The Brooklyn picks are untradable

[PhoSita]

Indeed, unless it's for an MVP caliber player

[oldtype]

Indeed, unless it's for an MVP caliber player

Well, I figure there are three of them in the NBA now. Two are on the same team. The other is Lebron.

[celticinorlando]

Ainge is at his best trading for players...his weakness has always been drafting. No picks are off limits...especially in drafts that are considerable weaker. 2017 might be better...but this year's #3 pick had little value

If Ainge can get good value for the picks, he will. I would not do it for a malcontent like Cousins though

[RJ87]

I'll give you the rim protection (until they bring in a ring-chaser), but what questions about fit? It's the same lineup as last year, except Kevin Durant is there instead of Harrison Barnes. They're going to win the next 3-5 titles.

Exactly. It's a perfect fit: Durant does everything that Barnes can do, only 10x better.

He really is a terrific fit for them. They'll need to rebuild their bench, but history shows there will be no shortage of vets willing to go there for minimum money.

[chiken Green]

I think many are overvaluing those picks. The days of slowly building through the draft and watching a team mature until they win is over. The NBA now is about hired guns. You have to go out and get high level FA to win.

The Nets' picks just offer assets that will be used to go get bigger names. Don't see Jaylen Brown as a true impact player. Next year could be the same.

And had to go get a hired gun in Durant. And honestly..Boston has not drafted as well as GS...

If they hadnt drafted Curry, Klaye and Green they would have had ZERO hopes of getting Durant..  You have to Draft a foundation.. NO TEAM can thrown together a bunch of big name Free Agents and expect to seriously win anything.

And out of Curiosity since You cant see Brown becoming anything, who do you see making an Impact from this years draft?

[celticinorlando]

I think many are overvaluing those picks. The days of slowly building through the draft and watching a team mature until they win is over. The NBA now is about hired guns. You have to go out and get high level FA to win.

The Nets' picks just offer assets that will be used to go get bigger names. Don't see Jaylen Brown as a true impact player. Next year could be the same.

And had to go get a hired gun in Durant. And honestly..Boston has not drafted as well as GS...

If they hadnt drafted Curry, Klaye and Green they would have had ZERO hopes of getting Durant..  You have to Draft a foundation.. NO TEAM can thrown together a bunch of big name Free Agents and expect to seriously win anything.

And out of Curiosity since You cant see Brown becoming anything, who do you see making an Impact from this years draft?

I think this year's draft was a 2 person draft. Difference between Boston and the guys GS drafted is GS did a much better job of drafting/developing. Look at the C's draft picks since the Ray Allen deal...some real misses that should at this point be valuable NBA players..Giddens, Johnson, Moore, Melo, Sully, etc. I like Smart and hope he take another step ASAP.

Danny has missed on draft picks..just not sure the draft is going to be enough.

[guava_wrench]

It really is a tricky question. If we want to give up on our current roster, the picks are our best bet. We will hope for the Nets pick become #1 (odds are against that because of the Lottery) and hope there is a transcendent player that year like Lebron or Anthony Davis. Is so happens that neither of those guys got a title on their rookie deals. In fact, what best players on their teams have won a title in their first five years?

Kahwi did it, but he was on a team that already had a roster that had been winning titles. He was more of a final piece than the foundation, especially since he was just reaching all-NBA caliber at that point clearly was not the best player on the team when the season started, regardless of how the finals went. Now that we have Horford, we don't necessarily need a young guy from the Nets pick to be all-NBA immediately, but we will be waiting a year or two before the player arrives and Horford will be a year or two older when that player is only a rookie and underdeveloped as likely a 18-20 year old.

Draymond Green is on his rookie deal, but Curry is the best player on that team and is the 2-time MVP.

The fact that the Nets picks will be at the top of the draft means that it will be less likely that we will draft older players like Green or Curry, which would mean waiting more years for development.  Green and Curry were 25 and 27 year old respectively when GS won. Those Nets picks will take longer to develop if they are higher in the draft.

I would avoid talking in such strong terms about those draft picks.

[tazzmaniac]

I think Lebron is going to sign another 1+1 so he should be a free agent next year.  Adding Lebron and Cousins would certainly make us competitive with GSW.  GSW has no one to guard Cousins and he'd also dominate them on the boards.  Westbrook and Cousins wouldn't be quite as good but we'd be competitive.

[hwangjini_1]

Ainge is at his best trading for players...his weakness has always been drafting. No picks are off limits...especially in drafts that are considerable weaker. 2017 might be better...but this year's #3 pick had little value

If Ainge can get good value for the picks, he will. I would not do it for a malcontent like Cousins though

this is simply not true. aside from using 20/20 hindsight that would expose each and every GM as a poor drafter, show me the evidence of ainge not drafting at least as well as most other GMs.

such evidence is not there and it has been shown here by many folks that ainge is at least above average at drafting.

you earlier rave about GW drafting. great for them picking at 7, 11, and 7. that makes it a lot easier that draft at 15 and the 20s, which is typically where ainge has been drafting until a few years ago.

[WolfofCausewayStreet]

The greatest strength of the Danny Ainge rebuilding project is that the Celtics are flexible. With the Horford signing, we have two very good paths to rebuilding, any one of which would be the envy of teams across the league

Plan A: obtain two more superstars, one through free agency and one through trading away our assets. (We must do this by the offseason of 2017, because once 2018 comes around the cap holds for IT and AB's expiring contracts will keep us from having max space.)

- or -

Plan B: run with this team centered around IT/Crowder/Horford. Win 55 games and make the ECF every year. Then just wait until Smart/Brown/whoever we draft with our Brooklyn picks turns into stars. In short, tank; but without actually losing.

As of today, Plan A is no longer a thing. The pool of potential stars available from now until 2017 is as follows (and I'm being very liberal with these lists):

Trade
Russell Westbrook
Jimmy Butler
Demarcus Cousins
James Harden
Lamarcus Aldridge
Paul George
Anthony Davis
Kevin Love

FA
Russell Westbrook
Blake Griffin
Gordon Haywayrd
Paul Milsap
Chris Paul
Kyle Lowry

Okay, here's the fun part. Mix and and match any of those guys from each column and assume you can get them to play for us. Which two would make us better than Golden State? James Harden and Blake Griffin? Paul George and Russell Westbrook? Here's the real answer: there aren't any. We are now in a position where not only will fireworks not make us a realistic title contender, even double fireworks won't be enough.

For a team like Cleveland which is constructed to win now with very little flexibility, this situation is a complete disaster. Their fate is most likely to be Golden State's designated whipping boys until Lebron finally starts becoming mortal. But thankfully for the Celtics, we still have Plan B. We are the only team in the NBA that can draft multiple elite prospects in preparation for the post-Warriors era, but still nurture them in a competitive, winning culture.

So here's my take (and I accept that Danny Ainge's take may differ. He probably knows better than I do): the Brooklyn picks are now untradable. They represent this organization's only realistic shot of winning a title in the near future. This is not to say we should tank: this team is fun and I look forward watching them contend in the Eastern Conference for at least the next couple of years.

But our long-term focus should now be on hording our draft picks and using them as a basis to form the next superteam once the Warriors start losing a step. That means not using these picks to trade for Jimmy Butler. That means considering trading away IT and AB for assets before we have to pay them max or near-max money.

If the Celtics really are a team with a "Championship or Bust" mindset, the Brooklyn picks are now untradable.

Mate this is a brilliant outlook. I'm almost certain Brown will be a big time player. Smart could become a fringe all star. Looks good in the long term.

Too bad the NBA is dead for atleast the next 2-3 yrs.

[Vegas Green]

I'm in agreement with Brooklyn picks being untradeable in most any situation including Butler but what we have to remember that GSW can't keep all these guys once it's their turn for free agency. The next couple years are going to be a,lot like this year. Wrote about this somewhere else

[LarBrd33]

Maybe we should offer our cap space to Allen Crabbe so Brooklyn doesn't get him.  Lol.

Not that I'm terribly afraid of a Brook Lopez, Allen Crabbe, Tyler Johnson and Jeremy Lin team - but I'd rather not see them inch out of the bottom 5. 

[Jarrin John]

The greatest strength of the Danny Ainge rebuilding project is that the Celtics are flexible. With the Horford signing, we have two very good paths to rebuilding, any one of which would be the envy of teams across the league ...

Thank you for the thoughtful, well-crafted post.

[CoachBo]

I think many are overvaluing those picks. The days of slowly building through the draft and watching a team mature until they win is over. The NBA now is about hired guns. You have to go out and get high level FA to win.

The Nets' picks just offer assets that will be used to go get bigger names. Don't see Jaylen Brown as a true impact player. Next year could be the same.

The Brooklyn picks would be untradeable - if Ainge could be trusted to use them wisely.

He can't. Would. Not. Hesitate to ship them out to get a Cousins, Griffin, et al. Only way you can be sure of value.

[CoachBo]

Ainge is at his best trading for players...his weakness has always been drafting. No picks are off limits...especially in drafts that are considerable weaker. 2017 might be better...but this year's #3 pick had little value

If Ainge can get good value for the picks, he will. I would not do it for a malcontent like Cousins though

I would.

I have no faith whatsoever in Ainge drafting. He is much more astute evaluating veterans than he is college kids.