The Boston Celtics Didn't Tank

[droopdog7]

I think if you ask Danny, for the most part he was trying to tank.  He traded our most high profile players which as it turns out, were not that good. 

The Thomas trade was the one example of bringing in a better player now but that's it.  DA did this because he doesn't believe in turning down good players when they present themselves. 

[BDeCosta26]

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.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experiment

Delaying gratification is a good thing.  The Pacers are likely going to give the Hawks a series and could even potentially win it.  The 12th best team will most likely get a better player in the draft than we will and they even have a shot at a top 3 pick.  We are most likely going to get swept.  I'm not saying any of those things will happen, but I mean...

Don't get me wrong, I love watching this team and they're very entertaining, I just hope that we get something out of this season.  I imagine half our team are going to walk at the end and I really doubt any free agents sign here on their own.

I seriously doubt we can't get any free agents to sign here, you can always get guys to sign somewhere that's willing to pay them. Time will tell whether we can get a few quality FA (As Evan Turner has turned out to be) to come play here. I'd bet they can, if not this year in the next few years. Maybe not Leonard or D.Jordan, but a quality FA nonetheless. We've gotten good FAs before, just not top-tier guys who demand max contracts, but we haven't ever had the money for that either?

And why do you think half our team is going to walk? Bradley, Thomas, Smart, Turner, Sullinger, Olynyk, Zeller, Young and Wallace are all under contract next season. Crowder, Bass, Jerebko and Datome are the only guys with free agency coming up, and Crowder is still restricted. I like all those guys, and I appreciate what they've done here, but that's not exactly our most essential guys. I like Crowder the most, and I think regardless of what happens they should find a spot for him. Bass has been great in his years here, always so dependable and one of our few veterans and Jerebko has really made a great impact in limited minutes. But idk if I even want to re-sign either of those guys and if I do, it's because one of Sully/KO got traded. Considering we have potentially three rookies coming in, as well as maybe a FA or two we can't resign them all anyway.

More important than whether we should or shouldn't resign those guys, this summer we need to figure out who of the Sully/Olynyk pair we're keeping. And if were gonna keep both, they need to get more than 20 mins a game to start next season. Sully has many good reasons to get in shape, and if he does his 14-8 numbers could very easily become 17/18-10. KO is much more talented than most people give him credit for. He's a true 7 footer who can shoot the 3 and drive like a wing, but his defense and post game are still seriously suspect, as well as his consistency.  I prob like KO a little more, only because I'm losing hope that Sullinger gets his head on straight and if we can get a shot-blocking 5, Olynyk would look much better. And even with all that, if including one of them in a deal to move up a few spots in the draft or for a good, young 3 with untapped potential like Porter Jr. comes along, I would consider dumping them.

Gonna be an interesting offseason for sure.

[PhoSita]

Delaying gratification is a good thing. 

Just ask Sting.

[Casperian]

In 2015 the Celtics traded away their best player, their second best player, the most highly regarded player they got back in the Rondo deal, and managed in a historically bad conference to win less than 50% of their games?

The Celtics sure shot for the moon on that one.

I don't understand why people can accept that a team can swing for the fences, miss, and miss badly, and wind up in the lottery and that's alright, but nobody can accept that a team might be trying to tank at a management level, but through luck and unforeseen outcomes, they manage to make the playoffs. In one situation, its "oh hey, you tried and failed, but you tried, and that's obvious" while on the other side its "Oh you intentionally put out a mediocre team (in terms of talent/experience) in a terrible conference but somehow you managed to take your losing record and still make it into the playoffs? MEANT TO DO IT."

"Man, I hate black and white thinking, especially the black side"

[aingeforthree]

I think if you ask Danny, for the most part he was trying to tank.  He traded our most high profile players which as it turns out, were not that good. 

The Thomas trade was the one example of bringing in a better player now but that's it.  DA did this because he doesn't believe in turning down good players when they present themselves.

Could've fooled me.  Almost everything he did has been anti-tanking.  Everyone of his moves after the rebuild has worked out really.  Picks aside:

Stevens
Smart
Turner
Zeller
Crowder
Jerebko/Datome
Thomas

I think the tanking guru's are just mad.  Face it, we're in the playoffs and we're a far better team than 3/4's of the board thinks.

[GreenGoggles]

I think if you ask Danny, for the most part he was trying to tank.  He traded our most high profile players which as it turns out, were not that good. 

The Thomas trade was the one example of bringing in a better player now but that's it.  DA did this because he doesn't believe in turning down good players when they present themselves.

Could've fooled me.  Almost everything he did has been anti-tanking.  Everyone of his moves after the rebuild has worked out really.  Picks aside:

Stevens
Smart
Turner
Zeller
Crowder
Jerebko/Datome
Thomas

I think the tanking guru's are just mad.  Face it, we're in the playoffs and we're a far better team than 3/4's of the board thinks.

I think that's a pretty aggressive and labeling comment just because people disagree with your viewpoint.

[Granath]

I think if you ask Danny, for the most part he was trying to tank.  He traded our most high profile players which as it turns out, were not that good. 

The Thomas trade was the one example of bringing in a better player now but that's it.  DA did this because he doesn't believe in turning down good players when they present themselves.

Could've fooled me.  Almost everything he did has been anti-tanking.  Everyone of his moves after the rebuild has worked out really.  Picks aside:

Stevens
Smart
Turner
Zeller
Crowder
Jerebko/Datome
Thomas

I think the tanking guru's are just mad.  Face it, we're in the playoffs and we're a far better team than 3/4's of the board thinks.

I think that's a pretty aggressive and labeling comment just because people disagree with your viewpoint.

No, it's fair. The simple fact is that if Danny was trying to tank he would NOT have traded for IT. He knew what IT could bring to this team - it's not like he was a revelation only once he arrived aka Crowder - and went and got him. His acquisition entirely refutes the argument that Danny was hell bent on tanking.

People want to point to the trades of Green and Rondo as evidence of tanking except that argument ignores the very simple fact that the team sucked with them. Green and Rondo were traded because they did not fit the system, their contracts were expiring and they were not getting us to the playoffs. There was no benefit whatsoever in keeping them because they simply weren't making the team better. So moving them was an extremely low risk move that brought in future assets.

The pro-tanking people are mad. They desperately want that #1 pick and would throw away the playoffs and risk ruining the attitude of the players on this very young team to get it. I'd rather these guys get a taste of success to see if they can build off of it because I think these kids will respond well to it. I wouldn't want to see what would happen to the attitude of Smart, Bradley or Olynyk if they thought the team had no interest in winning - those players may have been ruined forever.

[rollie mass]

whats this going to do for marcus and isiah and crowder,who ever posted the manipulation is on ainge and thats his job to build the celtics to another title  is correct but we are fans and brad is doing his job playing games to best of their ability and building a winning culture-its hard to quantify this trip to playoffs .It may inspire sully over the summer and KO and give tyler a further boost-anyway don't you love crowder ripping ball of guys ,marcus as a force on defense and feeling his way and the monster dunk,followed by a smash putback and a three then,lowry beat him twice but crowder rescued him-kg led those pierce celtics, maybe crowder has found a home -he sure says the right things

[Boston Garden Leprechaun]

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.

wrong. you along with others miss the whole point time and time again. Most preferred tanking IF WE KEPT all those vets we had. MOST all here were fine with making the playoffs IF IT WAS DONE WHILE DEVELOPING THE KIDS, which it was. END THREAD.

[wayupnorth]

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.

wrong. you along with others miss the whole point time and time again. Most preferred tanking IF WE KEPT all those vets we had. MOST all here were fine with making the playoffs IF IT WAS DONE WHILE DEVELOPING THE KIDS, which it was. END THREAD.

Not quite

[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.

[Celtics18]

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. 

[indeedproceed]

In 2015 the Celtics traded away their best player, their second best player, the most highly regarded player they got back in the Rondo deal, and managed in a historically bad conference to win less than 50% of their games?

The Celtics sure shot for the moon on that one.

I don't understand why people can accept that a team can swing for the fences, miss, and miss badly, and wind up in the lottery and that's alright, but nobody can accept that a team might be trying to tank at a management level, but through luck and unforeseen outcomes, they manage to make the playoffs. In one situation, its "oh hey, you tried and failed, but you tried, and that's obvious" while on the other side its "Oh you intentionally put out a mediocre team (in terms of talent/experience) in a terrible conference but somehow you managed to take your losing record and still make it into the playoffs? MEANT TO DO IT."

"Man, I hate black and white thinking, especially the black side"

Racist.


(I know it's not racist)

[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.

[Celtics18]

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.