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Volume CXXXIII, Number 16 |
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RearrAINGEing the Celtics
BRANDON CASTEN
STAFF WRITER
I am the type of sports fan who lives in the moment, so I will wait until baseball season to fume about A-rod. My sports frustration will now be directly focused on Danny Ainge, the inept-at-best general manager of the Boston Celtics. With the Celtics lottery-bound, fans really have to question whether the team that now roams the Fleet Center is better than the roster that Danny Ainge was handed.
Maybe I'm missing something here, but replacing names like Antoine Walker and Tony Battie for guys like Chucky Atkins and Jiri Welsch doesn't seem to make sense. But don't take my word for it; let's review the trades of the man who was called upon to save our hallowed franchise.
Ainge started with the blockbuster (after a draft-day trade), trading Antoine Walker and Tony Delk to the Mavericks for Raef LaFrentz and Jiri Welsch. I agree that the roster at that point needed to be shaken up, and Antoine was the guy who had to go. Matched up against Kenyon Martin of the Nets, his performance in the 2003 playoffs displayed that he was a player who had lost his athleticism and his understanding of his role on the court.
But an off-season spent working hard, losing weight, and regaining his form put Antoine in a unique situation. His trade value was at an all-time low because of his performance in 2002-2003, but he was clearly ready to regain his old form. This was where Ainge made his mistake.
Instead of trading Antoine at his lowest value, Ainge should have let him prove that he would be the Antoine of old, and then traded him at the deadline. Instead, Ainge chose to trade Walker for a soft, oft-injured big man, and an unproven European.
The next deal on Ainge's slate came at the 25-game point of the season. In this trade he sent Eric Williams and Tony Battie to the Cavaliers for Ricky Davis and Chris Mihm.
This trade made me throw an empty beer can at my television. Instead of a tough shot blocker (Battie) the Celtics get a soft center who can only score on Eastern Conference centers.
Surely Ricky Davis is better than Eric Williams, right? The answer is a resounding "hell no!" To summarize Ricky Davis as a player I will use one story. In a loss against the Atlanta Hawks last year, Mr. Davis was one rebound away from a triple-double. Nearing the end of the game, he stole the ball under his basket on defense and when the other players ran off to the other end of the court, good old Ricky throws the ball off the backboard to himself to gain his tenth rebound and a triple-double.
Ricky Davis is like a bad disease on a basketball team. Sure he may score a decent amount and throw up some flashy dunks, but this man is pure cancer, and that is why the Cavs got rid of him.
In this trade, Ainge ripped the heart and soul out of his team, replacing two experienced leaders with a punk and a green center who will never be great. In the 33 games since this trade, the Celetics and Celevand have switched positions, as the Celtics have only won 11 of those 33, including losses in 12 of their last 13, and now have the lowly Magic on their heals. In the meantime, Cleveland has won 17 of those 33 and are knocking on the doors of a playoff birth. These records display what happens when one team loses its leadership and transfers it to another.
The next trade sent Mike James to Detroit and Chris Mills to the Hawks for Lindsey Hunter, Chucky Atkins, and a first-round draft pick. This trade wasn't that bad, but it was a waste of time and team chemistry when we didn't really get anything significant in exchange. Lindsey Hunter is sporting a girl's name and hasn't been good since I was wearing a silk shirt to my sixth-grade dance and rocking out to "Whoomp, There It Is." Chucky Atkins has never been good, and the draft pick that Detroit gave us will be late and insignificant. Mike James was a fierce competitor and respected member of the team. This trade hurt team chemistry and we got little in exchange.
In all, Ainge started with one of the best teams in the Eastern Conference (which isn't saying much in the grand scheme of the NBA) and turned them into arguably the biggest joke in the league. Ainge traded all of the Celtics' talent, toughness, and experience in exchange for the outside possibility of a playoff team in a few years that still might not be better than the one with which he started. In the process, Ainge alienated one of the best coaches in basketball. I really hope this guy knows something that we all don't.
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