... I feel this is a departure from Danny Ainge who never talked about body type. That's why they ended up with a string of undersized power forwards ("tweeners") and short point guards.
Danny targeted long, strong guards pretty frequently, didn't he? Particularly in the draft? He definitely had a body ideal.
I'm sure he had a body ideal for big men, too, but those types of guys are rarely available late in the draft (DeAndre Jordan being the one exception who would have seemed to fit the Celtics' philosophy at the time; Danny instead picked a long, strong guard.)
No, and I'm not referring just to the draft, Roy -- Payton Pritchard, Carson Edwards, Tremont Waters, Terry Rozier, Kemba Walker, Isaiah Thomas...
This may be a discussion for another thread, but I see a marked difference in the type of players we acquired and pursued somewhere 2-3 years before Ainge left. I've become increasingly convinced that Ainge started a transition strategy and gave more and more basketball decision-making powers to his son and others in the organization, thinking he would soon retire-ish and they could take over.
Ainge targeted tough-nosed athletes with a chip on their shoulder. He was willing to get undersized guys if they played bigger (Rozier, Smart, Morris, and back further with Perkins, Davis, Powe, etc.). In fact, I think that was a market inefficiency that Ainge exploited. Height isn't as important as fans think.
There just seemed to be a clear divide in the decision-making process between a guy like Terry Rozier and Evan Fournier. Maybe the front office was more divided than we thought, or maybe Ainge just made bad decisions.
I don't think we are going to run into that with Brad Stevens. He's a pretty laser-focused guy. I think he will continue to do a good job getting the type of players that he and Ime think will work well in their scheme to be successful.
