Hey, the Dominique and Dana Barros signings weren’t bad. Nique was the leading scorer on a playoff team that played the eventually Eastern Conference champion Orlando Magic very tough, and Dana Barros was coming off a season with Philly in which he averaged about 20 and 8. There was no reason for David Wesley to get PT over Barros, either.

Anyway, in terms of the article, it was painful to read, knowing the eventual outcomem, i.e. not getting Duncan, Pitino being the anti-Christ, etc.

Very interesting read. I had forgotten just how transparent the fantanking had gotten, with crowds openly applauding losses. It sounds shocking now, but imagine if Oden had spent three more years in college and was sure to come out – the amount of tanking that season by the lottery teams would be much worse than it already is now.

I hope this article also clears up the fact that Duncan was widely considered a sure thing that season. I’ve seen some revisionist history where people claim otherwise, but every GM in the league knew that season who the prize was.

MacMullan also points out ahead of tournament time that that year’s draft class was thin after the first pick, and it ended up being so. That danger is not here in this draft, but back then the “no guarantee” people would have had much more justification. Of course, that team was not in a position to make a trade for a star either, so tanking was their best move anyway.

The NBA is always going to have this problem when a young superstar big man is poised to enter the draft, because the league has expanded to too many teams. There is now bulging middle class that has little chance to do much in the playoffs but aren’t horrible enough to have a shot at the top players in the draft. This is a big problem for the league, but they won’t contract because it would cost them money. It’s going to get ugly this season by the last month or so, but how can you blame the teams? Oden looks to be a franchise big man for the next 15 years. A team low in the lottery has no reason not to take their best (worst) shot. Look at how Minnesota’s last game and the Celts last game ended up giving the 6th pick and Randy Foye to the T-Wolves, the guy Ainge wanted. Tanking can prosper and the NBA would rather look away because it doesn’t want to put attention on the elephant in the room. Besides, they could never prove it anyway.

I remember it well.

Boy how I wish that Bird took over the GM position and they had hired Larry Brown at the time.

Things might be different, than having Rick Pitino completely destroy our franchise for the next 6 years.

Hopefully things will work out better the second time around

How did Pitino destroy the franchise yet Ainge is a savior? I just don’t get the people on this board.

The mor things change, the more they remain the same.

Horrible to remember. I was ashamed to be a fan at that point. I recall telling a friend at school it’s called a Lottery for a reason. You have a ‘chance’ to win. It’s not a lock by any stretch of the imagination. So play your best ball & let the chips fall where they may.

You also have to remember that players that you hope to resign like AJ want to win NOW and purposely tanking games will loom large in players minds when a contract is put in front of them.

Both wonderfully reminiscent and true…But an alley oop to a midgit with .3 seconds remaining!!…Give that man a Guiness!!!
I almost wish M.L. were our coach right now…or maybe bring him back if we get a top two pick and let him rise to the rafters with a good young team under his belt…Too poetic to be true…alas,

I didn’t think that Durant looked all that great last night. Really good, but not great.

LuckyNumber07,
I agree with your premise. What also looms in the minds of players is who your going to play with. If your lucky enough to get Oden and he’s going to be is good as advertised, he alone will attract players that wouldn’t consider Boston right now.

I’ve said before and I’ll say it again, tanking was ML’s plan. The sad thing is, these 15 wins were not by design and I haven’t seen any signs of tanking (incompetence, yes). I suspect if we get close enough to Philly or Memphis somehow stays close enough to us, I would suspect tanking may occur with 10 games to go.

One thing to remember about Durant and Oden is not that they either looked great or looked lousy, it’s what they will become as players down the road.

Many of these young kids, and our Celtics team can atest to that is that it takes time to develop and become polished.

Lebron James is 1 out of a million, so don’t expect either Durant or Oden to come in here immediately and make an impact playing against other teams with Veteran players.

The thought process is to get Durant or Oden and build and develop. I would expect this team to make the playoffs next season based on the fact that Jefferson will be better, that a healthy Szczerbiak & Perkins, a more mature Green and Rondo, a steady Gomes and West will provide come next season.

Add another Veteran player, be it Point Guard, in a trade with Ratliffs salary or a free agent and things will be looking much better especially when you add Durant or Oden

And if we don’t get Durant or Oden, it’s still a strong draft where we can either trade the pick or select someone of quality

The difference this year is that if we don’t get the number one, numbers 2 and 3 are still very good (definitely a Wright fan here, but durant is still better)…Van Horn, Billups(took a while), Antonio Daniels, Battie, and Mercer are hardly prizes. The only real impact player besides Duncan is McGrady who went #9- if we had only known. I agree that the situations are eerily similar, but I think we have a little more leeway this year if we don’t get the #1 in what’s considered the deepest draft in decades.

The only difference between that season and this is that in that season we were outright tanking, and there was a much weaker draft. Either of the top 2 picks will get us a franchise player, and most of the rest of the top 10 would get us a future all star.

Some interesting analogies, with the Celts and Grizzlies again having the 2 worst records. And Theo Ratliff, as the best leaper on the Pistons? Wish he still had something left…

imagine if we had drafted mcgrady and billups and stuck with them….

Ah, what might have been. Forget about Duncan. Lets start with 2001. All of the players below were available to the Celtics but they passed on most of them.

2001: Celtics roster is Pierce, Walker and trash (but some useful trash, e.g. Eric Williams, Tony Battie and Adrian Griffin.

2001 draft: Celtics select Joe Johnson, Richard Jefferson and Gilbert Arenas.

2002 draft: Celtics select Tayshaun Prince

2003 draft: Celtics select Boris Diaw and Josh Howard with picks 16 and 20.

2004 draft: Jefferson, West and Allen.

2005: Gerald Green

2006: Rudy Gay, Rondo.

2007 depth chart:

C: Jefferson/Battie
PF: Diaw/Prince
SF: Pierce/Jefferson
SG: Joe Johnson/Josh Howard
PG: Arenas/West

Walker and Williams would be long gone. Maybe they move Walker for another veteran backup center, e.g. Joel Przybilla.

Griffin would be a veteran character guy, and Tony Allen would be a little-used reserve. Green, Gay and Rondo would be in the developmental league. Players like Justin Reed and Ryan Gomes would never make the roster.

That’s a 55-60 win team. With Mike D’Antoni coaching them, it might be a 70 win team.

To be fair, Brickowski, you have to assume that, if the Celtics made the right pick the year before, if their record would be good enough to get the pick the next year. Obviously, Arenas was a 2nd rounder, so that didn’t make a difference, but if they had Johnson and Jefferson and Arenas and Prince and Howard and Diaw, would they really have had a bad enough record to pick 15th for Al? It’s nitpicking, but something to look at. There’s a reason teams like the Lions, Browns and the mid 90’s Celtics perennially screwed up high draft picks; they were constantly in a position to screw it up.

2001 is where we screwed up big time, and if it was jefferson, johnson and arenas then, that would be too many wings, as we already have PP..Maybe Duke is right that had we made d right selection then, Big al might not drop with us in 2004, and maybe even gerald…the past is the past as we can now only see in hindsight the mistakes we make in the draft…that is the reason why scouts should do their homework very well so players like Redd, Arenas don’t drop too far down.

Regarding a prevous post, I have to say I get really annoyed when posters in here compress or combine different and often contrasting posts by people and then act like it’s one person saying two different things or being hypocritical. When someone criticizes Pitino, that’s all he’s doing. When there’s no reference to Ainge, that doesn’t mean he’s praising Ainge. I hate it when people put words in people’s mouths in here. Stop succumbing to the white noise of a thousand posts and deal with them individually instead of saying “the people on this board” — it’s a huge brushstroke comment.

I’m watching the KU/Texas game, first half so far, and Durant is going off! I hope we somehow land him. I would rather build around himand get young talent to surround (hopefully Oden/Durant), big AL, and Gerald Green then to try to make a run with Pierce and trading out of the pick (like last year), etc to get veteran help.