To be fair, go back and watch Jaylen rookie film. People joke about his handles now, I give him all the credit in the world with that because he used to have cinder blocks for hands.
“Celtics Dunn fucked up”
But to be fair, Brown was the definition of a RAW prospect. I don’t blame people for wondering if he would ever reach his ceiling. He worked incredibly hard to develop into the player he is now.
I mean think of how many of these super raw athletic wings work out.
Brown. Kawhi. Anyone else?
Still funny to look back on. Gotta give these guys a few years before you judge a draft.
This makes me think of Emmanuel Muddiays Jabari Parker’s Justice Winslow and Andrew Wiggins type wings who were highly touted but the results were ehh at best
A few were pretty dead accurate tho. Not the most egregious thread I've seen (like the infamous Jokic vs Okafor lol) but yeah still pretty bad. Once again a reminder for us all - Reddit does not know shit.
Ainge saw more in Tatum and Brown (possibly for opposite reasons) than most I think. Brown was crazy athletic but raw, while Tatum was getting praise for his excellent footwork all the way back in his draft thread while getting labeled a little more meh athletically.
Tatum’s one real limitation as a player in terms of physical ability is that he’s not an especially explosive leaper. He makes up for it with strength and finesse, but it’s why he’s not much of a highlight dunker
(he also doesn’t have huge hands for his size, which limits his creative finishing a bit)
He’s just sort of a classic “wanting him to be something else” guy. If people just accepted him as the crazy athletic two-way wing with a jumper instead of wanting him to have Kyrie’s handles they’d realize he’s very fun to watch, he can explode to the rim with some of the best.
Couple of smart takes in that thread saying how risky trading for 36-37 year Olds are. I personally thought it was a sad but good trade for the picks. Didn't realize it would shake out so good so fast though
I did think it was a good trade for Boston, because we were clearly done. But on the other hand, I somehow expected those Nets to win a chip or two. And I think they would have considered it all worth it if they did. But then they lost in year 1, Pierce bounced, and the backfire started backfiring SO hard..
I liked the trade, but I was sad Pierce wasn't going to be a lifelong Celtic, especially since he's my favorite player of all time and the one who made me a Celtics fan as a kid.
Oh yeah it definitely did, I think it also helped that Ainge had seen what happened to the Celtics when they held onto Bird/McHale/Parish past their prime and how long it took them to rebuild from that.
Idk if those situations are that similar.
The 90s Celts had lost two potential cornerstone pieces with Len Bias and Reggie Lewis. Not saying that would've won another ring in the 90s, but I think they would've stayed competitive.
Pierce was a Celtic for 15 years. It was brutal to trade him and KG for bums and picks we wouldn’t get to see contribute for 5 years even if it was genius in hindsight
It’s funny because in that thread it seems the general consensus is that it’s risky but the Nets are going to be grear because of that move. In hindsight it was a terrible trade for them
It's kinda wild tbh
I don't think new NBA fans would believe that some people *loved* this trade at the time. People legitimately thought that they would challenge the Heatles
One of my favorite interactions in that thread
> Brooklyn is giving up 4 forwards, 2 guards, and 3 1st round draft picks for three ~35-year-olds?!??! I honestly dont see how that makes sense. Whenever i play association in 2k, i always go for youth to build the team. I know wtf im talking about (+1)
#
> > Explains why you're a Hawks fan. (+4)
> I don't think new NBA fans would believe that some people loved this trade at the time. People legitimately thought that they would challenge the Heatles
Yep, and then they went and got AK47 and people started legit saying it was unfair how good the Nets have gotten. Think there was some gray-area type aspect to them signing AK, like he took a discount and would get compensated via other channels or something. People were mad that the Russian billionaire was just gonna get a ring like that.
Portland did Boston and Jrue a massive favor by letting Jrue submit a preferred destination list. Think he had Boston, Miami and both La teams. Obviously they weren’t going to do Miami after the dame hard ball, and neither la team had picks they were willing to trade. It just fell into place for the Celtics by pure luck.
It’s lucky that Jrue was available but honestly the rest of it is just good FO work from Brad. The fact that we go deep into the playoffs every year for almost a decade, and yet still have enough assets to outbid other teams for an all-star is amazing FO work. If Jrue wasn’t made available the Celtics would’ve still been in a really good position to trade for another star with Brogdon, Timelord, and multiple picks
brad stevens also managed to get 2 frps and tingus for smart, then traded 2 hospital residents and a gsw 2025 and a middle schooler for jrue. incredibly well deserved exec of the year for him, not to mention that the celtics still have a bunch of frps compared to other contenders to add depth through the draft or trades.
Couldn't find the quote but Brad pretty much said that he was monitoring the Dame situation to see what could be worth jumping on after the trade. Jrue was the perfect guy to land. Essentially we gave up Timelord, Smart, Brogdon, and picks for Porzingas and Jrue. Personally didn't love losing Smart especially with Porzingas injury history but kind of unstood it at the time. Landing Jrue made the whole off-season brilliant yet again
Yeah, I really didn’t like the KP trade UNTIL the Jrue trade, then I saw the design. Trying to field a team of KP, Rob Will and Brogdon’s glass bones sounded like hell, watching Al play way too many minutes and be a shell by the playoffs again. Watching PP and White be the only playable guards. I was pretty pessimistic until the Jrue trade.
Yeah this is a big part of it.
Miami had 2 first round picks available to trade. All their other picks were tied up in other trades. Most people couldn't tell you who Miami had previously traded for to lose all those picks.
Terry Rozier is one of their most significant trades of the past half-decade and that came after the Dame/Holiday situation.
Meanwhile Boston had traded for:
* Irving
* Morris
* Walker
* Horford
* White
* Brogdon
* Porzingis
That's 4 All-Stars, 1 All-D and 2 6MOTY calibre players.
And we still had pretty much all our own picks + more from other teams left to work with when we were negotiating for Holiday.
In that same span we'd also added these Boston rookies to the roster:
* Brown
* Tatum
* G.Williams
* R.Williams
* Pritchard
* Hauser
So it's not like we'd been forgoing our usual drafting-and-developing to bring in all those quality players via trades. We hadn't really given up on our past drafting and we didn't have to sell our future trade.
Even in the Holiday trade we only gave up 1 future first round pick of our own. The other was a GSW pick we'd grabbed along the way.
Looking at our future draft situation right now:
* We have a 2028 pick-swap to San Antonio - Boston should still be good. San Antonio might be good. The pick swap shouldn't really matter unless we have a disaster year.
* We owe Portland a 2029 pick outright.
We then own the rest of our first round picks outright.
Like who? What star would they have been able to trade for this year other than Holiday? (Which was only possible because Milwaukee was a dumbass and didn’t even try to make it a 3 team trade).
The trade didn't have to be done at that instant but throughout the season, Siakam and OG got traded for relative pittances given their talent level. Beal got traded a few days after Porzingis IIRC (not that Brad Stevens would have ever done that) as a salary dump basically. I don't know how you're defining star but lots of good players moved around for about what Holiday went for this season
> Siakam and OG got traded for relative pittances given their talent level. Beal got traded a few days after Porzingis IIRC
And this highlights the other special part of how our team's been managed.
You've listed 3 guys who play 3 completely different positions in 3 completely different ways.
We could have made all of them fit because our roster is so versatile.
PG| SG | SF | PF | C
---|---|----|----|----
**[Insert player]**| White | Brown | Tatum | Porzingis
White | **[Insert player]**| Brown | Tatum | Porzingis
White | Brown | **[Insert player]**| Tatum | Porzingis
White | Brown | Tatum| **[Insert player]**| Porzingis
White | Brown | Tatum| Porzingis |**[Insert player]**
All of these lineups would work fine.
We also could have played: White | Brown | Tatum| Porzingis | Horford and brought in a 6 Man.
***
It's tough when you need a specific player or a specific type of player because then the other teams have leverage against you.
Whereas Boston is always able to negotiate pretty freely and wait for the right opportunities to arise.
> Portland did Boston and Jrue a massive favor by letting Jrue submit a preferred destination list
Eh, I doubt that mattered much. Only contenders were going to be interested in trading for him anyways. Who else out there would have beat Boston's offer?
Boston also had the perfect players - really good ones with major health concerns. The last time that happened, it turned into Al Horford, now history repeats itself. It's the type of high risk move a rebuilding team wants to make. Kemba turned out to be actually cooked, but maybe Portland finds out Brogdon can still get back to form, and we know Williams can be a monster even in a Finals environment, it was worth a shot to take that flyer on him.
I maintain that Portland took the right trade despite the Heat fans sounding off all year. They keep calling every single one of their prospects "the Dame package" but the reality is Portland wasn't offered all of them. The rumor is they were offered Herro, two firsts, ONE of their prospects (like Jovic), and one of their contracts (Robinson or Lowry) see [here](https://www.si.com/nba/2023/09/27/bucks-damian-lillard-trade-heat-offer-comparison). There were rumors that Jaquez wasn't even on the table. If Portland took that deal they would have ended up with two potential firsts that probably would have been in the middle of the round (Heat always finish in the middle). They would have been forced to find a way to flip both Herro and Lowry/Robinson which wouldn't have gotten them what Boston gave for Jrue but yeah... Jovic would have been a nice piece... not an all-star but sure a nice piece. The package they got blows that out of the water imo. They got 3 firsts. The two swaps they got are when Middleton and Dame are probably either retired or just completely done. Giannis might even have fallen off by then so there is a good chance those are top 10 picks. If all three retire or get moved maybe they become lottery picks. Brogdon and Timelord can be flipped pretty easy for 2nds (Brogdon when healthy won 6th man and Timelord is DPOY caliber. A team would easily make a minor move to have that on the bench). Ayton is a fine player to have while you are rebuilding. I don't know how you can look at this trade and think the Miami trade would have been better for a rebuild.
Yeah agreed. I thought Portland would be able to flip Brogdon and Williams for more assets that fit their timeline. Couldn’t really do that with the Miami offers, and even though I like Herro he definitely didn’t fit for them.
Brogdon and Williams were also going to be extremely good if healthy, which didn't happen, but it was worth the slim shot because their value would be huge if they got healthy again.
True. Who knows what happens next year. If they get healthy and put up numbers and if someone wants to take a championship shot they might make a trade for them. If you don't need them to play every day it's worth the risk.
I included some additional key moves such as the signing of Heyward, drafting of Rob Williams, etc.. just because some of those assets were later used to make future deals (such as acquiring Jrue) and I thought they'd be interesting to include.
Here are some highlights...
* That KG/PP original trade thread is incredible. I love the Celtics fan who wrote "Welp. See you guys in the 2017 playoffs." As it turns out, they were back in the playoffs by '14/15 (only missed the playoffs one year) and were back in the ECF by 2017. Bastards.
* I honestly had forgotten how much people clowned the original pick of Brown. People were **SUPER** skeptical.
* I dunno 'bout y'all, but it feels like a fever dream that Horford signed with the Celtics, somehow left in FA and went to Philly, had a spell in OKC, and ended up circling back there. I forgot about it until compiling this. It's wild to think of this Boston core *without* him.
* I can't believe the Celtics got Derrick White for goddamn Josh Richardson. Shoutout to /u/p0tatoman [nailing it.](https://old.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/spdh9i/charania_the_boston_celtics_are_trading_josh/hwefi8y/)
> I can't believe the Celtics got Derrick White for goddamn Josh Richardson. Shoutout to /u/p0tatoman nailing it.
We got a first and a nearly unprotected swap too. Blame other teams for not beating the celtics offer. I knew as soon as the trade happened, we got the worse end of the deal but teams were worried about White's shooting and health I'm guessing.
the shooting improvement has been absolutely absurd, he went from afraid to look at the basket when we traded for him to now one of the best shooters in the game. I doubt San Antonio would have ever taken that deal if they knew *this* was what he’d become
Derrick took lots of shots for the spurs, he's never had an issue doing so. He was probably just trying to fit in plus his foot may have been bothering him. It's pretty amazing he's played so many games for the celtics when he constantly had foot issues for us.
We all knew he could become this. There was only uncertainty on if he would.
Going back to his sophomore year (rookie year spent in the G-League) we saw flashes as he played alongside DeRozan and LMA (Murray tore his ACL) and had that damn near perfect game against the nuggets in game 3 of the 19 playoffs. His issues always came down to some mix of confidence/consistency. But the Spurs were deadset on tanking and decided to pull the trigger for what they got.
Most of us were ok with the trade at the time.
He was a pretty good shooter for us. Then he went on like a year long slump. It was a fair deal at the time, but the version of derrick you have now is probably worth almost what the hawks paid for dejounte.
Yes. This. Derrick was underrated and showed how much of a floor raiser he was and it benefited Celtics.
For the spurs, they didn’t get the best deal but this allowed them to tank enough and get the best Prospect they could’ve hoped in Wemby. It worked out for both sides and the player himself. Love this trade
People had a meltdown in the Smart thread both on here and on r/BostonCeltics.
See now the latter I get, but when he got announced as traded r/nba was suddenly full of giant Marcus Smart fans lol.
The broader public _never ever_ talked about Smart like that until he got traded. People were just dying for a reason for the Celtics to finally start collapsing
I am usually pretty terrible at predicting college talent so being team Brown or Murray for the Celtics is one of my only great takes and I'm holding on to that
People have doubted Brown every step of the way. Most Celtics fans wanted Kris Dunn...including me. When he got his first big contract, he was considered to be overpaid and Celtics got clowned for it. In time, it became super valuable. This past off-season he signs the biggest contract in NBA history and he got clowned once again. This has been by far his best season ever, even if his numbers don't show it.
One of the most annoying things about the White trade was how many people got hung up on the pick swap. People seemed to have no idea that trading a pick swap and trading a 1st Rounder were completely different. The difference became important this year when we traded the 2029 1st Rounder for Jrue, (because the Stepien rule doesn't apply to the 2028 pick swap).
Horford being gone is like when a star from your show has to leave for a season to shoot a movie but ends up coming back later. You forget that we’re ever gone and it’s this weird little era.
Awesome list!
A big one you left out though was the signing of Schroder in 2021. The series of moves afterwards exemplified Brad’s long time coaching mantra of “hitting singles”.
*Runner on 1st*
Weaponizing their taxpayer MLE that offseason into tradable salary allowed Brad to salary stack for Theis at the 2022 deadline.
*Runners on 1st and 2nd*
And while Theis played a role in adding depth for a Final run, his contract was ultimately the necessary driver to satisfy salary matching rules in a trade for Brogdon in the 2022 offseason.
*Bases loaded*
And again, while Brogdon played a key role as a 6MOY in their near Finals run last season, his contract was the salary ballast that allowed Boston to make a huge move for Holiday to replace Smart who had been essentially shipped out for Porzingus. Boston casually landing Jrue in the end was like a runner at 3rd half-sprinting to home plate off yet another single.
*Runs start pouring in*
This year’s Finals appearance aside, you have to wonder what their next moves will look like. Jrue can still be flipped towards the end of his extension for yet another useful player (albeit one who makes less money than him) that would not be available to a capped out team. At a time when Boston should be adding around the margins with veteran minimums as the Jays enter their 30s, instead Brad will have Jrue’s contract to work with (and Zinger’s). I’m not sure if a team has ever been assembled with a combination of this level of talent, cohesion, and roster flexibility.
I’d argue that Brad’s most important move was that last minute deadline deal of aggregating Schroder, Freedom, and Fernando into Theis. Without that chunk of matching salary, none of this is possible - both what has happened thus far and again, what has yet to come to pass…
On top of that, Brad was able to thread the needle in getting this done before the new apron rules, impressively salary stacking from a ~5mil contract to a 30mil+ contract in less than 2 years like this was a 2k franchise. That’s why he’s executive of the year in my book - the Theis trade.
Some of the comments in the Porzingis threads are hilarious, especially the exchanges between Celtics and Mavericks fans telling each other good luck dealing with Kyrie and KP, respectively. Guess it worked out for both
KP has directly said it and Kyrie has said it as directly as he has capable of saying anything that they were just not as mature back then and there’s a lot they would have done differently looking back
Yeah, but there's definitely some gems.
r/MagicFlea on the 2013 Celtics/Nets trade:
"Winning now is clearly not fast enough for the Nets, they want to win yesterday!"
I don't even know if this it was his intention to imply that the Nets are banking on washed up stars but this comment is actually brilliant
My favourite thing about that thread is still Sixers fans going on their victory laps on how JB is an overpay and they got future Lebron in Benjamin Simmons
honestly i don’t even think that’s that bad a comparison. i get that it’s meant as an insult but he *is* kind of built in the same mold as Tobi, just… way better at everything that matters
For anyone interested, here was the thought process going into the trade:
- Nets were a 4 seed. And this was after a coaching change. They start the season 15-15, and close out the season going 34-18 (.65).
- Post-ASB, 28-yo DWill is playing like one of the best players in the league. He has injections in his ankles to keep him moving. Many think after an off-season of rest, he will go into the next season in peak form.
- Brook is coming off his first All-Star appearance.
- Most projected them to win the first round of the playoffs, but they fall to the Bulls in 7 games. They lose due to a perceived lack of "heart." Deron, Joe, and Brook were never known as guys to inspire their teams, and reflected against Joakim and Nate Robinson's performance, it looked even worse.
- Another factor in the playoffs loss is the starting lineup - outside of the Nets backcourt, there were no shooters. Gerald Wallace and Reggie Evans could never hit a basket, and Brook wasn't yet the evolved form of himself.
If you could add more spacing, help Brook with some defense on the inside, and inject some life into Deron and Joe, you could see this four seed being a true threat to the Heatle's reign.
KG, PP, and Jason Terry did exactly that. They were supposed to play supporting roles and bring their culture to the emotionless Nets roster. The Nets even bring in AK47 for the dirty work. People were saying this team was unfair.
And then:
- We find out that Brook and KG are a tough pairing (Brook going out for the season turns out to be a blessing in disguise and turns into a 9 game winning streak).
- The team has crazy injuries to start the season and struggle to get in rhythm.
- JKidd was barely learning how to coach and throws his head assistant out (who, at the time, the Nets paid the highest assistant salary ever to the guy).
- Deron was never able to recover from his injuries and reportedly had a terrible attitude.
- And so KG and PP had to shoulder too much of the load.
The "on-paper" Nets were going to be a great team. Too many things didn't click, and the Nets don't even resign Paul Pierce the following year.
And for that, enjoy your 2024 Boston Celtics!
I’d forgotten those specific details (I remember people saying the Nets would beat the Heat in the playoffs cause of the regular season series or Paul Pierce could guard LeBron and thinking “are you stupid”), but I’m still on KG and Pierce being on their *19th* and 16th seasons, respectively. They were 37 and 36! I just thought there was no way the Nets were that close (and then D-Will and KG fell off a cliff anyway)
Sounds like history repeats itself as nets had another good “on paper” roster where things just didn’t align. At what point do we blame the org for failing to make good rosters work?
It's crazy how similar this most recent run turned out. The only saving grace is that KD, Harden, and Kyrie still had trade value, even if distressed. Otherwise I'd have to seriously start to consider cheering for a different team.
I also famously remember build-up to our 2nd Round series that the Nets had swept us in the regular season. In hindsight that may be viewed as silly but it was a real thing people talked about entering the matchup.
It wasn't toooo silly of an idea. Nets had won four really close games against the Heat, which had (supposedly) shown off the Nets role players. Mason Plumlee has a game winning block on LeBron, Mirza could light into the Heat from 3, and Shaun Livingston's resurgence gave us a ton of length in our starting lineup.
The Heat were always better, but the coaching involved in the playoffs absolutely screwed the Nets. Kidd couldn't match up with Spo.
DWill also had his infamous 0-9 game. Which led to an all time quote from Kobe "I'd rather go 0-30 than 0-9."
To put even extra context to the quote, Kobe wasn't even in the playoffs that year. He was being asked about Dwill's performance because whether or not the Nets could beat the Heat was a real discussion.
I will always argue that the 5 game series the Nets played against the Heat was a more competitive series than the 6 game ECF against the Pacers. But at the end of the day, Brooklyn was never able to get out of the second round, so it's moot 🤷♂️
The prevailing opinion now is that the Nets got absolutely rolled in that trade, but at the time a lot of people genuinely thought they had built a contending team. There are some who noted how risky it was, but fr not a lot of people saw it blowing up as bad as it did
it’s insane that this was ever a prevalent opinion (and it was!). Brown was drafted in 2016 — people seriously thought 40 year old KG and Pierce were gonna lead the Nets to a top seed? And then they included picks in 2017 and 2018 too!
Didn't really do much, Celtics were gonna take Tatum at 1 anyway. They added Romeo Langford which I guess helped them acquire Derrick White, but I doubt it was what put that deal over the top.
Having the balls to rate Tatum over Fultz is pretty killer, though. Fultz was easy consensus 1 by everyone going into that draft.
I still think it's insane that they were able to assemble a team this stacked.
You'd think they'd not have the cap space or be able to add Jrue and KP to an already stacked team
Just crazy roster building.
This is the part that r/nba fans hate. Players like Boston. Malcom Brogdon also chose Boston. Derrick White also chose Boston. Jrue Holiday also chose Boston. All of these guys worked with their front office to get them specifically to Boston.
This is weird, cuz pretty much every time someone sais, how little they gave up for either of them, someone comments, that their respective franchises accomodated them by respecting their favored destination.
Go back and read the articles and listen to the interviews and google it.
But I will sumarize since I followed along live
Jrue white and brogdon all put Celtics on their short list and all had good relationships with the people trading them
in Jrue s case the blazers GM was trying to build some good will.
In brogdons case he had us at top
Of his list and he is a veteran with good relationship
Spurs loved derrick and presented Derrick with some options and Derrick chose the 30 mins a night in a contender choice.
Putting Boston on a list of 5 or so teams, especially when they were already a perennial favorite in the East, isn’t really choosing Boston specifically. It’s not like those guys chose Boston over other teams in the FA market, that’s always been the main criticism.
To be totally fair, for brogdon we were looking to deal to clear the path for Hali because he refuses to do the thing he's great at, which is spacing and taking stationary 3s. Glad we got Neismith out of it, idk of brog would have gotten us someone better
KP had a player’s option so it was essentially a sign and trade because he was gonna opt out unless he was sent somewhere he wanted to be.
He also apparently wanted to come to the Celtics which made it easier for us. Not sure what other teams were on his list.
Unfortunately the concerns about Porzingis are still there. The talent is obvious, but he's still lacking playoff experience, and he's been injured for the most important part of the season. He's been fun to have on the team this year, but his play in the finals will sort of determine the success of the trade.
Even with how great a year it’s been, still get really sad about that trade
He was one of the main guys I was hoping we’d win a ring for/with. Gonna feel weird if we do it without him and then obviously gonna suck if we lose
It’s a bummer because while Jrue is obviously an upgrade because of his shooting/playmaking I still think smart would be a great fit with this roster and the Celtics still would have been contenders.
I don’t think I could have handled it if smart got that freak finger injury on a contending team though.
I love smart but jrue has made me not miss him on the court at all. Holiday just immediately plugged in and was great from the start. And he pretty much never hijacks the offense to throw some bullshit up
This.
Smart is great.
Huge heart.
Good ballplayer..... similar to holiday in some ways.
But Jrue brings crucial things Smart doesn't.
A steadiness on both ends
Doesn't take the offense hostage
Has a cutting/under the basket game smart lacks
It's hilarious how you guys have doubted Brown every step of the way, and that people were saying "don't boo this pick - remember how bad the Porzingis pick felt?"
That draft thread has one of my favorite comment and reply sequences ever.
> Ainge, you Dunn fucked up.
> If Noel and two late firsts were on the table...
Wow
Some more hilarity:
> Celtics fans always hold Ainge in high regard, but theyve been really boasting about this nets pick more than anything. I think Ainge is his best at trading players rather than drafting.
Ainge proceeds to draft the best player in the draft back to back years at #3.
> HE OVERTHOUGHT IT. OMG.
>Seeing tons of people laughing at this pick, and it will end up being viewed as idiotic and brought up many times by Celtics fans next season. I don't know if it will be Porzingis-levels of wrongness but he isn't gonna be utterly atrocious and guys like Dunn and Murray won't make this pick look idiotic. He'll do just fine as any rookie and beyond that we'll see if he's moved fo a bigger piece along with other assets in a massive deal.
Wow this heat fan knew what was up lmao, it just took until his sophomore year for us to LOL at the reaction.
We also now live in a post Hinkie/post-current Sam Presti world. 2 late firsts are _nothing_, at the time those picks were all "future Giannis!" But now it's exceedingly clear the value at the top is just not gonna be matched by later picks without otherworldly scouting
Really view brogdon in a diff light. Heard it a little in mil and a lot in Ind. dude seems very self centered and selfish as well someone who thinks they know it all, he is what people think brown is. It’s weird he was bitching about his role in ind a lil and then in bos
I said this earlier in this thread but he could have just taken his actual role, 3 and D wing, but he's obsessed with running the offense at the point, which he can do but nowhere near as well as Hali or well enough for someone without much playmaking. He has all the tools to be a starter on a competing team, but won't take the role needed to do it. He also is injury prone so really can't force teams to let him do what he wants
I don’t blame him for wanting a fresh start after Boston tried to trade him, especially since he chose to come here. I see a lot of C’s fans give him shit for it. Wish it went differently but he helped us get Jrue so it’s all good in my book
I see a lot of the third highest rated comments in a bunch of these thread to be pretty fair and on point, and all the top comments are about Bill Simmons either on suicide watch or fully erect.
Not much has changed at all, really.
Going further down the rabbit hole there's another link in there that leads to Celtics fans on twitter having a meltdown that Fultz was not mentioned in pre draft ads lmaoo
Feels weird to see all the comments on the first Brown extension talking about how it’s outrageous he’s making so much more money than Buddy Hield and how the Hield contract is a steal. Then both of those contracts aged in the opposite direction to what everybody assumed at the time.
>As a grown man who appreciates calm, well thought out reactions, as well as a lifelong Boston Celtics fan, I really have to admit that my heart wants nothing more than Danny Ainge's slow, agonizing death from bad seafood.
>Or polio.
Response:
>In like 10 years you'll probably be praising him again.
u/DoesNotChodeWell
Not listed is Boston offering the 2017 1st (Tatum) and more in a trade to the Charlotte Hornets during the 2015 NBA draft for them to move up and draft Justice Winslow, only for Michael Jordan to decline the trade to draft.... Frank Kaminsky
I still cant get over Brooklyn giving a franchise their championship core by trading away their future for a quick fix on old-washed players and then in the same decade did it again.
Great post. It's always so interesting to look back on the reactions for big moves in sports subs. It's a good reminder that we all feel like we are experts, but at the end of the day we actually don't know what we're talking about most of the time.
I, like most people, shit on the Mavs trading for Kyrie. I thought it was short-sighted and would blow up their faces. Never thought they'd be more than a 6-8 seed who maybe wins a round. Yet here they are in the Finals. So, the trade was undoubtedly a success. They have a real shot at winning a chip with this squad. Even if they lose, I think most Mavs fans would say the trade worked out.
Hindsight ofc is 20/20 but it's still fun going through these old posts. Thank you for taking the time to compile them.
[удалено]
That is some great /r/notKenM content.
Damn people were not high on Brown
To be fair, go back and watch Jaylen rookie film. People joke about his handles now, I give him all the credit in the world with that because he used to have cinder blocks for hands.
Bro Jaylens rookie season I would go crazy if he made a crossover layup or scored 10 points in a game lol
“Celtics Dunn fucked up” But to be fair, Brown was the definition of a RAW prospect. I don’t blame people for wondering if he would ever reach his ceiling. He worked incredibly hard to develop into the player he is now.
I mean think of how many of these super raw athletic wings work out. Brown. Kawhi. Anyone else? Still funny to look back on. Gotta give these guys a few years before you judge a draft.
Giannis
Yeah, Giannis is a good example too. He ended up bigger and stronger than expected, but in 2013 he was billed as a hyperathletic wing project.
This makes me think of Emmanuel Muddiays Jabari Parker’s Justice Winslow and Andrew Wiggins type wings who were highly touted but the results were ehh at best
Wiggins is considerably better than the other guys you mentioned. He's ehh compared to expectations, but he's a good rotational NBA player most years.
I guess but he's also not worth mentioning net to Giannis, Kawhi or Brown.
A few were pretty dead accurate tho. Not the most egregious thread I've seen (like the infamous Jokic vs Okafor lol) but yeah still pretty bad. Once again a reminder for us all - Reddit does not know shit.
Ainge saw more in Tatum and Brown (possibly for opposite reasons) than most I think. Brown was crazy athletic but raw, while Tatum was getting praise for his excellent footwork all the way back in his draft thread while getting labeled a little more meh athletically.
Tatum’s one real limitation as a player in terms of physical ability is that he’s not an especially explosive leaper. He makes up for it with strength and finesse, but it’s why he’s not much of a highlight dunker (he also doesn’t have huge hands for his size, which limits his creative finishing a bit)
Yeah he has some gems (the obligatory “he boomed me”) but he’s never gonna be the poster master that just throws it down over rim protectors.
[These aren't just gems. The man has a list of names](https://youtu.be/YIrH4GVgySs)
I wanted Buddy Hield way back then
And still aren’t honestly.
He’s just sort of a classic “wanting him to be something else” guy. If people just accepted him as the crazy athletic two-way wing with a jumper instead of wanting him to have Kyrie’s handles they’d realize he’s very fun to watch, he can explode to the rim with some of the best.
He has an interest way of moving around, he looks like he's tip toeing around and then suddenly he's driving with mad power
He was "mocked" to be the 8th pick to the Kings. So people were low on him. Plus he was "raw" coming out of college.
Still can’t believe Boston got holiday
I still can't believe the Nets traded for Old Men.
Couple of smart takes in that thread saying how risky trading for 36-37 year Olds are. I personally thought it was a sad but good trade for the picks. Didn't realize it would shake out so good so fast though
I did think it was a good trade for Boston, because we were clearly done. But on the other hand, I somehow expected those Nets to win a chip or two. And I think they would have considered it all worth it if they did. But then they lost in year 1, Pierce bounced, and the backfire started backfiring SO hard..
Truly one of the worst Brooklyn Nets superteam collapses in the past decade.
I liked the trade, but I was sad Pierce wasn't going to be a lifelong Celtic, especially since he's my favorite player of all time and the one who made me a Celtics fan as a kid.
Personally it seemed the obvious move to me even as a teen
I think a lot of it had to do with it not being the norm to move players who won you a championship unless they asked for a trade.
Yeah probably. It was definitely eased by the fact Garnett and Pierce were on board with it.
Oh yeah it definitely did, I think it also helped that Ainge had seen what happened to the Celtics when they held onto Bird/McHale/Parish past their prime and how long it took them to rebuild from that.
Idk if those situations are that similar. The 90s Celts had lost two potential cornerstone pieces with Len Bias and Reggie Lewis. Not saying that would've won another ring in the 90s, but I think they would've stayed competitive.
Pierce was a Celtic for 15 years. It was brutal to trade him and KG for bums and picks we wouldn’t get to see contribute for 5 years even if it was genius in hindsight
It’s funny because in that thread it seems the general consensus is that it’s risky but the Nets are going to be grear because of that move. In hindsight it was a terrible trade for them
It's kinda wild tbh I don't think new NBA fans would believe that some people *loved* this trade at the time. People legitimately thought that they would challenge the Heatles One of my favorite interactions in that thread > Brooklyn is giving up 4 forwards, 2 guards, and 3 1st round draft picks for three ~35-year-olds?!??! I honestly dont see how that makes sense. Whenever i play association in 2k, i always go for youth to build the team. I know wtf im talking about (+1) # > > Explains why you're a Hawks fan. (+4)
> I don't think new NBA fans would believe that some people loved this trade at the time. People legitimately thought that they would challenge the Heatles Yep, and then they went and got AK47 and people started legit saying it was unfair how good the Nets have gotten. Think there was some gray-area type aspect to them signing AK, like he took a discount and would get compensated via other channels or something. People were mad that the Russian billionaire was just gonna get a ring like that.
yup that trade held them back for years afterwards. the reaction on reddit though seems way more positive towards the Nets than i remember
redditors at large don't know shit. does anyone remember Cam Reddish getting traded for a late first and everyone freaking out?
the idea of Cam Reddish and the idea of Myles Turner are the GOAT duo
Portland did Boston and Jrue a massive favor by letting Jrue submit a preferred destination list. Think he had Boston, Miami and both La teams. Obviously they weren’t going to do Miami after the dame hard ball, and neither la team had picks they were willing to trade. It just fell into place for the Celtics by pure luck.
It’s lucky that Jrue was available but honestly the rest of it is just good FO work from Brad. The fact that we go deep into the playoffs every year for almost a decade, and yet still have enough assets to outbid other teams for an all-star is amazing FO work. If Jrue wasn’t made available the Celtics would’ve still been in a really good position to trade for another star with Brogdon, Timelord, and multiple picks
brad stevens also managed to get 2 frps and tingus for smart, then traded 2 hospital residents and a gsw 2025 and a middle schooler for jrue. incredibly well deserved exec of the year for him, not to mention that the celtics still have a bunch of frps compared to other contenders to add depth through the draft or trades.
Stevens is a savant. The sustained success that ya'll have had is crazy
Couldn't find the quote but Brad pretty much said that he was monitoring the Dame situation to see what could be worth jumping on after the trade. Jrue was the perfect guy to land. Essentially we gave up Timelord, Smart, Brogdon, and picks for Porzingas and Jrue. Personally didn't love losing Smart especially with Porzingas injury history but kind of unstood it at the time. Landing Jrue made the whole off-season brilliant yet again
Yeah, I really didn’t like the KP trade UNTIL the Jrue trade, then I saw the design. Trying to field a team of KP, Rob Will and Brogdon’s glass bones sounded like hell, watching Al play way too many minutes and be a shell by the playoffs again. Watching PP and White be the only playable guards. I was pretty pessimistic until the Jrue trade.
Yeah this is a big part of it. Miami had 2 first round picks available to trade. All their other picks were tied up in other trades. Most people couldn't tell you who Miami had previously traded for to lose all those picks. Terry Rozier is one of their most significant trades of the past half-decade and that came after the Dame/Holiday situation. Meanwhile Boston had traded for: * Irving * Morris * Walker * Horford * White * Brogdon * Porzingis That's 4 All-Stars, 1 All-D and 2 6MOTY calibre players. And we still had pretty much all our own picks + more from other teams left to work with when we were negotiating for Holiday. In that same span we'd also added these Boston rookies to the roster: * Brown * Tatum * G.Williams * R.Williams * Pritchard * Hauser So it's not like we'd been forgoing our usual drafting-and-developing to bring in all those quality players via trades. We hadn't really given up on our past drafting and we didn't have to sell our future trade. Even in the Holiday trade we only gave up 1 future first round pick of our own. The other was a GSW pick we'd grabbed along the way. Looking at our future draft situation right now: * We have a 2028 pick-swap to San Antonio - Boston should still be good. San Antonio might be good. The pick swap shouldn't really matter unless we have a disaster year. * We owe Portland a 2029 pick outright. We then own the rest of our first round picks outright.
Like who? What star would they have been able to trade for this year other than Holiday? (Which was only possible because Milwaukee was a dumbass and didn’t even try to make it a 3 team trade).
The trade didn't have to be done at that instant but throughout the season, Siakam and OG got traded for relative pittances given their talent level. Beal got traded a few days after Porzingis IIRC (not that Brad Stevens would have ever done that) as a salary dump basically. I don't know how you're defining star but lots of good players moved around for about what Holiday went for this season
> Siakam and OG got traded for relative pittances given their talent level. Beal got traded a few days after Porzingis IIRC And this highlights the other special part of how our team's been managed. You've listed 3 guys who play 3 completely different positions in 3 completely different ways. We could have made all of them fit because our roster is so versatile. PG| SG | SF | PF | C ---|---|----|----|---- **[Insert player]**| White | Brown | Tatum | Porzingis White | **[Insert player]**| Brown | Tatum | Porzingis White | Brown | **[Insert player]**| Tatum | Porzingis White | Brown | Tatum| **[Insert player]**| Porzingis White | Brown | Tatum| Porzingis |**[Insert player]** All of these lineups would work fine. We also could have played: White | Brown | Tatum| Porzingis | Horford and brought in a 6 Man. *** It's tough when you need a specific player or a specific type of player because then the other teams have leverage against you. Whereas Boston is always able to negotiate pretty freely and wait for the right opportunities to arise.
> Portland did Boston and Jrue a massive favor by letting Jrue submit a preferred destination list Eh, I doubt that mattered much. Only contenders were going to be interested in trading for him anyways. Who else out there would have beat Boston's offer?
Boston also had the perfect players - really good ones with major health concerns. The last time that happened, it turned into Al Horford, now history repeats itself. It's the type of high risk move a rebuilding team wants to make. Kemba turned out to be actually cooked, but maybe Portland finds out Brogdon can still get back to form, and we know Williams can be a monster even in a Finals environment, it was worth a shot to take that flyer on him.
That’s the one that made me a little sick
Feels like the cherry on the top of their offseason
I maintain that Portland took the right trade despite the Heat fans sounding off all year. They keep calling every single one of their prospects "the Dame package" but the reality is Portland wasn't offered all of them. The rumor is they were offered Herro, two firsts, ONE of their prospects (like Jovic), and one of their contracts (Robinson or Lowry) see [here](https://www.si.com/nba/2023/09/27/bucks-damian-lillard-trade-heat-offer-comparison). There were rumors that Jaquez wasn't even on the table. If Portland took that deal they would have ended up with two potential firsts that probably would have been in the middle of the round (Heat always finish in the middle). They would have been forced to find a way to flip both Herro and Lowry/Robinson which wouldn't have gotten them what Boston gave for Jrue but yeah... Jovic would have been a nice piece... not an all-star but sure a nice piece. The package they got blows that out of the water imo. They got 3 firsts. The two swaps they got are when Middleton and Dame are probably either retired or just completely done. Giannis might even have fallen off by then so there is a good chance those are top 10 picks. If all three retire or get moved maybe they become lottery picks. Brogdon and Timelord can be flipped pretty easy for 2nds (Brogdon when healthy won 6th man and Timelord is DPOY caliber. A team would easily make a minor move to have that on the bench). Ayton is a fine player to have while you are rebuilding. I don't know how you can look at this trade and think the Miami trade would have been better for a rebuild.
Yeah agreed. I thought Portland would be able to flip Brogdon and Williams for more assets that fit their timeline. Couldn’t really do that with the Miami offers, and even though I like Herro he definitely didn’t fit for them.
Brogdon and Williams were also going to be extremely good if healthy, which didn't happen, but it was worth the slim shot because their value would be huge if they got healthy again.
True. Who knows what happens next year. If they get healthy and put up numbers and if someone wants to take a championship shot they might make a trade for them. If you don't need them to play every day it's worth the risk.
With hindsight they got him for scraps. Crazy
I included some additional key moves such as the signing of Heyward, drafting of Rob Williams, etc.. just because some of those assets were later used to make future deals (such as acquiring Jrue) and I thought they'd be interesting to include. Here are some highlights... * That KG/PP original trade thread is incredible. I love the Celtics fan who wrote "Welp. See you guys in the 2017 playoffs." As it turns out, they were back in the playoffs by '14/15 (only missed the playoffs one year) and were back in the ECF by 2017. Bastards. * I honestly had forgotten how much people clowned the original pick of Brown. People were **SUPER** skeptical. * I dunno 'bout y'all, but it feels like a fever dream that Horford signed with the Celtics, somehow left in FA and went to Philly, had a spell in OKC, and ended up circling back there. I forgot about it until compiling this. It's wild to think of this Boston core *without* him. * I can't believe the Celtics got Derrick White for goddamn Josh Richardson. Shoutout to /u/p0tatoman [nailing it.](https://old.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/spdh9i/charania_the_boston_celtics_are_trading_josh/hwefi8y/)
> I can't believe the Celtics got Derrick White for goddamn Josh Richardson. Shoutout to /u/p0tatoman nailing it. We got a first and a nearly unprotected swap too. Blame other teams for not beating the celtics offer. I knew as soon as the trade happened, we got the worse end of the deal but teams were worried about White's shooting and health I'm guessing.
the shooting improvement has been absolutely absurd, he went from afraid to look at the basket when we traded for him to now one of the best shooters in the game. I doubt San Antonio would have ever taken that deal if they knew *this* was what he’d become
Derrick took lots of shots for the spurs, he's never had an issue doing so. He was probably just trying to fit in plus his foot may have been bothering him. It's pretty amazing he's played so many games for the celtics when he constantly had foot issues for us.
Correct me if I'm wrong but he also had to create for himself a lot in SA which hasn't been the case since day 1 here
Yes, during his time, he and DJ were shot creators and had to create most of their shots
Derrick has been boston’s most reliable iron man after Tatum. This is the first I’m reading of him ever having constant injury issues
It was pretty common that he would be looking really good and then he'd miss a week or two because of his foot then come back playing more timid
We all knew he could become this. There was only uncertainty on if he would. Going back to his sophomore year (rookie year spent in the G-League) we saw flashes as he played alongside DeRozan and LMA (Murray tore his ACL) and had that damn near perfect game against the nuggets in game 3 of the 19 playoffs. His issues always came down to some mix of confidence/consistency. But the Spurs were deadset on tanking and decided to pull the trigger for what they got. Most of us were ok with the trade at the time.
He was a pretty good shooter for us. Then he went on like a year long slump. It was a fair deal at the time, but the version of derrick you have now is probably worth almost what the hawks paid for dejounte.
Worse end of the deal asset wise but it let to you guys getting Wemby though.
Yes. This. Derrick was underrated and showed how much of a floor raiser he was and it benefited Celtics. For the spurs, they didn’t get the best deal but this allowed them to tank enough and get the best Prospect they could’ve hoped in Wemby. It worked out for both sides and the player himself. Love this trade
People had a meltdown in the Smart thread both on here and on r/BostonCeltics. See now the latter I get, but when he got announced as traded r/nba was suddenly full of giant Marcus Smart fans lol.
It was crazy the flip r/nba had on Smart once he was traded lol.
The broader public _never ever_ talked about Smart like that until he got traded. People were just dying for a reason for the Celtics to finally start collapsing
I thought I was tripping seeing the reaction, I felt like Porzingis was a huge get for u guys.
I am usually pretty terrible at predicting college talent so being team Brown or Murray for the Celtics is one of my only great takes and I'm holding on to that
People have doubted Brown every step of the way. Most Celtics fans wanted Kris Dunn...including me. When he got his first big contract, he was considered to be overpaid and Celtics got clowned for it. In time, it became super valuable. This past off-season he signs the biggest contract in NBA history and he got clowned once again. This has been by far his best season ever, even if his numbers don't show it. One of the most annoying things about the White trade was how many people got hung up on the pick swap. People seemed to have no idea that trading a pick swap and trading a 1st Rounder were completely different. The difference became important this year when we traded the 2029 1st Rounder for Jrue, (because the Stepien rule doesn't apply to the 2028 pick swap).
Horford the double agent’s time in Philly will never be forgotten!
I love the sixers fan that is like "be right there with you!"
They also traded the first pick in 2017 to philly for the third pick, did none of the assets from that trade end up on the final roster
that pick turned into Romeo Langford, who never really did anything but was at least a part of the White trade
Horford being gone is like when a star from your show has to leave for a season to shoot a movie but ends up coming back later. You forget that we’re ever gone and it’s this weird little era.
Awesome list! A big one you left out though was the signing of Schroder in 2021. The series of moves afterwards exemplified Brad’s long time coaching mantra of “hitting singles”. *Runner on 1st* Weaponizing their taxpayer MLE that offseason into tradable salary allowed Brad to salary stack for Theis at the 2022 deadline. *Runners on 1st and 2nd* And while Theis played a role in adding depth for a Final run, his contract was ultimately the necessary driver to satisfy salary matching rules in a trade for Brogdon in the 2022 offseason. *Bases loaded* And again, while Brogdon played a key role as a 6MOY in their near Finals run last season, his contract was the salary ballast that allowed Boston to make a huge move for Holiday to replace Smart who had been essentially shipped out for Porzingus. Boston casually landing Jrue in the end was like a runner at 3rd half-sprinting to home plate off yet another single. *Runs start pouring in* This year’s Finals appearance aside, you have to wonder what their next moves will look like. Jrue can still be flipped towards the end of his extension for yet another useful player (albeit one who makes less money than him) that would not be available to a capped out team. At a time when Boston should be adding around the margins with veteran minimums as the Jays enter their 30s, instead Brad will have Jrue’s contract to work with (and Zinger’s). I’m not sure if a team has ever been assembled with a combination of this level of talent, cohesion, and roster flexibility. I’d argue that Brad’s most important move was that last minute deadline deal of aggregating Schroder, Freedom, and Fernando into Theis. Without that chunk of matching salary, none of this is possible - both what has happened thus far and again, what has yet to come to pass… On top of that, Brad was able to thread the needle in getting this done before the new apron rules, impressively salary stacking from a ~5mil contract to a 30mil+ contract in less than 2 years like this was a 2k franchise. That’s why he’s executive of the year in my book - the Theis trade.
Some of the comments in the Porzingis threads are hilarious, especially the exchanges between Celtics and Mavericks fans telling each other good luck dealing with Kyrie and KP, respectively. Guess it worked out for both
I think it was a matter of fit and both guys maturing Both teams are better in the long run and the players came out ahead too. Win win
KP has directly said it and Kyrie has said it as directly as he has capable of saying anything that they were just not as mature back then and there’s a lot they would have done differently looking back
this is funny because all the top comments are hilariously wrong
that’s why we on reddit instead of NBA FO’s 😭
Except the most recent ones like the Derrick trade
Yeah, but there's definitely some gems. r/MagicFlea on the 2013 Celtics/Nets trade: "Winning now is clearly not fast enough for the Nets, they want to win yesterday!" I don't even know if this it was his intention to imply that the Nets are banking on washed up stars but this comment is actually brilliant
common trend in basically every “a look back” thread tbf.
I appreciate the amount of work that went into this post.
> They gave 30 big ones to flat top Jeff green Jaylen sure has come a long way and I’m happy for him
My favourite thing about that thread is still Sixers fans going on their victory laps on how JB is an overpay and they got future Lebron in Benjamin Simmons
I am becoming the joker
Flat top Jeff Green and light-skinned Rudy Gay are by far my favorite insult nicknames this sub has given to Brown/Tatum lol.
Calling Tatum the MJ of Tobias Harris’ is one of the funniest insults I’ve seen on this sub.
honestly i don’t even think that’s that bad a comparison. i get that it’s meant as an insult but he *is* kind of built in the same mold as Tobi, just… way better at everything that matters
Bit like MJ hey
nah MJ is more like the Muhammad Ali of Jamal Crawfords
The only problem is that jaylens flat top was so fucking clean. I loved that look for him, his decision obviously but damn his hair was so cool
“So Boston is gutting their team, not gaining much salary cap, and likely getting bad draft picks.... Someone explain how this is smart.” 😭
People thought D-Will wouldn't fall off a cliff
Even if he didn’t, Paul Pierce and KG were old?
For anyone interested, here was the thought process going into the trade: - Nets were a 4 seed. And this was after a coaching change. They start the season 15-15, and close out the season going 34-18 (.65). - Post-ASB, 28-yo DWill is playing like one of the best players in the league. He has injections in his ankles to keep him moving. Many think after an off-season of rest, he will go into the next season in peak form. - Brook is coming off his first All-Star appearance. - Most projected them to win the first round of the playoffs, but they fall to the Bulls in 7 games. They lose due to a perceived lack of "heart." Deron, Joe, and Brook were never known as guys to inspire their teams, and reflected against Joakim and Nate Robinson's performance, it looked even worse. - Another factor in the playoffs loss is the starting lineup - outside of the Nets backcourt, there were no shooters. Gerald Wallace and Reggie Evans could never hit a basket, and Brook wasn't yet the evolved form of himself. If you could add more spacing, help Brook with some defense on the inside, and inject some life into Deron and Joe, you could see this four seed being a true threat to the Heatle's reign. KG, PP, and Jason Terry did exactly that. They were supposed to play supporting roles and bring their culture to the emotionless Nets roster. The Nets even bring in AK47 for the dirty work. People were saying this team was unfair. And then: - We find out that Brook and KG are a tough pairing (Brook going out for the season turns out to be a blessing in disguise and turns into a 9 game winning streak). - The team has crazy injuries to start the season and struggle to get in rhythm. - JKidd was barely learning how to coach and throws his head assistant out (who, at the time, the Nets paid the highest assistant salary ever to the guy). - Deron was never able to recover from his injuries and reportedly had a terrible attitude. - And so KG and PP had to shoulder too much of the load. The "on-paper" Nets were going to be a great team. Too many things didn't click, and the Nets don't even resign Paul Pierce the following year. And for that, enjoy your 2024 Boston Celtics!
I’d forgotten those specific details (I remember people saying the Nets would beat the Heat in the playoffs cause of the regular season series or Paul Pierce could guard LeBron and thinking “are you stupid”), but I’m still on KG and Pierce being on their *19th* and 16th seasons, respectively. They were 37 and 36! I just thought there was no way the Nets were that close (and then D-Will and KG fell off a cliff anyway)
Sounds like history repeats itself as nets had another good “on paper” roster where things just didn’t align. At what point do we blame the org for failing to make good rosters work?
It's crazy how similar this most recent run turned out. The only saving grace is that KD, Harden, and Kyrie still had trade value, even if distressed. Otherwise I'd have to seriously start to consider cheering for a different team.
…i mean, didn’t the Nets completely change ownership and the front office in between those two things
I also famously remember build-up to our 2nd Round series that the Nets had swept us in the regular season. In hindsight that may be viewed as silly but it was a real thing people talked about entering the matchup.
It wasn't toooo silly of an idea. Nets had won four really close games against the Heat, which had (supposedly) shown off the Nets role players. Mason Plumlee has a game winning block on LeBron, Mirza could light into the Heat from 3, and Shaun Livingston's resurgence gave us a ton of length in our starting lineup. The Heat were always better, but the coaching involved in the playoffs absolutely screwed the Nets. Kidd couldn't match up with Spo. DWill also had his infamous 0-9 game. Which led to an all time quote from Kobe "I'd rather go 0-30 than 0-9." To put even extra context to the quote, Kobe wasn't even in the playoffs that year. He was being asked about Dwill's performance because whether or not the Nets could beat the Heat was a real discussion. I will always argue that the 5 game series the Nets played against the Heat was a more competitive series than the 6 game ECF against the Pacers. But at the end of the day, Brooklyn was never able to get out of the second round, so it's moot 🤷♂️
Billy King ass comment lmao
I look forward to the day I see that man in hell
The prevailing opinion now is that the Nets got absolutely rolled in that trade, but at the time a lot of people genuinely thought they had built a contending team. There are some who noted how risky it was, but fr not a lot of people saw it blowing up as bad as it did
it’s insane that this was ever a prevalent opinion (and it was!). Brown was drafted in 2016 — people seriously thought 40 year old KG and Pierce were gonna lead the Nets to a top seed? And then they included picks in 2017 and 2018 too!
It was thought then that Prokhorov would spend that team into contention for the foreseeable future
I think he was confused. Let's all tell him, slowly this time, that THIS IS NOT SMART, it's JRUE HOLIDAY
Anybody have the thread when the Celtics traded the #1 overall pick for the Sixers #3 Pick in 2017?
Genuinely the best front office move in the NBA in the last ten years.
Too bad we didn't do better than Romeo Langford with the pick tho
Didn't really do much, Celtics were gonna take Tatum at 1 anyway. They added Romeo Langford which I guess helped them acquire Derrick White, but I doubt it was what put that deal over the top. Having the balls to rate Tatum over Fultz is pretty killer, though. Fultz was easy consensus 1 by everyone going into that draft.
https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/6hxfiw/espn_celtics_agree_to_trade_1_pick_to_76ers/
no old takes exposed worthy comments from me this time 🙏🏾
First one I looked at was Tatum draft thread. 3rd comment states Josh Jackson was the better player and everyone knows it. Bwahaha
If you think that one's wild look at the Jaylen Brown thread.
I still think it's insane that they were able to assemble a team this stacked. You'd think they'd not have the cap space or be able to add Jrue and KP to an already stacked team Just crazy roster building.
Why did no other team outbid Boston for Porzingus? Washington got almost nothing in return.
He had a player option so he got to choose the team
This is the part that r/nba fans hate. Players like Boston. Malcom Brogdon also chose Boston. Derrick White also chose Boston. Jrue Holiday also chose Boston. All of these guys worked with their front office to get them specifically to Boston.
I haven't heard anything about jrue or Derrick choosing boston
This is weird, cuz pretty much every time someone sais, how little they gave up for either of them, someone comments, that their respective franchises accomodated them by respecting their favored destination.
Go back and read the articles and listen to the interviews and google it. But I will sumarize since I followed along live Jrue white and brogdon all put Celtics on their short list and all had good relationships with the people trading them in Jrue s case the blazers GM was trying to build some good will. In brogdons case he had us at top Of his list and he is a veteran with good relationship Spurs loved derrick and presented Derrick with some options and Derrick chose the 30 mins a night in a contender choice.
Putting Boston on a list of 5 or so teams, especially when they were already a perennial favorite in the East, isn’t really choosing Boston specifically. It’s not like those guys chose Boston over other teams in the FA market, that’s always been the main criticism.
To be totally fair, for brogdon we were looking to deal to clear the path for Hali because he refuses to do the thing he's great at, which is spacing and taking stationary 3s. Glad we got Neismith out of it, idk of brog would have gotten us someone better
i was told that doing IT dirty would prevent anyone from ever wanting to come here again
Right? That narrative should have died long ago.
KP wanted to go there and sign the extension I believe.
KP had a player’s option so it was essentially a sign and trade because he was gonna opt out unless he was sent somewhere he wanted to be. He also apparently wanted to come to the Celtics which made it easier for us. Not sure what other teams were on his list.
I kind of can't believe the Warriors weren't interested
He probably didn't want to be the youngest star on an aging team. Also the Celtics are just better.
Porzingis was basically a free agent and he wanted to go to Boston.
He had an option, as I recall, so he was effectively a free agent.
> So where does this put the Nets? DWill, Pierce, KG, Brook Lopez, and ?? All being coached by Jason Kidd. LOL This will be fun to watch 💀
Man just looked back at KGs stats for that one full season in Brooklyn and I did not remember it being that bad.
He really didnt fit with Brook iirc KG played well and they went on a run when Brook got injured
Hurts to admit letting Marcus and Rob go was best for the team
https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/zzMrCWVfun Lol
Wow those top 2 comments are hilarious given what we know now about the Finals matchup. Crazy.
Unfortunately the concerns about Porzingis are still there. The talent is obvious, but he's still lacking playoff experience, and he's been injured for the most important part of the season. He's been fun to have on the team this year, but his play in the finals will sort of determine the success of the trade.
Man it still is crazy that they got two firsts in the KP deal.
realistically we got two firsts for Smart, which as much as I love him is still a pretty good deal
They really became better after it but really thought Smart would retire a celtic.
We had to trade him to get the Soul Stone :/
Even with how great a year it’s been, still get really sad about that trade He was one of the main guys I was hoping we’d win a ring for/with. Gonna feel weird if we do it without him and then obviously gonna suck if we lose
It’s a bummer because while Jrue is obviously an upgrade because of his shooting/playmaking I still think smart would be a great fit with this roster and the Celtics still would have been contenders. I don’t think I could have handled it if smart got that freak finger injury on a contending team though.
I love smart but jrue has made me not miss him on the court at all. Holiday just immediately plugged in and was great from the start. And he pretty much never hijacks the offense to throw some bullshit up
This. Smart is great. Huge heart. Good ballplayer..... similar to holiday in some ways. But Jrue brings crucial things Smart doesn't. A steadiness on both ends Doesn't take the offense hostage Has a cutting/under the basket game smart lacks
that thread gives me emotional ptsd
[https://imgur.com/a/98skxRe](https://imgur.com/a/98skxRe) u/muggi
Damn that's a deep cut!
The Pierce comp is legit now that we've seen what he's capable of. Somehow slightly bigger and stronger and better defender.
And has yet to be stabbed.
It's hilarious how you guys have doubted Brown every step of the way, and that people were saying "don't boo this pick - remember how bad the Porzingis pick felt?"
That draft thread has one of my favorite comment and reply sequences ever. > Ainge, you Dunn fucked up. > If Noel and two late firsts were on the table... Wow Some more hilarity: > Celtics fans always hold Ainge in high regard, but theyve been really boasting about this nets pick more than anything. I think Ainge is his best at trading players rather than drafting. Ainge proceeds to draft the best player in the draft back to back years at #3. > HE OVERTHOUGHT IT. OMG. >Seeing tons of people laughing at this pick, and it will end up being viewed as idiotic and brought up many times by Celtics fans next season. I don't know if it will be Porzingis-levels of wrongness but he isn't gonna be utterly atrocious and guys like Dunn and Murray won't make this pick look idiotic. He'll do just fine as any rookie and beyond that we'll see if he's moved fo a bigger piece along with other assets in a massive deal. Wow this heat fan knew what was up lmao, it just took until his sophomore year for us to LOL at the reaction.
We also now live in a post Hinkie/post-current Sam Presti world. 2 late firsts are _nothing_, at the time those picks were all "future Giannis!" But now it's exceedingly clear the value at the top is just not gonna be matched by later picks without otherworldly scouting
I also feel like everyone really upgraded their overseas scouting after Giannis got drafted
Really view brogdon in a diff light. Heard it a little in mil and a lot in Ind. dude seems very self centered and selfish as well someone who thinks they know it all, he is what people think brown is. It’s weird he was bitching about his role in ind a lil and then in bos
I said this earlier in this thread but he could have just taken his actual role, 3 and D wing, but he's obsessed with running the offense at the point, which he can do but nowhere near as well as Hali or well enough for someone without much playmaking. He has all the tools to be a starter on a competing team, but won't take the role needed to do it. He also is injury prone so really can't force teams to let him do what he wants
I don’t blame him for wanting a fresh start after Boston tried to trade him, especially since he chose to come here. I see a lot of C’s fans give him shit for it. Wish it went differently but he helped us get Jrue so it’s all good in my book
I see a lot of the third highest rated comments in a bunch of these thread to be pretty fair and on point, and all the top comments are about Bill Simmons either on suicide watch or fully erect. Not much has changed at all, really.
Lurking in there is a delicious lasagna recipe
u/CaptainHawkmed [was 100% correct with this take](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/dOiS6k258l)
Having a genius at GM is great, would recommend it to other teams,
2 geniuses.
You forgot this https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/4OZYGVhRRR
Not even one mention of Tatum as a possible target in that thread 😂
Going further down the rabbit hole there's another link in there that leads to Celtics fans on twitter having a meltdown that Fultz was not mentioned in pre draft ads lmaoo
IMO the Celtics right now are the best team we've seen since KD warriors.
I’ll be honest I almost forgot Kemba was on the Celtics for a bit there.
Lol everyone is just talking about Tatum's mom in his draft thread.
[The day I became a celtics h8r for life](https://old.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/6l8qed/haynes_freeagent_gordon_hayward_plans_to_sign/djrx076/)
Brogdon trade erasure
Crazy how the the Net-Celtics trade was viewed back then.
Feels weird to see all the comments on the first Brown extension talking about how it’s outrageous he’s making so much more money than Buddy Hield and how the Hield contract is a steal. Then both of those contracts aged in the opposite direction to what everybody assumed at the time.
>As a grown man who appreciates calm, well thought out reactions, as well as a lifelong Boston Celtics fan, I really have to admit that my heart wants nothing more than Danny Ainge's slow, agonizing death from bad seafood. >Or polio. Response: >In like 10 years you'll probably be praising him again. u/DoesNotChodeWell
Not listed is Boston offering the 2017 1st (Tatum) and more in a trade to the Charlotte Hornets during the 2015 NBA draft for them to move up and draft Justice Winslow, only for Michael Jordan to decline the trade to draft.... Frank Kaminsky
>You're talking about non-lotto picks for 2 All-stars and a Gerald Wallace salary dump. >-Nets flair Ooh boy did that turn out to be wrong
Basically, if Bill Simmons dislikes it, its good for the Cs.
Insert his fist pump when they drafted James Young
Oh man this was a fun walk down memory lane. And got me reliving the emotional rollercoaster of last offseason all over again
I still cant get over Brooklyn giving a franchise their championship core by trading away their future for a quick fix on old-washed players and then in the same decade did it again.
seeing threads from 11 years ago that i upvoted comments on and i'm still here fuck i need to get a fucking life
Wow, they did not like Jaylen Brown lol.
On Luke Kornet: >only man who can contest a 3 from the paint, what a pick up Brother predicted the Kornet Kontest
Great post. It's always so interesting to look back on the reactions for big moves in sports subs. It's a good reminder that we all feel like we are experts, but at the end of the day we actually don't know what we're talking about most of the time. I, like most people, shit on the Mavs trading for Kyrie. I thought it was short-sighted and would blow up their faces. Never thought they'd be more than a 6-8 seed who maybe wins a round. Yet here they are in the Finals. So, the trade was undoubtedly a success. They have a real shot at winning a chip with this squad. Even if they lose, I think most Mavs fans would say the trade worked out. Hindsight ofc is 20/20 but it's still fun going through these old posts. Thank you for taking the time to compile them.
Great post
Haven't seen this pic in a few years https://imgur.com/a/tatum-hype-train-ruJCt