No. I don't think Ainge was tricked, but the ocational fan was.
Lots of fans point to the Celtics heroic playoff run where we took the Heat to 7 games before lossing the series.
It is important to the ocational fan to understand the following:
1. DRose got injured during the Philly/Chicago series.
2. The ocational fan seems to forget that the Sixers - a
much lesser team - took the Cs to 7 games.
3. Cs made a galant effort against Miami, but it always
felt like when Miami wanted - they shifted to a gear
our crew couldn't reach.....almost like toying with
us.
In the end, they(Miami) won the last two games going
away. Not even close....
..so, in short, DAinge wasn't fooled into believing, but the ocational fan was probably fooled by the Celtics deep run.
Maybe with ABradley would have been different, maybe not. We'll never really know...