Celts Don't Have Pro Scouts?

Hey, if they need someone for the job, I’m in….

Oh god, this is embarrassing.

All I can think about is the Telfair deal where Ainge kept on talking about scouting Telfair in high school and how great he was. Hey Danny, he’s been in the league 2 seasons since then!

In some ways, it is a more paletable answer to hear that vs. the thought of having a pro scout who makes the trades we have seen.

if what si’s thomsen says is true, that is a glaring organizational error. of course, with all these assistant coaches who i assume watch tapes of games, they must have some ideas of how to scout. dan’s trades do seem to leave a big doubt about what he knows about vets, especially their injuries.

this is the first time ive heard this and, if true, its crazy. How can an a major league organization not have pro scouts. Someone needs to get down to the truth on this issue.

Sorry I don’t buy into it. Where is this guy getting his information from anyway? Teams don’t have advance scouts scouting teams before they play them? The C’s don’t have that? I just find it hard to believe. Coming from SI makes me more suspect. I may be wrong but for now without any back up from within the orginazation or from the local media that has more access to the team I remain very sceptical…

I have 2 admit that I am shocked.

I am waiting for a response from the organization.

- Mk

I share Alaska’s skepticism. This is something that will surely be responded to by the organization. I call BS.

Thomsen is specifically talking about a traveling scout that goes to pro games and collects “behind-the-scenes information.” This is different from just looking at videotape or reading media reports. It costs money to hire and support a scout, or group of scouts in this endeavor and the Celtics may feel it’s unnecessary. A scout following the Pacific Northwest might have had a better read on the reasons for Telfair’s struggles in Portland and his personality.

Maybe this isn’t a good example, but Telfair seemed like mature young man who always said the right things in press clippings. However, there is quite a disconnect between his maturity in his press quotes and in off-the-court incidents. Not that this should have anything to do with his poor on-court performance, but the Celts may have thought the Hanscom gun incident was just a one-time thing. Telfair knows how to say the right things, but doesn’t necessarily live by them. Just throwing this out there as a possible example…

Extending on my previous post, I just want to conclude that a pro scout may have been fully aware of Telfair’s risky off-court behavior, or had more intimate knowledge of how Telfair’s game struggled in the NBA. Like I said before, when Telfair was acquired, all Ainge could talk about was seeing him dominate high school kids. I wonder if he ever looked hard at Telfair after he entered the league, or just assumed he wasn’t being utilized properly.

It’s like playing poker. If you can’t sit down at the table and guess who the sucker is after the first five or ten minutes, chances are, you’re the sucker.

If this is true, great injustice to all Celtic fans.

The media guide lists an advance scout and an amateur scout. But no Pro scout so maybe Thomsen is not full of telfair.

http://www.nba.com/media/celtics/mediaguide0607_1_administration.pdf
media guide link

If the article is true, it explains a lot. But Danny thinks differently anyway. It has helped him in drafting but hurt him in trading.

Our front office is much like our roster, full of inexperienced people making rookie mistakes. This is clearly one of Ainge’s worst blunders.

obnoxiousmime said: when Telfair was acquired, all Ainge could talk about was seeing him dominate high school kids. I wonder if he ever looked hard at Telfair after he entered the league, or just assumed he wasn’t being utilized properly.

Look this is fine, no matter what player comes into the league the time line for growth is always a moving target. Just look at Chauncey Billups, Jermaine Oneal, and many others. Many teams don’t go the distance long enough. Yes Ainge took a gamble, but to think he only looked at his highschool record and not what happened in Portland is crazy. People have got on Ainge for his “Brain Doctor” approach to players. Now this is a guy that doesn’t look at the entire picture? Look it was a mistake, he took a gamble, but I would think on how he analyses players I just find it hard to believe he didn’t do the same here. Mistake yes, lack of research no….I can’t find how a “pro” scout would of changed things.

One more thing, don’t any of you think for a minute that Danny Ainge is not for the better ment of the Boston Celtics. I stated before it’s like raising kids, your most precious commodity, you want the best to transpire in your decisions in raising them. Yet we all make mistakes, remeber that! Ainge’s heart is in the right place, it’s these kind of gambles that sometimes can yield the biggest results.

Portland was the same team that gave up on Jermaine Oneal, remember that.

I hope you my point, did Indiana take a gamble on Oneal? Did Detroit take a gamble on Billups? Did both teams do thier research? It’s real easy to be a critic after the fact, it takes guts, to take the gambles.

Alaska, you call it a “gameble,” I call it a “colossal rip-off for the ages.” The fact is, Ainge screwed up, plain and simple. Giving him credit for “taking a gamble” is absurd. Yes, I’m aware that teams have made good trades in the past and taken chances on players who haven’t shown much. However, I don’t recall those players commanding a 7th overall pick and future ROY in a trade. Thomsen called it the “worst trade of the year” and you’re still defending Ainge?

I’m sure Ainge did look at Telfair’s games in the NBA. However, my point is he BASED HIS JUDGEMENT PRIMARILY on his impression of Telfair from scouting him for the draft. Ainge is just fascinated with certain guys – Robert Swift is another one he coveted after the draft, trying to trade for him the next year.

To suggest the Celtics don’t do any pro scouting at all is ludicrous. Thomsen is simply stating they don’t have a regular scout on the road doing in-depth analyses of players. This isn’t game-tape, but hearing gossip, rumors, “inside-the-locker-room” stuff about player’s personalities, tendencies, weaknesses, off-court behavior, etc.

And why can’t we criticize in hindsight? Ainge is making poor decisions during his tenure and we’re supposed to be silent? We are just basketball fans, not former NBA stars who are GMs and have access to tremendous resources. He’s supposed to be more knowledgeable than the common fan, which is why he’s hired to do what he does.

Hmmm. I’ll be interested to see Ainge’s response to this. But it wouldn’t have taken much to figure out that Raef was chronically injured, Wally was chronically injured, Ricky was a nut, Blount was an unmotivated nutjob, etc. etc.

It also didn’t take much to figure out that Walker was a detriment to any team where he is expected to be one of the star players, that Kedrick Brown couldn’t play, that Eric Williams was finished, that Tony Battie was a marginal player who had no use on a rebuilding team, etc , etc.

Sounds like a good job for Doc after he’s been removed from the bench “but will still be with the organization.”

An advance scout is one that goes out and actually scouts upcoming opponents. Amateur scouting is the college/high school ranks, but who is that guy? What a joke. Besides Danny, Wallace and Papile who else is there acutally looking at these guys…the Brain Doctor? Come on now….let’s get some experienced people in there….

Wow – if that doesn’t clear up a few things, I don’t know that anything will. Scouts are more important to a sports organization all but the players and a few key positions. That’s almost comical.

This whole discussion is silly. The Celtics have plenty of people with the ability to evaluate players, whether or not you have someone with the title of “pro personnel scout.” Chris Wallace or Leo Papile can get on a plane just like anyone else.

The issue is whether or not the Celtics do their homework before making a trade. In the case of Vin Baker, they obviously didn’t. After that I’m not so sure. They knew all about LaFrentz’ and Szczerbiak’s knee issues. I also think they knew perfectly well that Ratliff wasn’t going to play. That stuff about him being a “veteran defensive presence” was alot of PR crap, especially after he spent the whole summer in the Bahamas instead of working out in Waltham.

Otherwise, Davis was the player everyone knew he was. Same with Scalabrine, Olowokandi and Dickau. Really, the last veteran who was an unpleasant surprise was Baker.

The player evaluation area where the Celtics have been most deficient has been with international players. Except for Welsch, who spent a year with Golden State before they acquired him and was preobably never scouted in Europe, they have gone after free agents like Dickau and Scalabrine instead of the Obertos and the Garbajosas. And that has been a mistake.

I’m waiting to see what the Celtics have to say about this one.

I am sure they do their homework, but a lot of times it seems like they put the money aspect in front of everything. The Telfair/Ratliff deal was purely a money deal, saving on Raef’s contract. The Vin deal, pure money deal as the team was at it’s highest value, just off the ECF in 02 and then trade away players to make the cap look good for any potential new owner.

This news is absolutely ridiculous….To think that a pro-basketball team in a huge sports city doesn’t have a pro scout?? Explains a lotttttttt of questions about 90% of danny’s trades. I still can’t believe it.

I emailed Shira at the Globe after reading this. Her response: I’m not sure exactly which SI piece you are referring to, but the Celtics scouting group consists largely of Danny Ainge, Leo Papile, Chris Wallace, former assistant Paul Pressey, a couple of current assistants and other basketball operations staff members. They also use computer programs that provide non-typical statistical analysis of players. Hope this helps, Shira Springer.

I thought this kind of cheapness went away when we got rid of Gaston. I would hope the team would issue a statement on this issue. This can’t be right.

This team doesn’t need a pro personnel scout. What it does need is a Senior Vice President of Revisionist History and Excuses. This senior level officer in the marketing department would help Wyc Grousbeck coordinate his “We’re Really a Playoff Team in Disguise” marketing campaign and finding new and creative ways to explain why this team cannot win basketball games.

Dulany- pretty cool response, i thought its funny though that Shira brought up that the scouts consist of Danny’s crew and a computer HAHAHAH

If we do have a pro scout , you can bet he is in hiding after the trades we have made. Who would want to be credited with that mess?

Corporations on the upswing spend a considerable amount of their profits on R&D (research and development)…They know that to remain “competitive” or to remain an industry “leader” they NEED to invest in their future.

Basketball is a 50-60 million dollar business. Team worth rises as the fan base and profits continue to escalate. A decision to spend $100,000 for a full-time scout constitutes “small-change” when viewed from the corporate financial ladder.

I find it hard to accept the premise that the Celtics do not have a “traveling” full-time scout. The arguement should be directed at the “credentials” and basketball “savy” of this scout rather than questioning whether he exists.

Red relied heavily on the input of former players etc. for “tips” on talented players.