Daily Links 5/28

The RealGM article is way too kind to Ainge. The first Walker trade was a disaster. They would have been far better off just keeping Walker through June of 2005 and then either moving him in a sign-and trade (which is what they did anyway) or just letting him go into free agency.

a few of the mock drafts have us picking Green. Is this really a possibility?

It’s beginning to look like Ainge will either trade down or do a sign and trade with the 5th pick. All of these possibilities are dependent upon what happens with 4th and 5th pick and what player Ainge is targeting. The 5th pick will not come cheap for those coveting it and well that it should be expensive since the talent pool is so deserving.

There is some speculation that Atlanta may go for a PG and while Conley may have the greater upside, Acie Law is far more seasoned and capable of contributing right away whereas Conley may need a couple of years. I’m sure that Atlanta would love to trade down if PG is their target but several teams in the top 10 may be targeting the PG position so there is some risk in trading down too low.

The speculation that Portland is looking to acquire Conley may be just what we need to open the field of big men at #5 or for a trade. It’s so difficult for most of us bloggers to have a sound opinion as to the best talent since we haven’t seen the “whole field” of available players. One witnessed game is not enough to base such an important decision unless one were to see so dominant a performance that everyone else was overshadowed.

If Ainge trades down, it will be yet another blunder. He has the absolute responsibility to take the best player available and being the process of bridging the talent gap that lies between the Celtics and most every other team in the NBA.

We know that one of the following will be available at #5 – either Conley, Horford or Brewer. Every one of those guys will be an NBA star, and every one is an upgrade over what we have now.

Conley is a far superior playmaker than Rondo, and before everyone starts howling about Rondo’s defense and rebouding, don’t forget, a point guard is supposed to run the offense first and foremost.

Horford is a huge step up from Gomes. Sure, he and Al would make an undersized front line, but the eastern conference is undersized anyway. Horford has talent and drive and projects to be a legit 20/9 guy.

Brewer would start immediately over Wally and GG. If it’s embarassing to have a guy making $11 million sitting on the bench, I don’t care. This franchise has the responsiblitiy to start making decisions based on talent and the product on the court. Not because they are stubborn, stingy, and embarassed to admit they’ve done a terrible job.

Any one of these choices I’d take over Ainge get fleeced in a wrong headed trade.

Red made his share of poor draft selection but when he he took risks (as in drafting Bird one year ahead of his availability with the added risk that Bird had the option of going into the following year’s draft) he hit a “home run”. Reggie Lewis was quite a find too. Red drafted well when drafting high in the draft and “lady luck” played a large part too (i.e., Bob Cousy).

Red’s trading philosophy was to acquire well rounded players with at least one DOMINANT skill. He also looked for players to BALANCE the roster and when he couldn’t find starters, he then looked for instant defense/offense off the bench. Simple in theory, not so simple in targeting the right players and then finding a trading partner.

While Danny has made some questionable trades with motivation dictated by shedding either problem players, over-paid players or to reduce salary it’s hard to see that he had the assets (to include money) to go after real talent. He elected instead, to acquire draft choices but this process usually brings more rewards to whoever succeeds him rather than himself (because of the time lag for raw player development).

This draft truly begins the Danny Ainge era as a GM and will define him as a success or failure. He cannot be held totally responsible for the poor decisions of his predecessors as some have tried to do.

moskqq, do you work for the Celtics PR team? With all due respect, you cannot give Ainge a pass for three years worth of blunders and state that his era begins now that the team has hit rock bottom. Ainge was solely, and entirely, to blame for the Telfair trade, the 2nd Antoine trade, the Scalabrine signing, the Dickau signing, drafting Marcus Banks, trading for Wally Szczerbiak and re-signing Mark Blount. And I’m not even counting the Pierce extension, but time will probably show that to be a crippling mistake as well.

The moves Ainge has made in response to the prior era’s mistakes were still ill-conceived. The first Antoine trade would be forgiveable if not for the fact that HE KNEW LAFRENTZ WAS INJURED. The Ricky Davis trade was trouble from the start, simply because it was patently obvious that Ricky and Paul fill pretty much the exact same role. As for the Lakers trade, it was imaginative but pointless.

I admire that you want to show some patience, but Ainge doesn’t deserve it.

Agree with George on a lot of points except the “Celtics PR” line. Play nice, fellas. LOL.
Ainge is a vast improvement over previous GMs, which is of course a backhanded compliment cuz others have done so poorly in the draft and trades. Ainge is great at finding players in the draft who do a little bit of everything well but nothing great (West, Allen, Gomes) and can target raw HS talent (Big Al, GG). He deserves credit for Rondo, but not really, not when he could have gotten Roy/Foye.
He’s simply trigger happy when it comes to trades, and that’s what’s really done him in, so I’m pretty much ready to let him go. I’d make two predictions: Either he’ll make the perfect pick at No. 5 or he’ll blow it by trading it away/down. I can just imagine that itchy trigger finger right now, going crazy. Danny simply should not be allowed to trade, period. He hit a home run with Big Al, and practically HAD to take GG at No. 18 because it just seemed silly not to. Time will tell on him. I remain dubious.
That all said, Danny’s done just enough to make us suck, and for that he should probably be canned. If he doesn’t hit a home run in the draft OR pull off a trade this summer (you know how I already feel about that), I say fire him.
My mock board at No. 5: Conley, Noah, Brewer, J. Green, Horford, Wright. (I fear Horford and Wright will be nothing better than 12/7 guys in this league.) If Ainge took the “best athlete available,” it’d probably be Brandan Wright, and he’s too raw with too many question marks to take him. So I say draft for need and not talent and go for either Conley who’s superior to Rondo or Noah or Brewer or Green to provide energy and defense at the forward positions. (I predict Noah will actually make an awesome small forward, but failing that the Camby comparison is apt even if he won’t be that great offensively.)
I want the announcers on draft night to say either “awesome point guard” or “lockdown defender.” Any other comment will be a waste of our time.

I meant the PR line as playfully as possible. Sorry to Moskqu if it came across as snide. I fully respect his opinion.

And yeah Big Easy, this is a terrific point – “I want the announcers on draft night to say either "awesome point guard” or “lockdown defender.” Any other comment will be a waste of our time."

1. On resigning Blount—There was little choice. We had no Center. Perk was going into his second year and was not allowed to play his first year. I believe Dampier and Dalembert were free agents asking for $10 mill. Signing Blount at $6 mill was about all that could be done. Also, Blount is not here any more.
2. On first Antoine trade—It was Ainge’s first year and he wanted to change the style of play. Antoine would have helped the team more if he played under the basket because he was a terrific rebounder. Instead he was playing pg and this was encouraged by the prior coaches. It was also said by prior management that our players were untradeable. Moving Antione got the ball of change moving. Bringing him back for half a season was a nothing to lose move. It got us into the playoffs. Resigning him would have been a bad move.
3. The trade to get Ricky was a gamble because of his reputation. It worked well at first. Many believe he should have won the “sixth man award” in his first full season. Ricky seemed to have his own agenda in his second full season and it didn’t work. Plus, there was noise about him being a problem in the locker room. Trading him for Wally was addition by subtraction (Ricky, Blount-especially-and Banks). We knew Wally had knee problems. Many NBA players do. If Wally was healthy he would have been a big addition to the team. If he’s able to overcome his injuries he can still help this team.
4. With his mid to late first round draft picks and second round picks Danny has put us into a position to get better. We’re not allowed to use youth (and injuries) as an excuse on this blog, but those were facts. No team has ever had to integrate so many high schoolers and inexperienced college players at once. Usually a young player is integrated into a lineup of vets. The C’s have been a class in remedial basketball. As to Roy and Foye a decision was made from tryouts before the draft that Rondo was better. The Telfair deal obviously didn’t work, but 5 years from now let’s look again at Roy and Rondo.
5. I think this year the team needs to show by wins and losses that it is getting better. This year should be the year that it would be fair to evaluate both Danny and Doc.

1) Ainge had every choice not to re-sign Blount. Sportsguy did an extensive piece at the time saying how he couldn’t believe he’d fork over that much for him. Ainge’s fault was that, as always, he misjudged the team’s needs, and chose to move forward with a piece that didn’t fit into the puzzle. This was also ownership’s fault because at the time there was a huge push to show how the Celtics treated their players well, as if this would attract future FA’s. You can see how well that worked out.
2) Again, the first Antoine trade was a debacle simply because Danny knew LaFrentz was hurt. You don’t knowingly take on that hefty a contract when the player in question is damaged goods. The 2nd Antoine trade was pure idiocy. To quote a journalist I cannot recall, but who wrote at the time, “danny ainge traded Antoine Walker and a number one pick for Antoine Walker.”
3) Ricky Davis was another case of “right piece, wrong puzzle.” For the amount of damage Ricky did to the franchise (driving out its only good coach of the past ten years, helping to necessitate the trade for Wally), it’s hard to point at his success as a sixth man for half a season as a gamble that paid off. And again, as it is widely believed that Ainge could have traded Blount for Kandi man straight up, so it’s hard to call the Wally/Ricky trade “addition by subtraction.” More likely it was a case of “instead of admitting I made a mistake by signing Blount, drafting Banks and trading for Ricky, I’ll ship them all off in a deal so confounding that it’ll take two years for everyone to realize what a disaster it is.”
4) Ainge’s picks have been no more than adequate, and with the exception of Big Al (who he lucked into and immediately offered to Seattle for Robert Swift), none of them have the kind of impact a mediocre franchise needs to right itself. As for Roy and Rondo, were it not for Ainge’s incompetence, both players could be Celtics right now.
5) Barring a major trade for an impact point guard, this team will finish just below .500, lose in the first round of the playoffs, and add another murky chapter to Ainge’s legacy.

In the end, the only thing that matters is results, not that Ainge drafted so-and-so who has so much potential.

In four years here, the Celtics have made the playoffs twice and were eliminated in the first round both times. They have had a winning record only once. This, despite being in a weak Eastern conference.

Next year will be his 5th. That should be enough time to produce a consistent winner. Ainge certainly has positives and it will be a shame to lose them, but we can’t keep a GM around just because he is a good drafter or an upfront guy. Where is the success on the court?

I’m just confused as to why, before the lottery, the RealGM said it was Oden/Durant or bust and then, after the lottery, he backtracked and said the end was not necessarily near. He also said in an earlier piece that Danny struggled at making trades yet he then writes a whole piece defending Ainge’s deals.

There are defenses of Ainge to be made but this writer didn’t make them.

I’m not sold on the idea that Telfair was the centerpiece of last year’s deal. I think he was an add-on that seemed to make sense if Telfair was a shadow of his past hype.

Ainge wasn’t the only one who misjudged Banks. L.A. wanted him, the Wolves wanted him and Phoenix wanted him. It’s the “intangibles” that make drafting such a hit or miss endeavor. Who could have known that Banks was uncoachable? True, the drafting risk gets greater if you plan to project a player at a new position. The conversion from SG to PG is a difficult one and only players with a very high basketball IQ seem able to do it. Bank’s basketball IQ was abysmally low.

I didn’t see Yi nor Al Thornton listed among the top players mentioned in this blog.. According to the Celtic’s, next to Durant, Thornton was the most explosive and complete offensive weapon in the draft. Both he and Durant had an inside/outside game and both were the centerpiece on their respective teams (meaning that they got alot of defensive pressure) yet both shot a high percentage (Thornton shot 44% from 3 pt. range and in the mid 50% overall). Thornton is more NBA ready too having played 4 years.

The problem with us bloggers is that we’re at the mercy of talent evaluators when it comes to projecting NBA potential. That fact is illustrated every year when late round players become more successful NBA players than those rated and drafted higher.

Danny has made poor choices when FORCED to act. Lacking sufficient money to purchase real talent, he’s tried to get by with one dimensional players. Dickau and Blount are good examples. Scal brought high energy and a high basketball IQ and little else…..

I choose to believe that this is the year when we truly see if Danny’s vision is steering this franchise in the right direction.

Everyone re-writes history and pays no attention to the facts. Ainge has gambled repeatedly and few of those gambles of paid off. But, those gambles were not without potential and that is how you get better when you have an aging team that is over the salary cap, you gamble. Reaf didn’t get that huge contract out of charity. He was when healthy an 18 10 guy who could block shots. At his best Raef was a much better player than that knucklehead chucker Tone. The problem was that Raefs knees went south and that was it. He became a shooting big man that could no longer elavate and was making $12 million a year. Danny gambled that Raef’s knees would recover. Had they recovered and Raef returned to form, that trade would have been a steal, Raef and what turned out to be Tony Allen for an unathletic chucker with a bad attitude. Raef’s knees didn’t get better and it turned out badly, but I don’t blame Danny for trying. Further, no one wanted Tone. It is not like All Stars around the league were demanding that their teams trade for the great Antoine Walker or anything. Taking a chance on Raef was about as good as you were going to get for Tone.

Danny gave up two journeyman and Jiri Welsh for Ricky Davis. Had Davis ever gotten his head straight, it would have been a steal. As it was, it still wasn’t a bad trade. It is not like the Celtics were going to go back to the promised land on the backs of Eric Williams or anything. Danny should have gotten more for Davis than Wally but he had to get rid of Blount so that reduced the value.

You can only judge a decision by what was known at the time. I don’t think either of those trades were bad considering what was known at the time. They were gambles that didn’t pay off but they weren’t nearly as bad as people make them out to be.

I’ll concentrate only on the most recent moves of Danny:

1) Telfair #7 was a fiasco, especially when Gay, Foy or Roy were available and Danny made this deal before the draft even began. Danny also had a chance to move up and deal with Toronto that wanted out of #1 selection, and we could have had Aldridge realistically for the likes of our #7 and maybe Gomes/West or Allen.

2) We were desparate for big man help at the start of last year, and Harrington was a good free agent pick up at roughly $8M. Remember, Al didn’t start playing like Big Al until almost midway in the season. I know owners didn’t want to spend the extra $8M but if we were serious about making the playoffs and going at least one or two rounds, Harrington was worth the signing.

3) Ricky,Blount, Banks for Kandi and Wally was god awful. Both this trade and Telfair were evident of poor trades the very hour they happened.

4) We don’t hear of the trades that were possible but because Danny has been toasted twice, GMs around the league aren’t offering what Danny likes, partly because Danny feels they are “suckering” him, and partly because he is gun shy to blow another deal.

“Ricky, Blount (and) Banks for Kandi and Wally was god awful”…????. What? Just because Wally had injury problems doesn’t necessarily make this a bad trade. Kandi should have been used more, a failing of Doc’s IMO.

When Ricky becomes a locker room cancer and a free spirit on the court what’s to like about his lack of team commitment? Blount missed?….and Banks, a miserable disappointment to us, the Wolves and now Phoenix. To rid themselves of this trio was "god awful? What ARE you smoking?

The “hate” disposition towards Danny can be spun any way that you like. I’m with JohnCK on this one. This trade, like the Antoine trade, was a FORCED move and we were lucky to find a trading partner. Had the Wolves substantially improved following this “lopsided” trade you might have some credibility but that trio stumbled there too (to no one’s surprise)!

   Hindsight is 20-20, and I’m not as critical of Ainge as many on this site. It may be the product of 20 years of futility, but at the time he made most of his moves, I was at least hopefull.
   The Walker trade #1 was pretty dramatic at the time, but Walker was a stat stuffing PF trying to be PG, and I think O’Brien wanted him gone as well. At the time of the Blount re-signing, there were rumors that Philly and Miami both were looking at him, and he did finish the year strong that year. Ricky was, at least, fun to watch for a while, and was young and talented.
   As far as the Telfair deal, It was as much a financial move as anything, but Ainge clearly liked him. He should have checked his lineage. If Brandon Roy was in the draft this year , where would he be taken??? Maybe not top 10. or 15
   All that being said, I would not have extended Doc or PP. It was un-necessary, we had them under contract, and Pierce at that price wasn’t going anywhere, just like Vince Carter isn’t going anywhere without the Nets help. Doc has done nothing to deserve a new contract, and that seems like a continuation of the “good ol boy” network, taking care of your friends.

George Meyer said:
  1) Ainge had every choice not to re-sign Blount.

Who was going to play center if Blount was not re-signed? Were Dampier and Dalembert worth $10 mill. What other player on the Celtic roster could play center.

On face value, Doc’s extension does look like an “iffy” move. What we don’t know but have been lead to believe is that Doc was asked to be patient with our rebuilding core of raw youth and then induced to identify “keepers” from this group without regard for our win/loss record. We don’t know but suspect that with Oden and Durant as consolation prizes, losing could have been “painted” as winning.

If rumors are correct, Doc deserved an extension. What probably concerns bloggers more than Doc’s extension is concern about the coaching QUALITY of Doc and his staff. I’m ready to reward loyalty but I’m opposed to rewarding incompetence. This year will tell us whether our concerns were justified or our trust misplaced!

moskqq, I don’t think there’s a conspiracy here or a pre-planned design to lose on purpose. This is a re-building process and Doc understood what he was getting into. I also have a hunch that by signing only a 1 year extension that Doc is not planning to be here longer.