Ainge can now take a bow
Celtics boss delivers with Hayward arrival
LAS VEGAS — You can go back to blaming Danny Ainge tomorrow for trading Kendrick Perkins.
The people who follow the Celtics can exercise their inalienable right to fill up the message boards and call the talk shows and rail against the president of basketball operations for overvaluing his assets and failing to get any number of players who could have helped over the years.
But not yesterday. Friday was a day to celebrate an unfettered victory.
There was no grand stage as the Celts made official the signing of top 2017 free agent prize Gordon Hayward. There was just Ainge standing at the end of a walkway at a health club in Waltham. Weights clanged below as he spoke. It seemed like a rather underwhelming setting for such a big matter, but the bottom line is that Danny got his guy.
The presence of Brad Stevens, Hayward’s coach at Butler, may have been the biggest lure for the AllStar forward, but Ainge is the one who surprised the basketball world by hiring Stevens four years ago. And Hayward doesn’t pick the Celtics if Danny hadn’t built this into a 53-win team since the depths of a 25-57 season in 2013-14 after dealing away Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett.
Most importantly to getting this deal done, Ainge had to take the hits for not going after DeMarcus Cousins or securing trades for Jimmy Butler or Paul George. He was ripped for not getting the Celts rebounding help at the February trade deadline. Ainge stood pat at the deadline, protecting the ability to create space for a maximum contract free agent.
In the column that accompanied the dearth of deadline moves, we wrote, “Through it all, the Celtics maintained a stance that projected a seemingly odd confidence about the offseason in a business with so much uncertainty. As for whether Ainge believes he has this thing wired, be advised that some of his peers are wary.”
Then we quoted a league executive.
“Danny wasn’t taking the Nets picks or really anything off the table, but the fact he was so comfortable waiting for the draft and summer scares the (expletive) out of me.”
The Celtics traded down from pick No. 1 to No. 3 and selected Jayson Tatum, picking up a future firstround pick from the Lakers or Sacramento for their trouble. Then they went after Hayward and got him.
Apparently the exec’s fears were well founded.
In truth, Ainge probably wasn’t so comfortable. He knew then that even as the Celtics were winning with frequency that he needed more than one star and some mid-level veteran assistance. That wouldn’t be enough to get the C’s past Cleveland, and just adding Hayward and the very promising Tatum isn’t now.
That’s why he wanted Indiana to wait a few days until he got Hayward’s decision. The idea was to add George to the Isaiah Thomas, Al Horford, Hayward core and more seriously challenge the Cavaliers for a trip to the NBA Finals.
But — cue the critics’ chorus — Ainge wasn’t willing to give up next year’s Brooklyn pick or the Lakers-Sacramento choice. He wasn’t going to give up a potential top-five pick for someone who’d openly expressed through his agent that he wasn’t going to stay with the Pacers next summer and would be bolting to his home-area Lakers.
He still wanted George badly, however, and there was strong disappointment that the Pacers sent him to Oklahoma City for a Victor Oladipo-Domantas Sabonis package the Celts could seemingly have beaten with ease without including the two draft picks.
By holding the line on this year’s portion of the Brooklyn bounty, the Celtics have Tatum. It’d be hard to find many who don’t now appreciate Ainge’s willpower with the pick.
But it’s a lock that he will again take the heat if he doesn’t loosen up and part with a premium pick next February when the Celtics need a key player to perhaps get them over the Cleveland hurdle.
Danny Ainge will get torched if he holds on to the assets, and, depending on what is available and at what price, he may deserve the abuse. He may overplay his hand and incur the wrath of Greenhearts.
But not yesterday when Ainge and the Celtics officially secured the most coveted free agent on the market. He got Gordon Hayward to pick Boston over Utah and Miami, when people have for years said no good player would ever choose our winters over South Florida.
It wasn’t much of a bow Ainge took, but after all the orders that have been placed and requests made, this was delivery day.