mafra
Legend
The Boston Celtics finished the 2006-2007 season with the second worst record in NBA (24-58); only MEM had a worst record (22-60). It was one of the worst seasons in franchise history. Paul Pierce would turn 30 that OCT, when the 2007-2008 campaign would begin.
Carmelo Anthony turns 31 in May… So, in essence, for the purpose of this analogy… CA is only 1.5 years older now than PP was back then. In other words, if we point to PP’s run in BOS from 2007-2013, and we measure that tenure to what we hope the potential is for CA in the near future (2015-2019), we can get excited about the best case scenarios… and that portends to rings and titles… if Phil Jax does his job and CA rises to the challenge.
Like NY, BOS had excellent odds to land the #1 pick in the 2007 draft. Maybe the second pick…they had the second most ping-pong balls….
Unfortunately for BOS:
“The lottery was held on May 22,2007 in Secaucus, New Jersey. The Portland TrailBlazers, who had the seventh-worst record in the previous season, won the lottery with just a 5.3% chance to win. This was the fourth time that the Blazers had the first overall draft pick and the first time that the Blazers won the draft lottery since it was introduced in 1985.The Seattle SuperSonics, who had the fifth-worst record, and the Atlanta Hawks,who had the fourth-worst record, obtained the second and third pick respectively.
Three teams who had the worst records—the Memphis Grizzlies, the Boston Celtics and the MilwaukeeBucks—obtained the fourth, fifth and sixth pick respectively. These were the lowest possible picks they could have obtained through the lottery. The most recent draft in which the three worst teams did not receive the top three picks was in 1993.” - - (Wikipedia)
The draft selections, in order, were: Greg Oden, Kevin Durant, Al Horford, Mike Conley Jr, Jeff Green, Yi Jianlian,Corey Brewer… and… what for it… Jokaim Noah (CHI via NYK; On October 4, 2005, Chicago acquired an option to swap 2007 first-round draft picks, a 2006 first-round draft pick, 2007 and 2009 second-round draft picks, Tim Thomas, Michael Sweetney and Jermaine Jackson from New York in exchange for Eddy Curryand Antonio Davis.)
After you swallow the vomit that just surfaced and made your curse IT and Dolan… let’s get back on track. (1) The top portion of the draft offered 4 franchise players: Durant, Horford, Conley, & Noah. Good news for us! Let’s hope the talent is on par… and caliber of players in Towns, Okafor, Russell, Mudiay is equal to those guys.Who knows?
Anyway… This is where Danny Ainge stepped up… as President of BBALL Operations in BOS. Like Phil Jackson, he was a former player. He took on his executive role in 2003… so he had a tad more experience by the time the summer of ’07 rolled around. Like Phil, too, he hired a former PG to be his head coach (Doc Rivers), who took over the HC duties in BOS in 2004. Unlike Fisher, though, DOC had been coaching since 1999… So he was going on 8 years when ’07 arrived. But,again, despite the lack of experience in their current roles… Ainge-Doc might be comparable to Jax-Fish… We shall see.
SO, Ainge lived up to his ‘Trader Dan’ moniker, and didn’t bank the back-9 of PP’s career on some raw, lottery selection.So, he dealt the #5 pick in that draft… shipping it to SEA for Ray Allen. PP had requested a trade after that bad season (something CA hasn’t done)… So, Ainge had to respond… SEA had 2 picks in the top 5… They Got Durant and then grabbed Jeff Green (If only they took Noah)… So, as SEA proved… the draft is a 50/50 bet, at best… just look at the #1 pick (Greg Oden)… D’uh!
Ainge was able to grab Glen ‘big baby’ Davis, out of LSU (who upset Duke that year) in the second round. In 2006, they took a PG from Kentucky (Rajon Rondo) - with the pick AFTER the New York Knicks snagged Renaldo Balkman, from the U.of South Carolina. A double D'uh!
After the Ray Allen trade, Ainge made the single biggest trade (for 1 player) in NBA history, gutting the roster and sending a boat load of guys to MIN for Kevin Garnett. Al Jefferson, GeraldGreen, Theo Ratliff, S-Telfair, a future 1[SUP]st[/SUP] rounder.
With 3 All-Star (PP, KG,Ray-Ray), along with Perkins and Rondo… the Celtics now featured a potent starting 5. They select Glen Davis, had the man from USC, Brian Scalabrine, and then sign a flurry of vets (Eddie House, Scott Pollard, & James Posey).
The roster was rebuilt… re-tooled…overnight folks. Those 2 deals fell in Ainge’s lap. McHale helped in the KG trade… and Jefferson was a good player.Just like LA had help when West shipped Gasol for Gasol, another good player.
The Boston Celtics would go 64-18 in the 2007-2008 season, and win the NBA championship.The “Big-3” would start a trend, and BOS would perennially be a title contender for the next 4 -6 years.
Here’s what Doc Rivers said about NYK’s chances of turning things around quickly:
"Phil Jackson and Derek Fisher know what they’re doing,” the coach said. “They knew that this year would be this year and they just need to rebuild.”
What Rivers stressed, though, is that one pick or one event will not save a franchise.
“We had a lot of assets,” he saidw hen asked how his Celtics turned things around so quickly. “We had a lot of draft picks and we had some really good young players. You think about who we had: Gerald Green, Delonte West, Al Jefferson.… To me, that’s what changed the whole thing. You gotta have both, you can’t just have money because we didn’t do it through free agency.
“We did it through draft picks and trades.”
“Boston fans hung inthere,” Rivers said. “[Knicks fans] can. It can turn around quickly, [the Knicks] got a lot of money,” he said, in reference to the Knicks’aforementioned cap space.
http://theknicksblog.com/knicks/hamilton-doc-rivers-believes-knicks-can-turn-things-around-quickly/#more-60548
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IN CONCLUSION: At this time in 2007, the BOS Celtics were in a better position than our beloved Knicks are in right now. Sure, I grant that... Ainge was experienced enough, with a fewyears under his executive belt… he was re-imaging the team for a 2[SUP]nd [/SUP]time… privy to the logistics of roster-building… aware of previous errors…DOC Rivers was closing in on a decade of coaching… The Celtics had a bunch of talented young players that other teams wanted… plus draft picks. And, finally,Paul Pierce PROVED he could change his game to mesh with two other stars and he rose to the challenge when the bell run and won his title.There was also a Rondo-Perkins tandem in place already (nobody thinks any of our young guards, or bigs, are capable of playing at that level in 2015-2016, that those 2 played at in 2007-2008).
But… on the bright side… We are LOCKED to get a top 4 pick.We also have more young players… quantity over quality… and we have TONS of cap space. In other words, we have enough to sign 1 big-dawg free agent… plus another 1 or 2 very good players… PLUS… we have enough ammo to pull off one blockbuster trade. We do not need to sign a bunch of vets to add depth… make a bench… b/c we have that in place already. Galloway,THjr, Schved, Ledo, Early, Thomas, Aldrich, Amundson, Wear… just young and hungry guys who can give you 12 minutes a night of energy, efficiency, production.
Is it possible to add 2 stars…and 2 solid players… 2 vets… to go with Carmelo and the young guys? Is it possible to plant the seeds… then hit the HR next year, in 2016, and round out the roster and really be in the title mix from 2016-2019?
I SAY YES!!!
IF Phil Jax does his job and brings in the right players, if Carmelo makes it work and rises to the challenge… if a few young guys develop…It’s likely, as BOS proved, we go from NBA worst to NBA Champs… it may not be the next season… maybe it takes us 2 years instead!
Carmelo Anthony turns 31 in May… So, in essence, for the purpose of this analogy… CA is only 1.5 years older now than PP was back then. In other words, if we point to PP’s run in BOS from 2007-2013, and we measure that tenure to what we hope the potential is for CA in the near future (2015-2019), we can get excited about the best case scenarios… and that portends to rings and titles… if Phil Jax does his job and CA rises to the challenge.
Like NY, BOS had excellent odds to land the #1 pick in the 2007 draft. Maybe the second pick…they had the second most ping-pong balls….
Unfortunately for BOS:
“The lottery was held on May 22,2007 in Secaucus, New Jersey. The Portland TrailBlazers, who had the seventh-worst record in the previous season, won the lottery with just a 5.3% chance to win. This was the fourth time that the Blazers had the first overall draft pick and the first time that the Blazers won the draft lottery since it was introduced in 1985.The Seattle SuperSonics, who had the fifth-worst record, and the Atlanta Hawks,who had the fourth-worst record, obtained the second and third pick respectively.
Three teams who had the worst records—the Memphis Grizzlies, the Boston Celtics and the MilwaukeeBucks—obtained the fourth, fifth and sixth pick respectively. These were the lowest possible picks they could have obtained through the lottery. The most recent draft in which the three worst teams did not receive the top three picks was in 1993.” - - (Wikipedia)
The draft selections, in order, were: Greg Oden, Kevin Durant, Al Horford, Mike Conley Jr, Jeff Green, Yi Jianlian,Corey Brewer… and… what for it… Jokaim Noah (CHI via NYK; On October 4, 2005, Chicago acquired an option to swap 2007 first-round draft picks, a 2006 first-round draft pick, 2007 and 2009 second-round draft picks, Tim Thomas, Michael Sweetney and Jermaine Jackson from New York in exchange for Eddy Curryand Antonio Davis.)
After you swallow the vomit that just surfaced and made your curse IT and Dolan… let’s get back on track. (1) The top portion of the draft offered 4 franchise players: Durant, Horford, Conley, & Noah. Good news for us! Let’s hope the talent is on par… and caliber of players in Towns, Okafor, Russell, Mudiay is equal to those guys.Who knows?
Anyway… This is where Danny Ainge stepped up… as President of BBALL Operations in BOS. Like Phil Jackson, he was a former player. He took on his executive role in 2003… so he had a tad more experience by the time the summer of ’07 rolled around. Like Phil, too, he hired a former PG to be his head coach (Doc Rivers), who took over the HC duties in BOS in 2004. Unlike Fisher, though, DOC had been coaching since 1999… So he was going on 8 years when ’07 arrived. But,again, despite the lack of experience in their current roles… Ainge-Doc might be comparable to Jax-Fish… We shall see.
SO, Ainge lived up to his ‘Trader Dan’ moniker, and didn’t bank the back-9 of PP’s career on some raw, lottery selection.So, he dealt the #5 pick in that draft… shipping it to SEA for Ray Allen. PP had requested a trade after that bad season (something CA hasn’t done)… So, Ainge had to respond… SEA had 2 picks in the top 5… They Got Durant and then grabbed Jeff Green (If only they took Noah)… So, as SEA proved… the draft is a 50/50 bet, at best… just look at the #1 pick (Greg Oden)… D’uh!
Ainge was able to grab Glen ‘big baby’ Davis, out of LSU (who upset Duke that year) in the second round. In 2006, they took a PG from Kentucky (Rajon Rondo) - with the pick AFTER the New York Knicks snagged Renaldo Balkman, from the U.of South Carolina. A double D'uh!
After the Ray Allen trade, Ainge made the single biggest trade (for 1 player) in NBA history, gutting the roster and sending a boat load of guys to MIN for Kevin Garnett. Al Jefferson, GeraldGreen, Theo Ratliff, S-Telfair, a future 1[SUP]st[/SUP] rounder.
With 3 All-Star (PP, KG,Ray-Ray), along with Perkins and Rondo… the Celtics now featured a potent starting 5. They select Glen Davis, had the man from USC, Brian Scalabrine, and then sign a flurry of vets (Eddie House, Scott Pollard, & James Posey).
The roster was rebuilt… re-tooled…overnight folks. Those 2 deals fell in Ainge’s lap. McHale helped in the KG trade… and Jefferson was a good player.Just like LA had help when West shipped Gasol for Gasol, another good player.
The Boston Celtics would go 64-18 in the 2007-2008 season, and win the NBA championship.The “Big-3” would start a trend, and BOS would perennially be a title contender for the next 4 -6 years.
Here’s what Doc Rivers said about NYK’s chances of turning things around quickly:
"Phil Jackson and Derek Fisher know what they’re doing,” the coach said. “They knew that this year would be this year and they just need to rebuild.”
What Rivers stressed, though, is that one pick or one event will not save a franchise.
“We had a lot of assets,” he saidw hen asked how his Celtics turned things around so quickly. “We had a lot of draft picks and we had some really good young players. You think about who we had: Gerald Green, Delonte West, Al Jefferson.… To me, that’s what changed the whole thing. You gotta have both, you can’t just have money because we didn’t do it through free agency.
“We did it through draft picks and trades.”
“Boston fans hung inthere,” Rivers said. “[Knicks fans] can. It can turn around quickly, [the Knicks] got a lot of money,” he said, in reference to the Knicks’aforementioned cap space.
http://theknicksblog.com/knicks/hamilton-doc-rivers-believes-knicks-can-turn-things-around-quickly/#more-60548
------------------
IN CONCLUSION: At this time in 2007, the BOS Celtics were in a better position than our beloved Knicks are in right now. Sure, I grant that... Ainge was experienced enough, with a fewyears under his executive belt… he was re-imaging the team for a 2[SUP]nd [/SUP]time… privy to the logistics of roster-building… aware of previous errors…DOC Rivers was closing in on a decade of coaching… The Celtics had a bunch of talented young players that other teams wanted… plus draft picks. And, finally,Paul Pierce PROVED he could change his game to mesh with two other stars and he rose to the challenge when the bell run and won his title.There was also a Rondo-Perkins tandem in place already (nobody thinks any of our young guards, or bigs, are capable of playing at that level in 2015-2016, that those 2 played at in 2007-2008).
But… on the bright side… We are LOCKED to get a top 4 pick.We also have more young players… quantity over quality… and we have TONS of cap space. In other words, we have enough to sign 1 big-dawg free agent… plus another 1 or 2 very good players… PLUS… we have enough ammo to pull off one blockbuster trade. We do not need to sign a bunch of vets to add depth… make a bench… b/c we have that in place already. Galloway,THjr, Schved, Ledo, Early, Thomas, Aldrich, Amundson, Wear… just young and hungry guys who can give you 12 minutes a night of energy, efficiency, production.
Is it possible to add 2 stars…and 2 solid players… 2 vets… to go with Carmelo and the young guys? Is it possible to plant the seeds… then hit the HR next year, in 2016, and round out the roster and really be in the title mix from 2016-2019?
I SAY YES!!!
IF Phil Jax does his job and brings in the right players, if Carmelo makes it work and rises to the challenge… if a few young guys develop…It’s likely, as BOS proved, we go from NBA worst to NBA Champs… it may not be the next season… maybe it takes us 2 years instead!
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