Category: Celtics

Tommy Heinsohn Checked Out Aaron Baynes in the Shower and Loved What He Saw

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The regular season hasn’t even started yet and Tommy is already making national headlines for saying outlandish shit. This time though it wasn’t about comparing Tyler Zeller to Bill Russell. It was about checking out Aaron Baynes in the shower and loving what he saw.

“I took a look at Baynes in the shower…..and he looks like ALL of Australia. He is really put together.”

Baynes laughed it off saying he appreciated the compliments from a Celtics legend. Umm yea, ya think? How dare he tell people about my gigantic hog?

Here’s the full clip:

Tommy’s a little bit nuts, we all know that. Tommy is like the drunk uncle at Thanksgiving dinner. We turn our heads when he makes an off color joke or screams into the microphone about a referee blowing a game. You just kind of laugh it off and embrace it because he’s a lunatic, but he’s our lunatic.

In an Effort to End Tanking, NBA Changing Draft Lottery in 2019, Which is Perfect Timing to Not Affect the Celtics!

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ESPN – The NBA’s board of governors voted to pass legislation on draft lottery reform and guidelines for the resting of healthy players in the regular season, league sources told ESPN…The lottery reform changes will be instituted for the 2019 NBA draft..The NBA needed a three-fourths majority to pass draft lottery reform, which is designed to discourage teams from tanking to pursue the best possible odds to select highest in the draft order.

This is great news for Celtics fans in the sense that we won’t be getting fisted out of the last of our coveted (hopefully) lottery picks. Not so much for small market teams that rely on tanking. Christ, Sam Hinkie wrote the book on tanking. Dude got canned by the Sixers, but they wouldn’t be where they are today without him. Trust the Process indeed.

Thankfully the Celtics have already pocketed all those Nets picks:

2018: No. ? – Traded to CLE as part of Kyrie Irving deal
2017: No. 3 – Jayson Tatum (Right to swap with Nets and BOS traded down from No. 1)
2016: No. 3 – Jaylen Brown
2014: No. 17 – James Young

Now the C’s will bank on the 2018 Lakers pick being a Top-2 pick next summer. Looking back, the Celtics “only” got two top-five picks from the Brooklyn trade. Imagine if they’d gotten none because of changes to the Draft Lottery?

Starting in 2019, when the Celtics no longer have top, unprotected, golden lottery picks, the rules change. Perfect. If this shit happened four years ago those Nets picks are DRASTICALLY less valuable and maybe Billy King still has a job.

Long story short, having the worst record in the league is no longer a one way ticket to a top pick. Things are a lot murkier now.

“The three teams with the worst records will share a 14 percent chance of getting the No. 1 overall pick, a change from the descending percentages of 25, 19.9, and 15.6 in the current system.”

So while it was always a nail biter for the team with the worst record because you still only had a 1/4 chance of getting the No. 1 pick; now thats down to a 14 percent chance for 3 teams. In theory that should deter a team from saying fuck it and just tanking down the stretch if the bottom three teams all have the same chance of getting the No. 1 pick. Teams will still tank to get down to the bottom 3, but I guess its a step in the right direction if the NBA truly wants to eradicate tanking (good luck).

“Four teams — increased from three — will become part of the lottery draw, which means the No. 1 lottery seed could drop no further than fifth, No. 2 could drop no further than sixth, No. 3 no further than seventh, and No. 4 no further than eighth.”

Imagine having the worst record and somehow dropping to the No. 5 overall pick? If I’m a fan of that team I’m drinking a bottle of whiskey on Draft Lottery night.

Gotta love the NBA though, they’re always pivoting, always changing shit. Remember back in 2006 when they tried to introduce a new basketball and reversed course like 2 weeks later?

Well virtually every player in the NBA bitched about the new ball. Why change the only piece of equipment that actually matters? Who the hell knows. But hey they tried it. It bombed. And rather than just forcing it down everyones throats because it was the league’s decision they said yup you’re right, fixed it, and moved on. Thats what keeps leagues relevant, adapting to the times, trying new things, and if it doesn’t working cutting your losses and moving along. Not burying your head in the sand (NFL vs CTE) or staunchly opposing evolution (MLB vs everything).

So good luck to all the Lottery teams in 2019, I’m just glad the Celtics will have no part of it because I can’t handle that kind of stress in my life.

Celtics Prominently Featured in NBA 2K18 Trailer and it Looks FIRE

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As I mentioned on this very blog not too long ago, the Celtics basically backdoored their way onto the cover of the biggest basketball video game in the world with the Kyrie Irving trade. So it should come as no surprise, but its still awesome to see Celtics green prominently featured in another excellent 2K trailer. Seriously, is this the only league that knows how to market a video game with music? Anyways, some of the highlights:

And yea, this one definitely hurt. Gonna suck seeing IT check what time it is with fucking LeBron yucking it up next to him.

Full trailer below:

Get Me Andrew Bogut On This Celtics Team ASAP

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CBS Sports – Andrew Bogut is nearing a return to the NBA, and the Celtics are reportedly among the four teams interested in the Australian big man’s services. Bogut, who hasn’t played since March after breaking his leg, underwent a final bone scan on Tuesday and is expected to be cleared to hit the floor in the near future. The seven-footer hopes to sign with a team within the next week, with four teams already showing interest. The Celtics are one of those four teams, according to The Boston Globe’s Adam Himmeslbach.

The Celtics No. 1 weakness for years has been their (lack of) rebounding on both ends of the glass. Usually they seemingly just punt on it and say rebounding will “be a team effort.” Which is a great way to say, we know we’re gonna finish at the bottom of the league in that stat again. They finished 26th in the league last year.

After being one of the most sought after big men at the trade deadline last year, Bogut ultimately signed with Cleveland after getting bought out by the 76ers. Tell me you don’t like my idea, tell me you don’t like my firm, tell me you don’t like my fucking neck tie, but don’t tell me the Celtics aren’t one of the most intriguing teams to join right now, Andy.

Bogut infamously broke his leg in minute 1 on the floor for the Cavs last year. Now healthy the 32-year-old Center is back on the FA market and the Celtics are reportedly 1 of 4 teams interested in the big man. Get this guy on board, Danny. Especially if he’s willing to take the veteran’s minimum. That would allow us to put the Marc Gasol rumors to bed, since we’d have to trade half our roster just to fit Gasol under the salary cap.

Its also a pretty strong coincidence that after the Isaiah-Kyrie trade the Celtics have had one open roster spot looming so I think Danny is hunting for a veteran on the cheap like Bogut. Not a big time scorer as he averaged 2.9 pts last season, but he did average 8.1 rebounds and is a literal 7 footer. His career numbers are 10 pts, 8.9 rebounds, 2.3 assists so maybe his scoring bounces back a bit being in one spot for the entire year, but his rebounding has been consistent his whole career. He’d be a great guy to have on the bench and a true Center to pair with Aaron Baynes, while allowing Al Horford to play where he prefers. Horford played well at Center last year, but similar to how the C’s used to use Garnett, its not his true position. I think Horford playing better was more a matter of him amping up his intensity more than playing the 5.

BRING ME ANDREW BOGUT!

 

The Celtics Just Back Doored Their Way into an NBA2K Cover

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One of the funnier things to come out of the Kyrie -Isaiah trade is the fact that NBA2K18 was locked, cocked and ready to go with Kyrie on the cover…in his Cavs jersey.

A little bit of an issue to say the least with Kyrie now on the Boston Celtics and with the game set to drop on Sept. 19th. So not exactly a ton of time to stop the presses.

The latest 2K tweet says the new Celtics Kyrie cover is “to be released at a later date.” So does that mean I’m gonna have to print it out and slip it into the PS4 game sleeve like I used to do printing out Nomar Garciaparra covers for MVP Baseball?

Welp either way the Celtics just back doored their way into a major video game cover. This marks the 3rd video game cover for a Boston athlete in the last 12 months (Gronk Madden 17, Brady Madden 18). The last one I can recall before that was Patrice Bergeron on NHL 15. Sure, Mookie Betts was on the cover of RBI Baseball 16, but thats a garbage game so that doesn’t count.

Something I Didn’t Expect to Write Back in 2013; It Must Suck to Be Doc Rivers Right Now

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This is not something I expected to write back in 2013. We all knew it was time for the Celtics to break up the band when they did, but I’ll never forget drinking a $3 PBR at White Horse as I somberly watched the ESPN news of the trade light up the flat screens around the bar. I knew it was time, but it still sucked to see the best Celtics team of my lifetime finally break up.

Back in 2013 the Celtics were at the end of an era and it was clear. The Big 3 of Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, and Ray Allen had dominated from their first tipoff together, starting the 2007-08 season by going 27-2 on the way to an NBA Championship. They were always in the hunt for a title over the course of the next 5 seasons and were a ton of fun to watch as they morphed from the dominant top dog into the aging, wily veterans making one last stand.

Once that all came to an end though, Doc Rivers, who infamously said how he wanted to be a part of the Celtics rebuild, almost immediately changed his mind on being part of said rebuild. With 3 years and $21 million left on Doc’s contract he wanted out. So Danny Ainge made a deal with the Clippers to send Doc out west and got a first round pick in exchange.

Shitty move by Doc, but I don’t hold some massive grudge over it like a lot of fans still do. Doc wanted to leave for greener pastures (and more power) in LA so why pay a coach $7 million dollars a year on a lottery bound team? Doesn’t make sense.

Back then though the Clippers were the place to be with young studs like Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan and Chris Paul to bring it all together. They looked like a team poised to do big things while the Celtics looked to be on the brink of a long, slow, and painful rebuild. Except four years later the Celtics are the reigning No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference with have the best young coach in the league in Brad Stevens, having recently added three All-Stars (Hayward, Horford, Irving), and picked up a couple of lottery picks to boot in Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum.

Meanwhile the Clippers are legitimately falling apart. Doc has been stripped of his role as President of Basketball Operations and is back to just writing “Coach” on his LinkedIn profile. Chris Paul is gone. DeAndre Jordan is suddenly 29 and Blake Griffin is now a 28 year old on bad knees who is aging in dog years.

Ask any executive in the NBA and I would bet the house that I don’t own that every single one of them would rather be the Celtics right now. Who the hell would have guessed that would be the case just 4 years ago? That would have been absurd to suggest, yet here we are.

The best part? The Celtics aren’t done. They still have a potential top 5 pick again next year with the Lakers pick and are only going to get better with Kyrie and Hayward on the team with the young guys continuing to develop.

I wonder if Doc looks back and says, welp I really fucked that one up. Not something I thought I would write just 4 years later from that Allston barstool.

Kyrie Irving Wanted Out of Cleveland Because LeBron is a Massive Dickhead

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As this trade languishes in GM negotiation purgatory I just wanted to circle back on some of the criticism of this deal. After the trade became public a lot of people were asking what does it say about Kyrie Irving if he wants off one of the 2 best teams in the NBA? If it were any other team and any other situation I would probably be asking the same question. Why does this guy want to leave a team thats been to the Finals 3 straight years and won a title just last year? Why would you want to leave that situation?

Except this is not any team. This is LeBron’s team and the guy is probably such an insufferable asshole that I don’t blame Kyrie Irving one bit for saying enough is enough.

If LeBron does leave after this coming season, that Cavs team would be in shambles having completely built itself on LeBron’s every whim. A team with stiffs like JR Smith and Richard Jefferson on the squad purely because they compliment LeBron’s game. So Kyrie said screw this I’m out, I’m not dealing with LBJ and I’m certainly not cleaning up his mess once he bounces.

I mean just take a look at this CBS Boston article that dutifully went back and pulled quotes from LeBron immediately after winning the title last year.

“LeBron was then asked about the comeback from a 3-1 series deficit and specifically what changed in Game 5. He said: “Just locked in. I had to change my approach a little bit in how I approached the game. I wasn’t that good in the first two games in this building [in Golden State]. I watched a lot of film, detailed it out, changed my blueprint, and was able to put together some spectacular games after being down 3-1.”

A LOOOT of “I’s” in there. I did this. I did that. I had some spectacular games. Puke city. Especially since these quotes came not 10 minutes after Kyrie saved his ass with an absolute dagger of a three in the final minute of Game 7.

Ya know, while LeBron was bricking shots left and right down the stretch.

So, hey is it a little petty to be complaining about not getting more credit for your role in winning a championship? Sure, but I’m not gonna hold that against a guy. Kyrie seems hyper competitive and wants the keys to the car. Not to mention, the thought of these two guys teeing off on each other opening night and in the playoffs has me all tingly inside. I’m just giddy thinking about the passive aggressive subtweets LeBron is gonna throw out there after the Celtics take Game 1. LETS GO.

Danny Ainge Should Tell the Cavs to Piss Up a Rope if They Asked for Jaylen Brown or Jayson Tatum

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Look, I never wanted to trade Isaiah; thats my guy. But, the Celtics have burned that bridge to the ground so going back isn’t really an option now. And the Cavs know it. According to several reports yesterday, the Cavs are now looking for a pot sweetener to complete the IT deal as concerns about his hip linger.

Hell, Kyrie was already disgruntled in Cleveland and asking to be traded. So if the trade doesn’t go through it doesn’t really affect the Cavs any more than it would have two weeks ago. But the Cavs made this deal KNOWING Isaiah had a hip injury. He suffered that exact injury playing against you for christs sake. So I find it pretty hard to believe that Danny Ainge was playing the role of snake oil salesman about how much healthier IT is or is not.

Especially for such a widely publicized injury. It happened in the Eastern Conference Finals. So I think the Cavs are purely posturing and just trying to hold Danny’s nuts to the fire and squeeze out some additional assets.

Except reports came out that they were asking for Jaylen Brown or Jayson Tatum ON TOP of everything else the C’s gave them, including the Brooklyn lottery pick. There’s only one reply for such an outrageous request.

I mean you’ve got the Celtics already selling Kyrie Irving jerseys, you’ve got Jae Crowder working out in Cavs shirts, there’s no going back on this deal now.

But, to reiterate my point and to borrow a GIF from one of Big Z’s recent blog posts, this needs to be Danny on the phone with Cleveland.

However, now there are conflicting reports the Cavs never made such a request. Who the hell knows. Get in there and clean this shit up Woj. Either way, if I’m Danny I tell the Cavs you’ll get nothing and you’ll like it. That or a second round pick.

Why the Celtics Won the Trade of Isaiah Thomas for Kyrie Irving

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Wow. Last night the Celtics traded Isaiah Thomas, Jae Crowder, Ante Zizic and the 2018 Nets pick for Kyrie Irving. As I said at 7:30 last night, I go off the grid to workout for ONE hour and I come back to find Trader Danny has fundamentally changed the structure of the Celtics with another blockbuster trade. Seriously, sleep with one eye open around this guy.

First things first, it sucks to see Isaiah Thomas go as he was absolutely integral in putting the Celtics back on the map the past couple of years and vice versa. Celtics went from a middling team to the No. 1 seed in the East. Isaiah went from a third string point guard in Phoenix to Boston finishing in the Top 5 for MVP. He had 40 and 50 point games while getting his teeth knocked out and even putting on dazzling performances after suffering tragic family losses. IT seemed like a genuinely good dude with a massive chip on his shoulder who just wanted to prove the world wrong. And he’s done that. IT, the last pick in the 2011 NBA Draft just got traded for Kyrie, the first overall pick in the 2011 NBA Draft.

While IT has been hands down my favorite Celtics player since KG and it sucks to see him go, Kyrie is so, so, so good that its hard to not like this deal. The Celtics upgraded at PG getting one of the best scorers in the entire NBA. Kyrie isn’t exactly a defensive savant either but he’s 6 inches taller than IT, which alone will allow him to more effectively cover the positon defensively. Kyrie is also going to create even more space for the Celtics on offense, especially in the playoffs, as other teams won’t be able to smother and trap Kyrie as they were prone to do with IT. Teams will have to account for his one-on-on play and continuously have help defenders and double teams waiting for Kyrie, which will open up even more opportunities for guys like Al Horford and Gordon Hayward.

The Detractors:

  • “Kyrie is not that much of an upgrade over Isaiah.”
    • He’s 3 years younger, healthier, bigger and has one more year left on his contract than Isaiah. At just 25 years old Kyrie can grow with the Celtics core of Jaylen Brown and Jason Tatum and be right in his prime as the other two are coming into theirs. As much as I love Isaiah, the core probably would not have been good enough quick enough as he and Horford would be in their 30s by the time Brown and Tatum enter their prime.
  • “The Celtics have just wrecked their team chemistry.”
    • This I admit could be an issue as the Celtics now only return 4 players from the 2016 team that reached the Eastern Conference Finals and only 1 out of 5 starters. That is CRAZY. However, one of the reason’s I’m not higher on the NBA in general is because, more than any other sport, talent wins above all else. It doesn’t matter how great your chemistry is if you don’t have 2 or 3 of the best players in the league. The NBA is built around a core of hypertalented superstars and if you don’t have at least a couple of them you’re porked.
  • “I hate to trade Jae Crowder and Ante Zizic.”
    • Always loved Crowder and he was a key guy off the bench. Again this is why I’m not a GM, but if we’re going to look at this emotionlessly, thats what Crowder was; a guy off the bench. You do not turn down trades for 25-year old 4x All-Stars over bench players. And for anyone crying about trading Ante Zizic I ask you this; Have you ever even seen Zizic play? Granted I’m not a scout, but this is a guy who was so good that he couldn’t get on an NBA roster and got stashed overseas his rookie year. I’m not sweating over trading a guy with exactly 0 minutes played in the NBA. Plus, we still have the Dancing Bear.
  • “Who is going to rebound for us?”
    • WHO HAS REBOUNDED FOR US THE LAST FOUR YEARS?! The Celtics as an organization have effectively punted on rebounding. Last year the Celtics were 22nd in Offensive Rebounds per game and 22nd in Defensive Rebounds per game. Not exactly world beaters to begin with.
  • “I hate trading the 2018 Nets pick.”
    • It sucks to trade one of our treasured assets, but thats exactly why Danny got them. He’s been trying to trade these things for years, he just has never found a deal he wanted to pull the trigger on. Plus how many of these things are you going to keep? The Celtics have already drafted No. 3 overall the past 2 years and still have a potential Top 5 pick next year (more on that below.)

How about Danny Ainge though? This guy has effectively turned a 36-year old Paul Pierce and a 37-year old Kevin Garnett directly or indirectly into: Kyrie Irving, Jaylen Brown, Jason Tatum, Al Horford, Gordon Hayward and the 2018 Lakers potential No. 2-5 pick.

And if Kyrie re-signs with the Celtics then Danny looks like an even bigger genius for the Jayson Tatum move, trading down from the No. 1 overall pick to No. 3 while also scooping up the 2018 Lakers pick from Philly. This is HUGE looking back because without that Lakers pick in his back pocket I highly doubt Danny makes the Kyrie trade, having to surrender the Nets pick. He basically, as many said at the time, got the guy he wanted in Tatum while also picking up an additional draft pick. And while many people laughed at Danny for trading the No. 1 overall pick for another one of his coveted draft picks, the fact of the matter is he got a great player while also adding a back up lottery pick, which allowed him to more aggressively shop the Nets 2018 pick.

For those of you that are mourning the end of the “Pierce/KG Nets Trade” well fear not, because its not over, not really. The Celtics got that 2018 Lakers pick by trading the No. 1 overall pick, which was the Nets pick. So we still have one more year to live off of the Nets misery if we’re getting technical. One more asset/player to build off of, while the Nets continue to send Billy King hate mail.

PS – This Isaiah trade just reinforces my longstanding personal policy of never buying a player’s jersey unless they’ve recently signed a contract extension. I’ll never forget buying a Sergei Samsonov jersey in 2006, only to see the Bruins trade him A WEEK LATER. Which is why the next Bruins jersey I bought was a Patrice Bergeron jersey, fresh off his 8-year contract extension.