Looking Ahead to 2007

I don’t see Doc being fired this year. Listening to Ainge last night – no way. Maybe yes on a Garnett trade. I think Chicago and Boston will be the finalists. Chicago is his hometown but I think when all is said and done, Kevin will want Jefferson over any other player in any other package coming back. Otherwise, I see a lot less than 35 wins (no defense) and a better shot at Oden than you think.

Ever the optimist, I’m hoping for around 20 wins and a real shot at Oden (or Durant, Noah). As for KG, I think Minnesota would be crazy to trade him. However, it’s possible he’ll bring a bundle in return even though aging superstars are not supposed to bring back what they should. I hope Ainge doesn’t succumb to temptation and deal away the best of the Celtics youth for him. I see the Bulls as the likeliest trading partner with the Lakers second.

Does Danny really decide a path in 07? Is he going to finally decide to to go with the kids all the way, or get a veteran star to win now?

If it is the latter, what has he been doing the last four years? Taking his sweet freaking time is what he is doing!

1. what about a 3 way trade with us getting 2 2007 first rounders and a good rookie for pierce and we set up for 2010?

doesnt sound good does it..

the alternative is 2. give up some of the young talent for another quality veteran like wally or 3. give up pretty much all of the young talent for Kg..

will any of these last two options produce #17? i doubt it.

4. last option is to stick with what we have and hope that Al, Allen, Green, Rondo and possibly Telfair all develop into great players over the next 2 years and either go after #17 as a “team” or 5. trade two of them for a old KG and try for #17 with pierce, KG and the remaining talent on the team..

i like 4 and would like to see us win with a ageing pierce in 2009/10 say.. he deserves it. but its more likely that we win if we develop the existing talent well and trade pierce at end of 07/08 for younger talent then make a run for 2010..

bah, just let perk, west, wally get 110% healthy. play rondo at point 50/50 with telfair. make gerald spend 1 hr per day every day on dribbling skills and we might win it in 08/09 with the team as is.

I do not see any takers for Wally.

wally seems to be closing in on raef territory. if they want to trade him, then they should have rested wally till he was better.

ankles were better, the knee is what it is :)

When Wally can’t shoot, he’s really not providing anything out there. Yet, the Celtics have a 48% 3pt shooter on their team and he gets 1/3 the shots of Wally.

Is it just me or is Tony Allen’s outside shot improving a bit? It used to be ugly looking but now it’s decent. Hopefully he can add better range so that defenders have to play up on him, thus enabling him a better chance to drive past them.

Anyone else notice last night during Ainge’s broadcasting that he apparently understands what’s going on better than Doc? I’ll give him credit, he was picking up on a number of in-game plays that I didn’t even notice.

I can’t see Ainge moving Big Al as a chip. I think he considers him a building block, which I’d have to agree with. Can’t say enough about the recent competitiveness of AL, which I’m loving.

Are Sebastian and Wally really chips? I just don’t see any team giving anything back for either of those two.

The L.A. Clippers are looking to make a trade……. Maybe Livington, for Telfair?

Who knows what Danny is thinking at the moment… alot depends where were at come trading deadline in the standings….

I’d rather see our young guys playing and hopefully the ping pong balls fall in our favor in May

Last night Danny remarked how Sebastian has to take his shot more often. This morning Doc says in the Globe that Sebastian has to stop shooting. This is another example of where these two guys are not on the same page. Jeff pointed this conflict out regarding Gerald. It’s no wonder both Gerald and Telfair are tentative; they are completely confused as to what is expected of them.

Doc is the “soul reason” we are bad this year. Get that man a James Brown CD.

GG needs to take more shots! He has a couple of WIDE open looks at the basket last night, and passed the ball.

Shoot the ball GG! While PP is out this should be the time when he is throwing up the ball when ever he gets an open look.

Jeff,

Draft Express has Sean Williams of BC forecasted as a top 20 pick as well – and while he has uncanny timing for blocks… he is not (Yet anyhow) a top 20 talent IMO (and I think dudley will be a sleeper). If we fall out of the Top 2 (oden/durant) I would strongly be in favor of trading down (or up into the top 2)… But heck june is awfully far away…

Is the top of the draft food chain an indictment on a lack of talented wings in college ball right now? If so — does that increase TA and GG trade value come june (especially if they continue to develop).

Doc may not be the “soul” reason why the Celtics are playing so poorly.. but I bet he could be seen as the SOLE reason.. haha.

Where the hell’s the game thread for last night’s game?
Have we gotten so far ahead of ourselves with the “lovely to look at, delightful to hold” site that we forget that they played and won last night?
Man alive!…I’ll have to pick up some Laker’s tickets from the nicely place link on the left…I might as well admit it: I don’t know what the hell’s going on in this world today…Nothing, and I mean nothing, is sacred!!!

Oh!, I forgot to add a smilie, :’(

PJ, I like your idea of keeping PP, Big Al, and Gerald if possible, then building around that. I know people still aren’t too high on Tony Allen yet, but I personally think he’s a keeper. Finally we have young players and decent contracts to work with, as opposed to debating whether or not to re-sign Rodney Rogers, counting on Montross as our inside presence, or hoping Todd Day would win a game for us.

In my opinion, Danny is setting himself up to be rid of Doc by the end of the year…. It seems that there views are changing and when 1 says something about a player good or bad, the other has said the opposite…..

I think Danny has done a great job aside from Scalabrine. The only way to get superstars with mid-first-round draft picks is to draft high schoolers and cross your fingers. Doc has just done a piss poor job of developing them, but he was the best option available during the coaching change. There is no reason to fire him right now in the middle of a pointless season it will just make us eat his contract.

I say we stay the course and develope unless we can get a steal for KG i.e. Perk Wally Telfair draft pick. If no, then i say Tank and draft another big so we can say goodbye to Scal for good.

The coach that will take us to the next level can be Doc once he has the players and TEAM development is com[pleted.

If Doc could trade Blount and LaFrentz, I do not doubt his ability to trade Wally.

Scal has become the man how dare you Breezy ;D ;D ;D

Maybe trade for Walker round Three!

And hear, hear TomHamilton30

Danny has been better any of the GMs the past twenty years, my only complaint is that he isn’t Red. Too bad this isn’t Star Wars.

The key to our future Is Danny’s upcoming decision. You KNOW he is going to make a trade. But he better start making good trades.

Ask yourself; when has Danny acquired a player that fit into the Celts long term plans? The answer is he HAS NOT. Yes, he has made trades that brought in picks that seem to fit in our long term plans such as Delonte, but Danny makes trades that don’t help us out long term

Wally will soon be another example. There was Toine (twice), Raef and Jiri, Chucky Atkins, Ricky Davis and Chris Mihm, and now what?

His trades just waste time, and do nothing to improve our present, or our future.

He better break this habit this year. If he makes another sideways trade this year, he will be following Doc out the door, even if it is a year or so later.

I was amongst the biggest of the Scal haters. I’m still gladly moving him if it brings us something nice back. But Danny’s signing of Scal looks a lot better recently. Scal’s level of play has been perhaps ten times better as of late, and a three year deal – is not too long term for a guy making roughly .5 MLE. I think Danny didn’t realize how easy it is to get guys like Gomes and Powe with second rounders, guys that are marginally as good as Scal and a magnitude cheaper.

There are only two moves with DA that are truly bad:

1. Antoine, Delk for Raef, Jiri (who became Rondo), and a draft pick (that became West) — [not that West/Allen and Rondo are bad young guys, just that Danny probably could have aquired those picks easily enough] — and if DA flips Theo’s expiring for something nice, well I might conside moving this close to the “push” category.

2. Resigning Blount – In principal it wasn’t a bad deal, he got an above average center for below average price. But Blount and Doc (and several others) couldn’t exist together and Danny was forced into the Minny deal. Again if Wally brings back anything decent and the Minny pick is worthwhile, well the Minny deal will look much better, but signing Blount will still look bad.

Scal’s deal just simply wasn’t the magnitude to be a worst deal ever. The main thing Danny did wrong was give him 5 years, when 3 would have been enough.

After listening to Ainge last night, it appears to me that Doc and he are not on the same page. But Ainge is not going to let go during the season. I think that is a mistake. A new coach could use the rest of the season to evaluate and to coach and prepare his team for next year.
Ainge should can Doc now, even if it means he takes over as coach for the rest of the year. Doc is not helping Green to develop at all.

Those of you who are waiting around for the “magic bullet” will be sorely disappointed. With the possible exception of a healthy Shaq, there is no veteran star in the league today who can turn this team into an instant contender— and the cost of acquiring that star would likely be the majority of the team’s good young players.

We saw a glimpse of the path to salvation last night: hard work and proper execution at the defensive end. There is no quick fix, just a slow, painful fix.

How about this? If PP returns, I think there is a good chance we don’t end up in the bottom 2 or 3 in the league and most likely won’t have a top 3 pick.

GG, our #1, Wally and any other refuse on our roster for a top quality 4/5? Probably not. Just dreaming.

I would consider Durant to be a semi-big man. He’s 6-10 and I could see him as a PF if he puts on some more muscle, which he likely will being in the NBA fitness.

Hate to bring this back up, but AI could have been that “magic bullet”. PP, AJ, & AI would have been one of the best trio’s in the league. Once again Danny has shown us he can’t get good deals done.

I am officially off the Dan Ainge bandwagon. He has had a horrible season. Our youngs had serious value this summer…with AI and Boozer on the block(and who knows who else)he did nothing. We were thin upfront with injury proned players…he cut D Jones and kept Allen Ray. We had our best draft pick in years…he traded it for an undersized, 3rd string pg that doesn’t pass or defend. Last year we were admitedly too young…DA went out and got us more rookies.

Note to Wyc, time to cut both Dan Ainge and Glen Rivers, their collective ceiling is a 6th seed in a week Eastern Conference.

I haven’t seen this mentioned so I thought I’d pass it along. It’s from John Hollinger’s Dec. 29 chat on ESPN.com:
*

matt (mn): Do you agree it’s time for the Wolves to trade Garnett, for him and the team’s best interest? We love him here, but he deserves better. And if so, what’s the best possible deal?

 John Hollinger: It was time a year ago, now it’s past time. Minny might be able to make a run for the No. 8 seed with this crew, but that’s about the best they can do, and pretty much everybody except Foye and Smith is at or near the downslope of their career. Chicago is the most obvious trading partner, with Boston a close second, because of all the intriguing young talent each team possesses.
*

Hollinger usually makes a lot of sense so I see this as realistic coming from him.

Um, “Boston a close second” was supposed to be in bold there. Guess I haven’t figure out this message board yet.

Iverson won’t be the “magic bullet” for Denver and he would not have been the solution for Boston either.

And Denver will have to dump some salary or else have serious luxury tax problems. It’s time for teams under the cap to raid Denver’s roster for useful players like Najera, Evans abd perhaps even Camby, all of whom are available for a song.

You can claim anything you want, but that doesn’t make it true.

So far AI’s play has been stellar for Denver. I can’t see why they don’t have as good a shot as any other team to win the title this year.

There are three reasons why Denver has no shot to win a title this year: Dallas, Phoenix and San Antonio.

If we win 35, we will win the Atlantic going away most likely!

2007 could be huge for us, not this season but during the off-season. Hopefully we can rid ourselves of the cancerous tumor that is Doc Rivers and make a big trade, and hopefully attain a nasty big man in what is supposed the best draft ever.

GMing from my computer sure is easy

I am back baby YEAH!!!…

ok, Danny will trade his chips before he getts the boots…I warranty it. No way he’ll let someone else get credited for it(the impending turn-around)

Ainge’s inability to pull the trigger on a trade using all these “chips” (Iverson aside) really woke me up. Shook me up, really, to the point where I’ve kind of soured on Ainge. I keep going back to Peter May’s line about it being a poorly constructed team, and he’s both right and wrong: Ainge constructed the team as is to make a trade to construct it properly, but he’s put himself in a Catch-22. He got too young, so the kids don’t have enough vets to develop with and therefore haven’t improved their trade value to help bring in, you guessed it, another quality veteran! It’s almost as if Ainge missed his window.
I also dislike Doc as a coach, but he’ll be a tough coach to evaluate given all the youth and injuries he’s had to deal with. But part of the problem they’re hurting is they brought in two key veterans (Wally, Theo) with serious health issues (and Raef before that!). That’s on Ainge, too.
The good news is people like Allen and Jefferson and to a lesser extent Green are developing. Considering Ainge’s inability to trade, I’d consider loosening up on Green and make Big Al the only untradeable kid. We need help desperately, and if we think it’ll come in the draft, well, good luck with that.

I don’t see many takers for wally, I like him and what he adds to the team but he needs to be healthy. I see him coming off the bench and keep allen starting, brings more to the team. Allens d on a top starter give Pierce more freedom, wally’s d lackluster but his offensive punch to second unit is great. Second unit’s d would be bolstered by rando..dump telfair. Untradables…(unless celts get something serious) to me; pierce, jefferson, west, gomes. Yes Gomes, I think he is so important when on the floor. Does lots of the little things AND averages his 10 or so pts with no offense set up for him. A good nucleus player as is west, jefferson & pierce are franchise players now and soon to be. I’d add rondo on there also but he is still so young but definately the true point guard on team. Doc as coach…eh, don’t think he’s upper level mid at best. Why can’t he figure out how to break a zone d??? And why not get a basic inside out offense set up now that jefferson is such a low post threat. As for Garnett coming to boston that would be great but what do you have to give up to get him…pierce or jefferson definately. Wouldn’t that just put the celts right back where they are now. How ‘bout Don Nelson to coach (wouldn’t jerry sloan be great but he wouldn’t leave utah)

I see no takers for Wally. He would be most attractive to a contending team that needs to add one more scorer. But with the exception of Dallas, no team has a salary structure that would permit a deal to be done, or pieces that the Celtics might want. And Dallas doesn’t need another perimeter scorer.

People are all too free with trade this guy for that guy. Someone even stated that our kids had more value last summer. what is that guy smoking? The only team there were valuable to was us. Danny certainly needs to make a trade, but he needs to try to make it from a position of strength and the way the kids are improving that may be possible this summer. And if not, then we should wait until we are. I don’t want to see another Chauncey Billups or Joe Johnson coming in to my Garden.

I also disagree with those who say Wally isn’t tradable. He has to get healthy, but he’s doing what DW is, and that is sucking it up with all the injuries. Actually, I like him coming of the bench with the 2nd unit and TA starting. Once PP gets back and is healthy this might not be a bad lineup.

I would also like to see Perk back in the starting lineup with Al. I think they complement each other – Perk with the Muscle and Al with the finesse and scoring touch. Big Al, just isn’t big enough to start at center against bigger centers. And with Gomes, then you have 2 undersized front court players. I’d actually like to see Gomes play some SF as well.