One happy re-Turner
Ex-Celtic glad to be back with old friends
Evan Turner feigned relief as he walked down the backstage hallway toward the pregame chapel service.
“People can cheer for me tonight,” he said. “Jae said it’s OK.”
Indeed, moments before, a reporter checked with Jae Crowder, who was angry when fans applauded for Utah forward — and potential free agent — Gordon Hayward two weeks ago.
“For ET?” said the Celtics forward, breaking into a laugh. “Yeah, that’s cool.”
And the locals did go ahead and give Turner, who left town for a deal much better than the C’s would have offered (four years, $70 million), a warm, if rather reserved, ovation when he was introduced with the Portland starters. But that was likely in large part due to the fact that Meyers Leonard’s picture was on the video board above center court when Turner’s name was called.
“Did they?” Turner said afterward. “I didn’t pay a lot of attention to it.” Then again, he didn’t pay
no attention to it — not after being hooted on the previous night in Philadelphia, where he committed the crime of being drafted second overall in 2010 and not becoming a superstar.
“It’s way better,” he said. “It’s crazy ironic how one day you get booed, and the next day people might be happy to see you. It’s cool.
“I’ve definitely been looking forward to this trip for a while.”
Yesterday in the Garden, where people see him as the affable energy guy who spurred the Celts’ bench brigade the past two years, he started slowly, perhaps because he was visiting with former teammates and setting a personal record for autographs and selfies as he made his way from the floor to the dressing room after his pregame shooting.
Turner went on to record 12 points in the Trail Blazers’ 127-123 overtime win. He also recorded a couple of transactions with Crowder. One involved a technical foul for inadvertently catching the Celt in the face after being fouled with 5:37 left in the fourth quarter.
“That was crazy,” Turner said. “I did that because I didn’t know what I was doing. I don’t know what I hit him with, regardless of which, whaaat? Who calls that call?”
On this Turner was called “not so great.” He got to cover his old friend, Isaiah Thomas, who came into the game second in the NBA at 28.7 points a night and went for 41 in 44 minutes.
“I thought Evan did a hell of a job,” said Portland coach Terry Stotts. “It goes to show how good Isaiah Thomas is.”
Said Turner: “It felt like he got 15, for real. It says 41 in the books, but it looked like a 15-pointer. But he’s talented. The dude does a lot. For his height and size, you can’t give him enough credit for his change of speed. You mix that in with the way Brad (Stevens) draws up plays, you could be in for a long night.”
Coming on the heels of four straight losses, the victory soothed the injury to his defensive rating. So did being back in Boston, the place where Turner’s joy for the game was rekindled.
“We had a great team,” he said. “We had a great chemistry amongst our team. That’s one thing I really recognized. I’m not saying we don’t here, but the locker room feel was kind of rare. I definitely appreciate that the most.
“And, you know, playing at the Garden was dope, man. Putting on the jersey is definitely dope, and you don’t take it for granted. This isn’t like a normal franchise. The sellouts and all that stuff, you don’t take that for granted. I definitely miss that. That experience.”
At this point, Turner would just like to see some good weather for a while. When we ran into him in New York back in November, he expressed surprise by how much it rains in Portland.
“And now it’s snowing there, man,” he said. “And then it’s nice here. It’s just my luck. It’s like when I first got to Boston there was like 128 inches (of snow) or something like that. So eventually I started looking at myself. It’s me. For sure that’s what happened. My life is always like that. I get like six bad days and one good one.”
From meeting up with old friends to posing for pictures with fans who still appreciate the way he plays the game and his sense of humor, this was a very good day for Evan Turner.