Rondo’s agent responds

[Cman]

My guess is that these comments were more of a shot at the agent than at Rondo himself.  All of what Ainge said is apparently true and he's just letting the agent know that we have no intention of overpaying down the road.  Airing this out also lets the rest of the league know about Rondo's need to grow up. 

Ainge may very well be playing this just right for what he hopes to do in the last few years of Big 3 time.

Yeah, Ainge is playing the game a bit. Maybe trying to lower Rondo's expectations and put the team in position to sign him to a fair and good value contract? That' my theory.

I think this is probably right. 

[johnnyrondo]

I have to agree with the agent here. Ainge shouldn't be saying all these criticisms publicly. It's very Stan Van Gundy of him. Rondo was on the radio and said that one day he would like to be a max player. He also said he wanted to be the best player. That means he's striving to be the best and doesn't expect the max on this contract, but on his NEXT one. I don't think Ainge owes anything to WEEI or the fans to speak so candidly and criticize his point guard.

If anything the unwarranted public criticism makes it less likely that Rondo accepts a little less to stay in Boston.  Maybe that's what Danny wants. We'd still have Pruitt 

[BballTim]

What's funny about this is that Ainge was answering questions that mostly were engineered from an interview that Rondo did not long ago. This is like a trial, when a subject is touched upon it's fair game for everyone.

For example, Rondo talked about him wanting to be a MAX contract player. As a consequence Ainge was asked if Rondo was a MAX contract player and he answered.

Rondo talked about being late for games, etc. As a consequence Ainge was asked about this particular issue.

  Rondo didn't offer that stuff up out of the blue. Rondo was responding to a bunch of internet rumors and they still would have been around for Danny to address. Danny probably should have left his responses at something like "we like Rondo, he's going to be a very good player, we plan on keeping him around for a long time, most of this is overblown or made up". I didn't think that Ainge was being overly critical of Rondo and he probably didn't either. He could probably have said as bad or worse about most players Rondo's age. But the agent was smart to tweak Ainge about it. Now, whatever happens, the team's at least as much at fault as Rondo.

[waltzero]

Publicly motivating a guy is what NBA teams have always done when they aren't getting through to him privately. It also means you don't plan on trading him.

The agent being a giant #(@$ about it adds a complicating wrinkle. Before I thought it was just other teams calling about Rondo combined with "reporters" who hate the Celtics and want to cause them trouble. Now I get the feeling the agent is trying to move him as well.

[tenn_smoothie]

rajon rondo has huge talent and also big deficiencies in his game - he is a bit unusual in that there is not a lot of middle ground in his game.

danny ainge, i believe is over-rated as our GM. he has made some solid late draft choices and really, one great trade (for kevin garnett).

his down side includes a propensity to make impulsive trades which often turn out badly and which he tries to fix with another impulsive trade. he also has changed the rebuilding plan for the Celtics several times (going young & athletic one season followed by signing veterans of questionable character the next)until he finally stumbled on a winning combination when he aquired kevin garnett.

we finally win a long-awaited 17th title and what does ainge do ?? he allows our most important bench player to sign with another team because he is worried about year 4 of a team with a three-year window to win titles ........ what conclusion did ainge make that allowed him to let james posey get away .......... the insane conclusion that tony allen could step right into the key 6th man role and replace a player full of basketball IQ, big-game savvy and intangibles that made this team better in every facet of the game.

so danny ainge is not screwing up these days ...... he's just reverting back down to his normal level of incompetence.

[BudweiserCeltic]

Do you really need to post the same crap in like 4 different threads? Please stop the spamming.

[xmuscularghandix]

Rondo IS NOT a max contract guy, he's so good becuase he does all the little things, Defense, Passing, Rebounding. Those things aren't going to get you paid but will still improve your team greately. Thats why he's so perfect, i don't want Rondo scoring 20 a night, i'd rather he gets 12-15 assists.