SQ2016-3 Celtics' Magic Year 2 B.E.

At the beginning of this week I started a column with the intention of discussing from whence this year's magic would come. Turns out that I never made it beyond Year 1 B.E (Brad Era). Hopefully I can get back on track and you faithful and patient readers will find my offerings worth the wait. We are still a couple of articles (years) away from the upcoming magic, but I hope the historical perspective of Brad's pre-extension seasons will add some value.

Year 1 (2013-14) was all about the GM (Danny Ainge) cashing in fading (ouch) assets (Pierce, Garnett), cap room, trade exceptions, freshly polished retreads, and highly protected second-round picks for potential (picks, slight upgrades, bigger exceptions, and players fallen on hard times). Under new coach Brad Stevens the makeshift Celtics over-performed, a pretty amazing feat under the circumstances. The non-pedigreed coach plucked from the college ranks, made the adjustment on the fly. He earned the trust of a constantly changing (more than 40 players spent some time on the 15-man roster) mixture of oldsters and youngsters. He instilled a culture of improving daily (process), playing your role unselfishly and to the best of your (often limited) abilities (if not just go home, Keith Bogans), practicing and playing hard from start to finish.

It might be appropriate to contrast Brad/Danny's rebuilding Celtics, to the continued tanking 76-er's. Brad squeezed every ounce of effort from the woeful and constantly changing collection of leftovers—playing berserker defense and manic offense from the gang that couldn't shoot straight. Compare this highly entertaining effort to the snooze-fest occurring in Philadelphia where playing badly is good and playing even worse is even better (at least for draft position). Strangely these outstanding efforts by Boston's leadership resulted in about double the number of victories that had been expected, a general manager that the other franchises were afraid to deal with for fear of being duped, and a rookie coach who players across the league found alluring. Again the contrast with Philly where each of their handful of victories was a shock, every GM want to deal (since you often could get something for nothing), and where no players wanted to play (even their own).

Year 2 B.E. (2014-15) saw these trends refined and extended. Assets not moved in the demolition-fest of 13-14 were auctioned off (a rehabbed Rondo to Dallas, the at-his-prime Green's teasing act to Memphis). Brad Stevens continued to buff a shine on Ainge's acquisitions which were then moved along for even better and shinier assets. Once again Ainge and Stevens spoiled the slow, incremental, and patient rebuild, by, once again, leveraging assets to outstrip expectations. Once again more than half of the Opening Day roster is gone by the season's end. Once again name-recognition players are sent out for players most Celtics' fans had never heard of, but some of whom became cornerstones of the team going forward, and picks (always more picks). The Rondo trade in December brought a little known but hard nosed perimeter player—Jae Crowder. Then at the deadline Ainge acquired the 3^rd Phoenix point guard for Marcus Thornton (from Brooklyn in Zeller deal) and the Cleveland 1^st (also acquired in Zeller deal where Boston “helped” Cleveland clear cap room to reacquire LeBron and only sacrificed a future conditional 2^nd round pick). That third Suns' point guard was Isaiah Thomas who was so well known that many Boston fans immediate response was “I didn't know that the former Detroit bad-boy was still playing.” In Boston, Isaiah exploded, providing a huge offensive boost to a team without shot-creators outside of the reborn Evan Turner. Everyone that expected that contribution from the former #60 pick (Mr. Irrelevant), stand up and take a bow.

The upshot of these additions and the sudden gelling the band of misfits was to “blow” their lottery slot and to sneak into the playoffs. Suddenly this long-term rebuild was way ahead of schedule and making a mockery of the plethora of tanking teams destroying any team-character building in the chase for losses and ping pong balls. The Celtics' brain trust of a mad alchemist and a basketball whisperer have compressed a 5-year plan into a magical 2-year return to relevancy keeping to the Celtic Way and eschewing a dip to the bottom. They did this while keeping the fan base as well as the cast of basketball vagabonds engaged and entertained. I would maintain that watching this team playing hard and “doing it right” has been more enjoyable than most of the NBA's elite teams regular season coasting.

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