<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">So it began, the remaking of the Celtics, Ainge style. Now it's nearly four years later and this is a team at the very worst place an NBA team can be: young, not overly talented, stuck on some treadmill to nowhere. Take away Pierce and they would be the Atlanta Hawks. With him, they're not far away. So how has it unraveled to this? It's apparent now that Ainge loves to make moves. Not surprising. In a sense it comes with the territory. Why bring in Ainge if you didn't want him to do something? So he arrived with both a vision of the future and an itchy trigger finger. But now it just seems like he makes moves to make moves. Wasn't Ricky Davis the athletic wing player Ainge seemed so enamored with? Wasn't it Ainge who gave Mark Blount the big, fat contract? Wasn't it Ainge who drafted Marcus Banks? Just asking. And that's the problem. There are no easy answers, no obvious path to get out of this morass. What there is is Pierce, now playing the best ball of his career, a couple of kids who have potential, a proven good player in Wally Szczerbiak -- although markedly less athletic than Davis -- and not a lot else. Add it all up and it comes up to a team that's 20-31 this morning. And Ainge is saying there might be more moves. But the only real chip he has to deal is Pierce. Or did you really think there's a lot of demand out there for Raef LaFrentz, Brian Scalabrine and Dan Dickau, to name three Ainge acquisitions? The good news? Maybe the only good news if you're Ainge? No one seems to care. Bringing Walker back a year ago gave the Celtics a popularity boost, both at the gate and on the radar screen. That's as gone as Walker's wiggle. Now it's back to another lost season. </div> http://www.projo.com/celtics/content/projo...ol.d97d64c.html Anybody else think Bill Reynolds is an idiot?
yes. but what really hurts is that nothing he said there is technicially inaccurate...or...it is, but it just hasnt been proven to be yet
New School Journalism Same ol' same ol'. That column is pretty much mailed in. Stringing together a set of obvious statements and relying on fan sentiment to carry the story. It's pretty obvious that he wasn't interested in doing any real work. I can't really say that I entirely trust Ainge at this point, but I believe that he does have some sort of vision for the team. Davis for Wally took some getting used to, but it doesn't appear to be that bad. Still not sure about Marcus Banks, and blaming Ainge for Blount's contract isn't legit. The way Blount was playing when he got the contract justified it. There just aren't that many real centers floating around, and they thought that they had gotten one. Unfortunately Blount has no heart. Also, did Reynolds fail to notice that they were rebuilding? Or did he think that they were going to win it all this year?
i think you can absolutley blame blounts contract on Ainge. Look how he had played his whole career up to that point and then how he just started playing once he relized he was up for free agency and tell me u had to have been nostradamas to figure out it was an apparition!
Blame and Blount I am aware of Blount's numbers before that year. I can also guarantee that some other NBA GM would have given him the same money. Had Blount played better somewhere else, we would be killing Ainge for that. It was just a losing bet, not an abhorrent error. It's also symptomatic of a much, much larger problem. Anyone who's read John Hollinger would have known that Blount was going to suck, so perhaps you have a point. Perhaps Ainge is guilty of not doing enough research. I still think it's a hell of a lot better than the Scalabrine signing.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting postpoint:</div><div class="quote_post">I still think it's a hell of a lot better than the Scalabrine signing.</div> Gee Whiz, I sure don't. To call it better is a misnomer, but to call it more excusable sounds a little more on point. Scalabrine's deal was an abortion, and Blount's was dumb, but like I said, more excusable, because I firmly believe in what you said in the previous post, that they thought they were getting a good center, and they are just so few and far between. And they are. They're extremely difficult to come across, especially one that can run and block shots, but alas, Mark Blount is a traitor of the highest order, and the word of the season was coward, so here we stand. I will never forgive a player who stole money on the level that Blount did, but I won't forgive Ainge for signing an aimless numbskull like Scal either. An aimless numbskull who had virtually no upside, and now an untradable commodity. I've scratched my head plenty, but I still believe in Danny's vision, and I didn't believe in ML or Chris previously, so I guess that has to count for something. I also think one of the classiest owners in the game is in Boston, and I think one day he'll make good on his investment.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Squishface:</div><div class="quote_post"> I will never forgive a player who stole money on the level that Blount did</div> It's not his fault your club chose to pay him like they did. Obviously it was a shocking decision, but not one Blount should hold blame for.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Jerry West:</div><div class="quote_post">It's not his fault your club chose to pay him like they did. Obviously it was a shocking decision, but not one Blount should hold blame for.</div> Mr West...i respect you as most of the time you seem to have a very levelheaded thought process on most things basketball related...But if you was standing within 15feet of me now i would whoop you old fashioned WWF-Style... How can you say a player like Blount is in no way accountable for the contract he was offered...??? Its scum like Blount,Dampier,Foyle and a host of other players in this league who all of a sudden in a contract year find the abilty to play at a high level...If you can play at that level once there is no reason on earth not to be able to reproduce that kind of form in other seasons...These morons are some of the most privaledged people on earth getting paid handsomely for doing something most of us would do for free... To say these players are not accountable makes you look about as retarded as they do...
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting UnLeAsHeD:</div><div class="quote_post">Mr West...i respect you as most of the time you seem to have a very levelheaded thought process on most things basketball related...But if you was standing within 15feet of me now i would whoop you old fashioned WWF-Style... How can you say a player like Blount is in no way accountable for the contract he was offered...??? Its scum like Blount,Dampier,Foyle and a host of other players in this league who all of a sudden in a contract year find the abilty to play at a high level...If you can play at that level once there is no reason on earth not to be able to reproduce that kind of form in other seasons...These morons are some of the most privaledged people on earth getting paid handsomely for doing something most of us would do for free... To say these players are not accountable makes you look about as retarded as they do...</div> While that last bit was a mite harsh, I do agree. To say that it was the team's fault for paying him is a little bit too narrow a view. The man played at a level beyond his scope for 40 games, got paid handsomely, and chose not to ever play that hard again. The fact that we traded him for the Kandi-Man gave me a good laugh though. It seems they've both come full circle.
