There is no guarantee you will win the top pick when you blow it up. Remember 2007? We had the FIFTH pick after a season in which we lost 18 straight games?
Yes. I remember that, it allowed us to get Ray Allen, which allowed us to acquire Kevin Garnett.
Again, we were not in full rebuild. If you acquire Ray Allen but no Paul Pierce, KG still doesn't come here. To be in full rebuild mode, you have to get rid of Rondo.
Eh, I don't see it like that. Rebuild for me means to change the fundamental structure of your team. Eschewing Pierce's contract for assets or cap space, Garnett retiring, unloading (if possible) Terry, Lee, maybe others, and being patient with Rondo's rehabilitation (read: he doesnt come back before february at least). You could start a 'full rebuild' without Rondo, but that's not a given.
My point with us in 2007 was to show we had nearly a whole roster turnover. Of the guys who had received considerable playing time the year previous, only Perkins, Rondo, Scalabrine, and Pierce remained.
We rebuilt the entire structure of the team, from a young talented squad, to a team of vets conventionally thought to be past their apex but still in their prime, with some young potential (lets not forget, Rondo while showing some defensive promise was NOT the guy he is today..and few people (MDFNP and BBT excluded of course) thought he'd turn into half the player he is now).
Who remember the mid to late 90's? We were pinning our hopes and dreams on Eric Williams, Ron Mercer, etc. etc. Everyone says the 2014 draft is LOADED but so was the 96 draft. I loved Antoine but he did not bring us to the promised land. There are too many variable to depend on a clean start.
Beyond that, the culture which was bred in Boston over the past 6 years vanishes. You no longer have a winning culture and THAT is huge.
I'm not going to touch the 1990's, we've got a guy named Danny Ainge, a different ownership group, and well...I'm just not going to talk smack about Dino Radja or Vitaly Potapenko.
But the 'winning culture'..if Garnett retires, and we have the option to continue to improve the club's assets going forward, what's the more 'winning' option?
You can't have selective memory. This is most certainly what can happen. Look at the Bulls. They were heartless when they gutted the Bulls championship teams. It took them a decade to contend.
I don't think its a situation of me having a selective memory as you making false comparisons. The Celtics have a different ownership group. They have a different GM. They're a different team than the one Bird, McHale, and Parish left in 1993. They share WAY more in common with the team Danny Ainge inherited in 2003 than the one that never bounced back after the big 3 left.
For instance, let's consider a 'full rebuild' ala the Seattle Supersonics.
They had the core of a team (Ray, Shard, Ridnour, Collison, etc) that had won the division just 2 years prior, but had suffered two consecutive disappointing seasons. They had also had the serendipitous luck of acquiring the 2nd pick in a draft that was allegedly loaded with talent on the top end, with multiple franchise caliber players, and many other potential all-star caliber players.
So they didn't trade Ray Allen on spec alone. They knew they'd have Durant or Oden (I know that we traded Ray Allen during the draft, but I have no idea when that was agreed to), they knew they'd have one of Conley, Green, or Noah, and they'd begin to build around them.
Is that all that different than counting on Rondo as our ace in the hole, tanking like a sherman while he's out, and setting out to build around him and one or two young pieces and a potentially high-value asset in the 2014 draft?
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While it worked out for Seattle, that's about as rare as it can get. I understand what you're saying about having new ownership and a new GM, but they cannot predict the future.
Look at how bad Philly as been... they've rebuilt through the draft but their in constant mediocrity now. The Bulls tanked, got a number one pick in Elton Brand, who was good but not a franchise player after all.
Look at Portland. Theyve been building through the draft for nearly a decade now.
My perspective is keep as much as you can within your own hands. I'm resigned to the fact Pierce and KG could be traded. That's fine. But not trading them for the sake of tanking. You have to remember any team who takes them is going to value the cap space they will open up. That same cap space will be valuable to us. Then you have money to add guys to a core of Rondo, Green and Sully.
I just dont understand blowing everything up. You have quality guys in Rondo and Green. They are a quality number 2 and 3 on a championship caliber team. We need to bring in a number 1. Whether that's free agency after Pierce and KG are gone, trading away assets including Bradley, Bass, Terry, etc. for a disgruntled star or moving up in the draft, then you make that move.
Sorry for the ramble, but hard to write coherently while at work.
Topic: The fallacy of blowing it up (Read 3557 times)