Shoulda released Humph and Bayless

[Celtics18]

I just don't buy into the idea that you would release players under contract because you are worried that they will help you win too many games.  The notion strikes me as unprofessional, unethical, and absurd. 

[pokeKingCurtis]

Basketball is a game of confidence.

You throw young Kelly-O and Philly-P with the beasts, you might lose them forever.

[Boston Garden Leprechaun]

smart was the BPA for us at the time but yes getting exum would have been great. very tall guard.

[tyrone biggums]

So this site is mad that the Celtics didn't cut these players and thus lose the ability to do a S&T for Hump? Yes makes perfect sense! Give them up for nothing!

Almost as annoying as Rondo for a 2nd rounder or McLemore.

[Sketch5]

smart was the BPA for us at the time but yes getting exum would have been great. very tall guard.

I think Smart is better than Exum. Could be wrong, but I don't know how hard his competition was. Wiggins and Parker looked amazing in Highschool, but dropped down a notch in college. This is why I really like the two year idea. Makes players stronger coming in.

I have a feeling Smart will shut down Exum when they meet.

[AngryAndIrritable]

Basketball is a game of confidence.

You throw young Kelly-O and Philly-P with the beasts, you might lose them forever.

Couldn't agree with this more.

It's clear that we are rebuilding, but if you jettison every piece of veteran talent you have, the youngsters have less learning opportunities and nobody to mentor them on the court.

Philadelphia will find this out soon enough.

[BballTim]

Boston won 6 games after the trade deadline.  The first two of those wins Bayless played pretty solid ball and in the third Humphries played pretty solid ball, but the last 3 those two guys were non-factors (and neither played in the final win against Cleveland).

So I guess my question is what would be the point of releasing them if Boston finished the season 6-21 and those two guys were pretty much non-factors in at least half of the wins.

Well the difference between us and the Magic was 2 games so you've already answered your own question. But the other point is that if you release those two you'd be filling their roster spots with borderline NBA players whose  impact would be making the team less likely to win.

  What's to stop Orlando from losing a few more games themselves?

[Celtics4ever]

  I dont know what games you were watching but when paired with Bass, Hump was far and away worse than either Sully or KO!  Especially in the 2nd half of the season!

Sullinger DNP the last 3 games, did he outplay him then?   Nope.  They were seeing who they were going to keep and Hump was expiring so he didn't play.   Maybe you didn't understand this fact when you watched the games. 

When given equal time he is a better player.  Which just goes to show how homer we are sometimes and how our eyes can deceive us when we don't see the big picture.   Watching a game and understanding what is going on is two different things.   You obviously did not do the latter.

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/h/humphkr01.html

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/o/olynyke01.html

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/s/sullija01.html

PER36 Stats bear this out.

He shot .50% from FG,   KO shot .47%(which I am ok with) and Sully .43%(which is horrible).
Humph projects at 10.7 RPG. KO 9.4 RPG and Sully 10.6 RPG ( Surprise! Surprise!)
Humph projects at 1.6 BPG,   KO .7% BPG and Sully .7% BPG
Sully does lead at fouls at 3.4

Humph didn't play because he was expiring and we wanted to see what we had.  When he was on the floor he was a better big than KO or Sully.   But too be fair KO played a lot on the wing and developed a nice shot.  Neither he or Sully are competant bigs on defense and offer nil rim protection.    Sully, with his shooting may not even be a quality starting PF.  Also, he is battling weight issues and I think we would be wise to sell high and package him for something before Mel Turpin 2 comes our way.

[crimson_stallion]

Smart is right there with Exum as a prospect. Exum benefited from being unknown and under-scrutinized, while Smart was picked apart a bit.

You don't really know what you're talking about, or what we have with Smart, or you wouldn't create a sour grapes thread like this.

This isn't sour grapes. This is something I argued for during the season.

As far as Smart being better than Exum, that could very well be the case. But is he better than Rondo? Because that is the next guy on the chopping block.

I actually like Smart and think he could be a great player. But I don't want him at the expense of Rondo who I KNOW is a great player and a player that could attract big time players to play with him. If Danny had the chips to get KLove, the Cs would be a destination. But we just don't have the chips.

Many argued that we had plenty of chips to get Love, but as it turns out, the main chip was our #1 pick and it just wasn't good enough. This has been documented by some the most reliable reporters including Woj.

It's not sour grapes when you argued for something all along. Danny dropped the ball here, and it's not entirely clear why.

Yeah, it really is sour grapes.

First of all, I was abolutely itching for Exum. When I saw that Orlando took Gordon I was dying with anticipation, with the thought that we may seriously have a shot.  When Utah took him I was certainly a little dissapointed.

BUT

I never expected we had a shot at Exum, and to be honest I was already pretty happy with either Smart or Vonleh.  As much as I did want Exum more, there were times where I actually reminded myself that there's every chance that Smart may prove the better player.  Maybe Exum will never put on the muscle and will just get bullied around too much.  Maybe his scorign ability would be negated against the bigger, stronger NBA talent.  Maybe he'd just never quite reach that celiling everybody thought he may have.

I thought all the same things about Wiggins - he could become a superstar, or he could just become a Jeff Green..not bad by any means, but well below expectations.  Exum would have been a high risk, high payoff type draft decision, and as a result it would have almost certainly meant that we were going to go in to a more long-term rebuild while we waited for him to develop.  Also would have likely meant Rondo would be gone, because Exum is not the type of talent you bring off the bench. 

Anyway the reality is, Boston won some of those last games and they won them because out players had heart.  No matter how many guys were injured, no matter how unimportant the games were, they still played to in.  That to me was a great test of the attitudes out guys have, and that to me meant more than one draft position on the board.  If our young guys just agreed to give up and let the team throw those last games, how would Rondo have respected any of those young guys?  How could we, as fans, respect them? 

Why would Danny trade Hump away if he didn't get any offers of value for him?  He's a $10M expiring contract. I'd rather keep him and let his contact expire rather than trade him for some bum contract (just for the sake of making the team worse) and then end up with $10M more on the cap after this offseason.

I love Smart as a player and his attitude as a person from what I see.  He looks to be the highest calibre of competitor - a guy who gets up for every game, will fight for every loose ball, will battle on every defensive possession.  A winner, through and through.  I love Exum's potential, but all of those personality tries are questioned.  Nobody knows him that well here - is he mentally tough?  Is he a leader?  Is he a hard worker?  Is he highly coachable?  We don't know.

So yeah Exum would have been nice for sure, but I'm perfectly happy with Smart.  I very much doubt he's going to let any of us down. 

As for the trade for Love, who cares? Do you really believe that getting Love would have changed this franchise around overnight?  The guy's been in Minnesota for 6 years - they haven't made a single playoff game in that time.  Even Chris Bosh's Raptors made the Playoffs before he went to Miami.  Likewise the Wade was able to single handedly will his terribly Miami Heat team to the playoffs before the Big-Three began.  KG led the Wolves to the playoffs how many times? Kevin Love on the other hand - not one playoff appearance.  Then on top of that, accoring to him teammates, he has all but zero leadership ability.

So what did you really expect would happen if we got Love?  We'd have had to do a sign and trade, take him on for at least $18M a year.  Then season after we'd have to re-sign Rondo to a max contract, min $18M a year.  Considering the fact that they aren't the only two players we'd have under contact, how exactly did you think we were going to find the cap space to sign a third max contract player?  Believe me, we'd need one.  No team with Rondo and Love as it's two best players is contending.   

Just let it go. 

Be proud that the guys on this team fought to win, no matter how insignificant the game.  That's Celtic Pride. 

[crimson_stallion]

  I dont know what games you were watching but when paired with Bass, Hump was far and away worse than either Sully or KO!  Especially in the 2nd half of the season!

Sullinger DNP the last 3 games, did he outplay him then?   Nope.  They were seeing who they were going to keep and Hump was expiring so he didn't play.   Maybe you didn't understand this fact when you watched the games. 

When given equal time he is a better player.  Which just goes to show how homer we are sometimes and how our eyes can deceive us when we don't see the big picture.   Watching a game and understanding what is going on is two different things.   You obviously did not do the latter.

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/h/humphkr01.html

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/o/olynyke01.html

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/s/sullija01.html

PER36 Stats bear this out.

He shot .50% from FG,   KO shot .47%(which I am ok with) and Sully .43%(which is horrible).
Humph projects at 10.7 RPG. KO 9.4 RPG and Sully 10.6 RPG ( Surprise! Surprise!)
Humph projects at 1.6 BPG,   KO .7% BPG and Sully .7% BPG
Sully does lead at fouls at 3.4

Humph didn't play because he was expiring and we wanted to see what we had.  When he was on the floor he was a better big than KO or Sully.   But too be fair KO played a lot on the wing and developed a nice shot.  Neither he or Sully are competant bigs on defense and offer nil rim protection.    Sully, with his shooting may not even be a quality starting PF.  Also, he is battling weight issues and I think we would be wise to sell high and package him for something before Mel Turpin 2 comes our way.

^^^ This ^^^

I have been saying for months that Hump was, overall, our best big last season.  There is no argument about it - when the numbers and the eye test both tell you the same thing.

When made our team better.  When he was on the court, the Celtics usually had an edge.  He battled so hard for every loose ball, bruised opposing players on defense with his physical play, hit midrange jumpers with impressive consistenty, gobbled up rebounds, put back a ton of offensive boards.  He just played so efficiently.  He didn't waste fouls, didn't waste energy, didn't try to do anything outside of who he was.  He played to his strengths and was often the best player on the court for us. Rarely made mistakes, forced bad shots, etc.

Sullinger showed flashes, but he was way too inconsistent.  Olynyk was borderline dominant over the second half of the season, but it's too small a sample size to make too much of it.  Bass was his usual self - average in every way.

He may not have much upside, but Hump was our best big by quite a long shot.  He didn't get playing time because Steven's knows that guys like Sully and Olynyk need playing time to develop.