The Boston Celtics Didn't Tank

[PhoSita]

Which, sadly, disappoints about 25% of Celticsblog.   

More like 50%.  this board doesn't seem to get excited unless we're slipping in the slime at the bottom of the barrel.

Honestly, I see much, much more gnashing of teeth around here from folks who are just SO morally outraged by the thought that some other people who claim to be Celtics fans would actually have a different viewpoint than theirs with respect to winning games, making the playoffs, the likelihood of building a good team without high draft picks, etc.

You seem SOOO outraged over the perceived outrage.

Outraged?  No.  Bored by it and mildly annoyed that seemingly every thread devolves into some type of name calling or soap-boxing about "the tank debate"?  Sure.

[ImShakHeIsShaq]

So, none of you listened to Danny last night? He pretty much said he TRIED TO TANK and didn't want to pick up IT at the time but he basically had NO CHOICE because of how amazing the deal was. He even said he knew IT would make us a little better but he never expected he would make us that much better. Believe what he said, he would not have picked up IT if he thought the price wasn't going to go up if he waited. He didn't even know we had won so much since the trade deadline, you could tell he was really shocked.

Danny did everything a team could do without gutting it, to put out a bottom team. He was forced to take on IT at a time when he didn't want to but hell, any idiot would have accepted that deal!

Even in the weak East, be honest, at the time we sent out RR (less so) AND Green, how many people actually believed we weren't trying to tank? I believe we have a chance to win at all times but that doesn't mean I was blind to the fact that Danny was trying to make us a top 5 lotto team.

Even the team (Crowder vocally) said they weren't going to tank even if that is what "Danny" and co. wanted. The players felt that's what they were "built" for but they were going to do everything in their power to upset those plans.

I missed that.  Some direct quotes or links to the interview would be great.

Did he really say he was trying to tank? 

That's fairly revelatory.  I'm surprised this is the first I'm hearing of it.

Of course he didn't/couldn't say the direct words. It was during the game last night when he mic'd up with Mike and Tommy.

Listen to what he said about getting IT. It's all the video I could find, sorry.


He said he didn't want to get incrementally better but he had to because the deal was so good. Also how shocked he was that IT made us so much better.

http://www.csnne.com/video_content_type/ainge-acquiring-isaiah-thomas-you-never-know-when-you-can-get-deal-again

[GreenWarrior]

so yeah the "state of the east" is still the only reason why we're in the playoffs.

[ImShakHeIsShaq]

so yeah the "state of the east" is still the only reason why we're in the playoffs.

Yes, that's part of it, for sure. You are wrong that it's the ONLY reason. Our play had to go along with it. It's not like just because the east was bad we were an automatic in, our guys had to fight to get in, had we not won as much as we did the second half, we would not be in right now.

[RockinRyA]

so yeah the "state of the east" is still the only reason why we're in the playoffs.

Assuming we lose the last game, we're only 2 games out of .500, that's pretty good considering how bad our record was the first half of the season.

[Casperian]

Racist.


(I know it's not racist)

 

http://www.csnne.com/video_content_type/ainge-acquiring-isaiah-thomas-you-never-know-when-you-can-get-deal-again

...which tells us two things:

1) We were not actively trying to make the playoffs.

2) We're not throwing out the baby with the bathwater just to get a better pick.