if Bias never died from overdose or Reggie Lewis never passed away, my assumption is Bird will probably play for another year or two.
Also I would think the dark years of the Celtics in the late 90s wouldn't exist either, meaning we do not draft Walker or Pierce since Bias and Lewis will probably keep us relatively competitive throughout the 90s. No Pierce, god knows what happens in the 2000s once Bias and Lewis retires. KG/Ray Allen probably would not be in Boston as well.
Well remember Reggie died years after Bird retired. And given reports of how much pain Bird was in his last year or two I don't know if Bias would've made much difference - seemed like playing basketball at all was a bigger problem than the number of minutes or workload. If anything he might've been more willing to retire with the next generation in place.
Agree on the last part though - the ripple effect probably means the franchise bottoms out later on, and isn't positioned to build the KG/Ray/Pierce team. We probably aren't in a position to even draft Pierce as you say.
here's another thing, if that is really the case, I wonder if Pitino will still happen or if Danny/Doc will still happen? Cuz I somehow still blame Pitino for majority of our dark years.
So if Pitino doesn't happen, and Danny was bought on earlier than expected, when Bias/Lewis retires, how would our down years look like?
Bias and Lewis were both drafted in 86/87 respectively so on average let's say they both last about 15-18 years.
that puts the Celtics competing until probably the end of their careers between 1999 to 2001. Therefore I don't think we will be in the lottery in any of those years, we will miss out on Pierce, Walker, and quite possibly, Billups, Joe Johnson.
So say when they retire around that time our real tanking/down years will be the first few years in the 2000s. Do we get in on that 2003 Draft lotto?