to Malone and was then pulled from the game.

"There is frustration on our end, having lost four games in a row now," Malone said. "Just trying to find way to get a win. Winning is a great cure-all for anybody, like it was for (the Clippers) tonight, coming in having lost three in a row. So this is a very competitive game, guys are out there working hard trying to do their best, and sometimes emotions get involved. By no means is there an issue with Emmanuel or anybody else on this team. We are together, we are unified and we're going to continue to fight to stay together to get this thing turned around."

Said Mudiay: "It's just both of us being competitors. It probably was my fault, I could have been doing a lot more. So I kind of put the blame on myself. I've got nothing against Coach, I respect him. He's a great person, and I have all the respect in the world for him.

"Me and him are both competitive. We want to win. We hate losing. We're on a four-game losing streak, something like that. It's just us trying to win. At the same time, it's over with. It's on to the next game. It's been like that my whole life. He's just trying to challenge me, which I accept."

Emmanuel Mudiay is averaging 13.1 points, 6.3 assists and 3.4 rebounds in 30.8 minutes per game over his first eight NBA games. Mudiay is shooting just 32.7 percent and averaging 4.4 turnovers per game as his play has been up and down.

"What I like about Emmanuel is that he is a student of the game," Mike Malone said.

"It's exciting to see a 19-year-old be able to run the team with his poise," Jason Kidd said. "It's extremely hard, because everybody wants the ball. That's just being honest.

"At that age, you are willing to give the ball. They're a young team. He's asked to do a lot, and I think he's standing up."

Wilson Chandler will undergo surgery on his hip and miss the remainder of the season.

Chandler is expected to make a complete recovery after a six-month rehab process.

Chandler signed a four-year, $46.5 million contract extension in the summer.

Chandler previously had to undergo surgery on his hip in May of 2012.

The Denver Nuggets will waive Erick Green in order to re-sign Kostas Papanikolaou.

Papanikolaou was acquired by Denver as part of the trade that sent Ty Lawson to Houston, but was waived Sept. 25.

Green was in his second year with the Nuggets. He appeared in three games this season, averaging 2.3 minutes per game.