Bob Cousy says he'd rather tank/draft than get stuck in the middle of the pack.

[Celtics18]

Well, regardless of Cousy's opinion, it doesn't look like Danny Ainge has set this team up to continue tanking next year or into the coming years.

Even if you are one of the fans that leans towards Cousy's philosophy on how to rebuild, it's got to help that we have a plethora of draft picks in the near future that are going to be coming from other teams.

Wherever those picks fall, they are going to aid in the rebuild in one way or another.

For better or for worse, our hopes lie with the Nets picks, and to a lesser extent the mavs pick

At getting a top ten pick, yes.  Of course we can't rule out the possibility of finding a legitimate impact player later in the draft.

A lot of folks like to act like finding such a player past the top of the lottery is virtually an impossibility.  History, though, has shown that star players come from later in the draft all the time.

[BornReady]

i agree with cousy

the only ways we are getting back to contention:

we trade up are vet assets - further develop young players and tank for the draft

or we trade for an all-star that has enough draw to bring in another all star free agent

unlikely but possible - we use all of the draft picks we obtained and 2 or 3 become all star players for us, where we can lure another all star free agent to join us

[BornReady]

Well, regardless of Cousy's opinion, it doesn't look like Danny Ainge has set this team up to continue tanking next year or into the coming years.

Even if you are one of the fans that leans towards Cousy's philosophy on how to rebuild, it's got to help that we have a plethora of draft picks in the near future that are going to be coming from other teams.

Wherever those picks fall, they are going to aid in the rebuild in one way or another.

For better or for worse, our hopes lie with the Nets picks, and to a lesser extent the mavs pick

At getting a top ten pick, yes.  Of course we can't rule out the possibility of finding a legitimate impact player later in the draft.

A lot of folks like to act like finding such a player past the top of the lottery is virtually an impossibility.  History, though, has shown that star players come from later in the draft all the time.

yeah but they are less obvious in their potential and are generally rarer to find

 For example, no one thought that jimmy butler would become the star that he is now
or else all those teams wouldnt have passed on him

I thought at the time that he was a very good player but only saw him being a starter and not the all-star all around player that he has become

[greece66]

Just turned 87 years old. Still sharp as ever....
Couz may have a point? hehe


http://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2015/08/08/bob-cousy-boston-timeless-treasure/bGAri28zRmJ7l7wBtihiqO/story.html

Cousy professed “great confidence” in Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge and his blueprint for banner No. 18.

But he also offered a pragmatic view of the Celtics’ road back to contention, after a surprising playoff berth last season.

“They’re ending up in the middle, which frankly is the worst place you can be, in my judgment,” Cousy said. “You either get up near the top and enjoy the goodies or you finish last and get the first, second, third pick, and then you’ve got a shot at helping yourself through the draft. When you’re in the middle you’re just not going to get impact players.”

Preach on, Cooz. If the Parishioners of the Parquet aren’t going to listen to bloviating sportswriters (raising hand), maybe they’ll listen to one of their most revered figures.

Nowhere in there it says that he'd rather tank...

True that.

Moreover, how are we supposed to bottom down? Trade every decent player we have for draft picks and expiring contracts?

To get that bad we need to trade most of the players we signed/traded for and get future assets in return. Not gonna happen.

Point is, even if we wanted to go for the full tankathon now, it is too late.

And a second thing to consider: even if tanking (and the top of course) are the only good places to be, in order to go from tanking back to contention you have to go through the dreaded middle. Going straight from bottom to contention is very rare (yes, I know, I know, but that trade was once in a lifetime - hoping this to happen again is not a plan- that's why most other teams did it the other way).

[Boris Badenov]

Well, regardless of Cousy's opinion, it doesn't look like Danny Ainge has set this team up to continue tanking next year or into the coming years.

Even if you are one of the fans that leans towards Cousy's philosophy on how to rebuild, it's got to help that we have a plethora of draft picks in the near future that are going to be coming from other teams.

Wherever those picks fall, they are going to aid in the rebuild in one way or another.

For better or for worse, our hopes lie with the Nets picks, and to a lesser extent the mavs pick

Kind of odd to think but in ten years, the biggest things influencing opinions about Danny's rebuilding plan might be what happened to Brook Lopez's feet in 2016 and 2017.

[Hemingway]

Yeah being middle of the pack is a bad place to be, but it's only really bad if you are there for a long time. And it's still better than being really really bad for a long time. Right now we are trending up. Thats a good thing. We got better all through the year last year and we look even better now. Give it a few more years, if we are still where we are now or worse and without any better prospects then we can think about rebuilding and bottoming out for a season again.

I don't know how to prove it, but I get the idea that the majority of the posters in favor of tanking (last season and especially this season) are too young to really remember the dark ages after bird retired and before we got KG(pr before that one year we got walker back and lost to the nets in the ECF.) Yes being a really bad team gives you a better shot at a star, but it also makes you much more likely to be bad again the next year(and then because you are bad the next year you are likely to again be bad the year after, as so on) and pretty soon you have a losing culture. We really lucked out, even though the team is almost completely different we were able to go from one good team to another pretty quick and I think Boston is seen as as a good destination (or at lease slightly better than average.) Thats huge. Remember when we traded for Payton and we had to ask ourselves, will he actually show up here? He did, but thats a bad position to be in.

[Hemingway]

There are no guarantees. You might be just as likely to get lucks and draft a star, develop him, put pieces around him and win as you would be to slowly improve, become good and then sign or trade for star and win. At least with the second option the games are more fun to watch over the years and you can be proud to be a fan.

Like most things, the best option is usually somewhere in the middle. We should not trade away everyone who can do anything to win games and we should not trade away prospects for vets that are only slightly better (I'm looking at you Tony Delk)

All things considered, we are in a pretty good spot right now for where we are coming from.

[Celtics4ever]

I think one can read into this that Cousy thinks our current talent is a stuck in the middle with you group.

[PhoSita]

And a second thing to consider: even if tanking (and the top of course) are the only good places to be, in order to go from tanking back to contention you have to go through the dreaded middle.

Right, you do have to go through the middle.  But in some ways it's like building a rocket -- how high it goes once in flight is determined in part by what you did while it was still on the ground.

In other ways, it's like NASCAR -- you can tune up and even slightly upgrade in the middle of the race to gain an advantage over your opponents lap by lap.  The biggest factor, though, is always the engine you've got underneath the hood.

[slamtheking]

It's so easy guys:

Year 1: tank get a superstar
Year 2: tank get another superstar
Year 3: Tank get a 3rd superstar
Years 4-10: Win titles
Year 11: tank get a superstar
Year 12: tank get another superstar
Year 13: Tank get a 3rd superstar
Years 14-20: Win titles
Year 21: tank get a superstar
Year 22: tank get another superstar
Year 23: Tank get a 3rd superstar
Years 24-30: Win titles

It's so easy guys.

so using your methodology, philly will win the next 7 titles because in the past 3 years they drafted Noel, Embiid (and Saric) and Okafor. 

[chambers]

Just turned 87 years old. Still sharp as ever....
Couz may have a point? hehe


http://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2015/08/08/bob-cousy-boston-timeless-treasure/bGAri28zRmJ7l7wBtihiqO/story.html

Cousy professed “great confidence” in Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge and his blueprint for banner No. 18.

But he also offered a pragmatic view of the Celtics’ road back to contention, after a surprising playoff berth last season.

“They’re ending up in the middle, which frankly is the worst place you can be, in my judgment,” Cousy said. “You either get up near the top and enjoy the goodies or you finish last and get the first, second, third pick, and then you’ve got a shot at helping yourself through the draft. When you’re in the middle you’re just not going to get impact players.”

Preach on, Cooz. If the Parishioners of the Parquet aren’t going to listen to bloviating sportswriters (raising hand), maybe they’ll listen to one of their most revered figures.

Nowhere in there it says that he'd rather tank...

Right....He says you should be a true contender OR going after top 5 picks.
No tanking implied at all

Just like Ainge didn't tank in 2013-14 to get Marcus Smart right?
Remember there's more than one way to tank. That's what front offices and 'player Development ' are for.

[Celtics18]

Just turned 87 years old. Still sharp as ever....
Couz may have a point? hehe


http://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2015/08/08/bob-cousy-boston-timeless-treasure/bGAri28zRmJ7l7wBtihiqO/story.html

Cousy professed “great confidence” in Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge and his blueprint for banner No. 18.

But he also offered a pragmatic view of the Celtics’ road back to contention, after a surprising playoff berth last season.

“They’re ending up in the middle, which frankly is the worst place you can be, in my judgment,” Cousy said. “You either get up near the top and enjoy the goodies or you finish last and get the first, second, third pick, and then you’ve got a shot at helping yourself through the draft. When you’re in the middle you’re just not going to get impact players.”

Preach on, Cooz. If the Parishioners of the Parquet aren’t going to listen to bloviating sportswriters (raising hand), maybe they’ll listen to one of their most revered figures.

Nowhere in there it says that he'd rather tank...

Right....He says you should be a true contender OR going after top 5 picks.
No tanking implied at all

Just like Ainge didn't tank in 2013-14 to get Marcus Smart right?
Remember there's more than one way to tank. That's what front offices and 'player Development ' are for.

Are you saying you agree with the Cooz for this year's Celtics?

I think we can all agree that the 2015-2016 Celtics are not a true contender.  Does that mean you would prefer to see us make some moves that would put us in the running for a top five pick as opposed to going for another playoff berth?

[D.o.s.]

If we do make the playoffs I expect us to have improvement on last year's playoff appearance.

We might win one whole game this go-around.

[chambers]

Just turned 87 years old. Still sharp as ever....
Couz may have a point? hehe


http://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2015/08/08/bob-cousy-boston-timeless-treasure/bGAri28zRmJ7l7wBtihiqO/story.html

Cousy professed “great confidence” in Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge and his blueprint for banner No. 18.

But he also offered a pragmatic view of the Celtics’ road back to contention, after a surprising playoff berth last season.

“They’re ending up in the middle, which frankly is the worst place you can be, in my judgment,” Cousy said. “You either get up near the top and enjoy the goodies or you finish last and get the first, second, third pick, and then you’ve got a shot at helping yourself through the draft. When you’re in the middle you’re just not going to get impact players.”

Preach on, Cooz. If the Parishioners of the Parquet aren’t going to listen to bloviating sportswriters (raising hand), maybe they’ll listen to one of their most revered figures.

Nowhere in there it says that he'd rather tank...

True that.

Moreover, how are we supposed to bottom down? Trade every decent player we have for draft picks and expiring contracts?

To get that bad we need to trade most of the players we signed/traded for and get future assets in return. Not gonna happen.

Point is, even if we wanted to go for the full tankathon now, it is too late.

And a second thing to consider: even if tanking (and the top of course) are the only good places to be, in order to go from tanking back to contention you have to go through the dreaded middle. Going straight from bottom to contention is very rare (yes, I know, I know, but that trade was once in a lifetime - hoping this to happen again is not a plan- that's why most other teams did it the other way).

I don't think it's  too late in all honesty.
The strategy would have to change on Stevens side and impact on player Development while dumping guys like Lee, Amir, Thomas and perhaps Bradley and Sully/ Olynyk. Like OKC got with arguably the best 3 draft picks from 3 yor 4 years.
When you think about it, the only guys over age 21 under contract past 2016 are Bradley,  Crowder, Mickey and Thomas. Crowder could probably stay and build his trade value because we'd still stink.

It would be pretty easy to move all of our guys by the end of this year and wiping the slate, to coincide with the Brooklyn picks if they are top 10.

Ainge has got every angle covered, and that includes having to blow it all up if necessary.ie we don't get a free agent or disgruntled star by summer 2016.

Honestly if he cleared the decks and left us with:

Smart
Crowder
Rozier
Hunter
Mickey
Young
 
Plus our
*2016 Dallas pick
*2016 Brooklyn pick
*2017 Brooklyn pick swap
*2018 Brooklyn pick
*our own 2016 pick
*our own 2017 pick
*our own 2018 pick
+the other junk we have...
With Stevens at the helm we could let him help Danny with a fresh rebuild of top 5 picks, we'd also (hypothetically :p) have the power with those brooklyn picks to move into the top 3 if needed.

Anyway,  it's a far less likely or probable scenario, more like the C or D options on the grand plan after A and B fail - but it's  absolutely there as a fallback if things go bad.

I mean what happens if Smart goes down like Exum with an ACL?
Then comes back and takes a Rondo - esque decline in his game?

You gotta cover all angles because you don't want to be stuck with just role players on short term contracts, with a few mid first round picks sprinkled in (trying to beat the odds and stay as a regular rotation NBA players ) for 5 or 6 years while the next Anthony Davis gets drafted by the Lakers.

[kheldar52077]

if you look at the future picks we have we just need to beat brooklyn 4x and cheer the other teams to beat them up some more and we try to win the playoffs.

in essence brooklyn will be doing the tanking for us while we try to win a playoff series therefore instilling a winning culture to our young core of so-so players and hopefully get an impact player via brooklyn.

PS: please tell Bob to boo at Brooklyn each game.