Danny Ainge Appreciation Thread

[Homerclease]

While there was still some good in the past few seasons, it was becoming clear that Ainge had lost his fastball a bit. Rob Williams was a no brainer pick at 27 who is a big hit, have to give Danny credit for Pritchard too. Home run pick at that stage in the draft. Grant for Thybulle is a toss up given how badly Edwards flopped. Dumping a couple late picks to move Baynes and Kanter really stung, especially since Bane was exactly what they needed. Whiffing on Romeo and to an extent Nesmith too was also a setback although the jury is still out on Nesmith and it’s well known the target was Herro before Riley snatched him up. Biggest black eye for me has to be the Kemba deal. I get why they did it but man did Danny get pantsed by Char.

Is that really true, though?

In his last four drafts, he got Tatum, Timelord, Grant, Pritchard, Romeo, Semi, and Nesmith. Even if you limit that to the last three drafts to exclude Tatum and Semi, that's really quite good when accounting for draft position -- which you absolutely must do in judging draft picks IMO.

Which is why I gave him credit for the good moves. The Kemba deal was bad, the trading of late round picks to dump Baynes and Kanter were also bad. For a guy that absolutely crushed 99% of his trades before the past two seasons to me, he was showing signs of slipping. I think Brad and Danny were both getting long in the tooth in their previous roles and that the shake up came at the right time.

[jmr07019]

We had what? 2 late lotto pics, Grant in late teens or early 20s and then Pritch and Time Lord in late 20s. 3/5 with a starting big man is excellent. Grant could prove to be a starting caliber player as well but is at worst a very solid bench piece.

The what if that always gets me thinking is what if we never traded for Kyrie and drafted one of the Bridges with the pick we traded. Team would have looked something like

Bradley / Smart
Hayward / Brown
Tatum / Bridges
Horford / Crowder
Baynes / Theis / Rob

we could have had Brad's wet dream switchable defense a couple years earlier. Of course IT was still on the team but he only had 1 hip at this point so it's irrelevant.

Anyways I'm with Cave Ainge gets unwarranted criticism. Looks like he drafted 6 of 8 rotations players on a title contender including the top 3-4 guys in the rotation. Not bad for a guy who can't draft.

[Curmudgeon]

Unwarranted criticism? I could start my list of Ainge mistakes with Marcus frigging Banks instead of David West and go on from there. He did some very good things too-- the KG trade and snookering the Sixers out of a pick in 2017--but it was a mixed bag. And the Kemba and Fournier trades were just awful. I cringe when I think of how many people here wanted to resign Fournier, even people who said they actually watched the 20-21 version of the team.

[CelticFaninLBC]

Unwarranted criticism? I could start my list of Ainge mistakes with Marcus frigging Banks instead of David West and go on from there. He did some very good things too-- the KG trade and snookering the Sixers out of a pick in 2017--but it was a mixed bag. And the Kemba and Fournier trades were just awful. I cringe when I think of how many people here wanted to resign Fournier, even people who said they actually watched the 20-21 version of the team.

I cringe when I think who wanted to trade Tatum and Brown for peanuts just a few months ago.

[Curmudgeon]

Unwarranted criticism? I could start my list of Ainge mistakes with Marcus frigging Banks instead of David West and go on from there. He did some very good things too-- the KG trade and snookering the Sixers out of a pick in 2017--but it was a mixed bag. And the Kemba and Fournier trades were just awful. I cringe when I think of how many people here wanted to resign Fournier, even people who said they actually watched the 20-21 version of the team.

I cringe when I think who wanted to trade Tatum and Brown for peanuts just a few months ago.

Not for peanuts. Besides, they heard me.

But yes, you are right. The way they were playing I was really doubting whether the light would ever go off. But it did.

[Shak_Celts]

I don't know how DA doesn't get more props for Tatum and JB selections, damn near half the league has had beaucoup picks in the lottery over the last decade+, and I can't think of many (Den and Utah have done well) who DRAFTED two players as good as the jays much less B2B. Hell, Sacto has been in the lottery the majority of the 10 years and they picked guys a couple of guys who are good (worthy lotto picks) but none as good as either jay (I said what I said)!

JB is a 1 time AS, but who drafts players B2B (neither #1) who were both AS? GSW, Washington, and OKC come to mind as having drafted AS around the same time, I don't remember if they were B2B picks though. The lotto (draft in general) is such a crapshoot, with a couple of wrong moves DA could have drafted Fults and Bender/Dunn! People booed JB!

We struggled with a lot of picks since then but he also got us ROB WILLIAMS and Pritch (marcus before the jays)! I'll throw some love in for my guy GWill! The team we have that has smacked teams lately is mostly DA draft picks. Theis, White and AL are the exceptions (of guys that play). Theis was basically the same as a draft pick because he was plucked from overseas by DA.

If we win the chip, DA deserves a large share of the pie, POBO just figured out what was needed to get us over the hump.

Thanks, DA!

[radcot]

Unwarranted criticism? I could start my list of Ainge mistakes with Marcus frigging Banks instead of David West and go on from there. He did some very good things too-- the KG trade and snookering the Sixers out of a pick in 2017--but it was a mixed bag. And the Kemba and Fournier trades were just awful. I cringe when I think of how many people here wanted to resign Fournier, even people who said they actually watched the 20-21 version of the team.

No GM in history can stand up to this sort of 20-20 hindsight criticism.
Take Red Auerbach for instance:

1958 Bennie Swain - still on the board: Hal Greer, Wayne Embry, Don Ohl
1959 John Richter - still on the board: Rudy LaRusso, Bobby Smith
1960 Tom Sanders - good pick, but other good players were still on the board as well
1961 Al Butler - not good, but not many good ones later, Bill Bridges
1962 John Havlicek - home run
1963 Bill Green - still on the board: Gus Johnson
1964 Mel Counts - still on the board: Willis Reed!!, Paul Silas!!, Jerry Sloan!! (passed on him twice)
1965 Ollie Johnson - still on the board: Van Arsdales, Jon McGlocklin, Bob Love!
1966 Jim Barnett - still on the board: Matt Guokas, Neil Johnson, Archie Clark
1967 Mal Graham - still on the board: Phil Jackson, Lou Dampier
1968 Don Chaney - good pick
1969 JoJo White - home run
1970 Dave Cowens - Home run (4th pick in the draft)
1971 Clarence Glover - still on the board: Mike Newlin, Spencer Haywood!!, Clifford Ray
1972 Paul Westphal - great pick but traded away before becoming All-Star; Julius Erving was still on the board.
1973 Steve Downing - still on the board: George McGinnis, Caldwell Jones, Larry Kenon
1974 Glen McDonald - still on the board: George Gervin!!

--- and so it goes --- Of course can't fault Red for his late '70s, early '80s choices of Larry, Kevin, and, of all people, Danny!!

[BostonCouchGM]

much of Danny's success is fortuitous timing. Lucky that his bff McHale gifted him MVP candidate KG, lucky an inpet Owens couldn't talk his Russian owner, desperate to make a splash, out of the massive haul they gave up for KG and Pierce and that his own owner kept making Danny go back to the table with more and more demands after Danny would have stopped. And then lucky Colangelo is such a horrible G.M. that he a) didn't realize what a fraud Fultz was and that Tatum was the best player from that draft b) gave a division rival a 1st rounder to move up 2 spots when Fultz was going to still be there at #3. He's mostly a bad drafter but good with trades. There's much worse out there but this is an industry rife with buffoons in front offices so it's not saying much tbh.

[themoneyteam2]

much of Danny's success is fortuitous timing. Lucky that his bff McHale gifted him MVP candidate KG, lucky an inpet Owens couldn't talk his Russian owner, desperate to make a splash, out of the massive haul they gave up for KG and Pierce and that his own owner kept making Danny go back to the table with more and more demands after Danny would have stopped. And then lucky Colangelo is such a horrible G.M. that he a) didn't realize what a fraud Fultz was and that Tatum was the best player from that draft b) gave a division rival a 1st rounder to move up 2 spots when Fultz was going to still be there at #3. He's mostly a bad drafter but good with trades. There's much worse out there but this is an industry rife with buffoons in front offices so it's not saying much tbh.

Exactly. If only NBA teams hired you as their GM instead of those buffoons. After all, you would rather have Lonzo, Bridges, and RJ freaking Barrett over Jaylen Brown so your eye for player evaluation is obviously great.

Thanks for the laugh!

[Curmudgeon]

LOL. let's see how Danny does in Utah, with all of the turmoil there. Mitchell is unhappy, Gobert is unhappy (because Mitchell never passes him the ball) and the coach is on the way out.

[jirrit]

much of Danny's success is fortuitous timing. Lucky that his bff McHale gifted him MVP candidate KG, lucky an inpet Owens couldn't talk his Russian owner, desperate to make a splash, out of the massive haul they gave up for KG and Pierce and that his own owner kept making Danny go back to the table with more and more demands after Danny would have stopped. And then lucky Colangelo is such a horrible G.M. that he a) didn't realize what a fraud Fultz was and that Tatum was the best player from that draft b) gave a division rival a 1st rounder to move up 2 spots when Fultz was going to still be there at #3. He's mostly a bad drafter but good with trades. There's much worse out there but this is an industry rife with buffoons in front offices so it's not saying much tbh.

Lmao. All good things are lucky and all the rest that happens is just straight incompetence. Your thinking is so flawed, it’s borderline ridiculous.

[Captain_Caveman]

Unwarranted criticism? I could start my list of Ainge mistakes with Marcus frigging Banks instead of David West and go on from there. He did some very good things too-- the KG trade and snookering the Sixers out of a pick in 2017--but it was a mixed bag. And the Kemba and Fournier trades were just awful. I cringe when I think of how many people here wanted to resign Fournier, even people who said they actually watched the 20-21 version of the team.

And you'd still be wrong. Banks was a Wallace/Papile pick, with Ainge having only been hired weeks before. I mean, you can call hitting .340 in baseball a mixed bag as well. If you are expecting perfection, you won't view anyone well. Judging Ainge vs his peers all at the same standards, he grades out as elite in basically all categories of running a team. Simple as that.

During his tenure, he was the best in the league at making trades, top 5 in drafting, and accounting for Boston not being a premier destination for FAs, excellent in his signings as well.

[Captain_Caveman]

Unwarranted criticism? I could start my list of Ainge mistakes with Marcus frigging Banks instead of David West and go on from there. He did some very good things too-- the KG trade and snookering the Sixers out of a pick in 2017--but it was a mixed bag. And the Kemba and Fournier trades were just awful. I cringe when I think of how many people here wanted to resign Fournier, even people who said they actually watched the 20-21 version of the team.

No GM in history can stand up to this sort of 20-20 hindsight criticism.
Take Red Auerbach for instance:

1958 Bennie Swain - still on the board: Hal Greer, Wayne Embry, Don Ohl
1959 John Richter - still on the board: Rudy LaRusso, Bobby Smith
1960 Tom Sanders - good pick, but other good players were still on the board as well
1961 Al Butler - not good, but not many good ones later, Bill Bridges
1962 John Havlicek - home run
1963 Bill Green - still on the board: Gus Johnson
1964 Mel Counts - still on the board: Willis Reed!!, Paul Silas!!, Jerry Sloan!! (passed on him twice)
1965 Ollie Johnson - still on the board: Van Arsdales, Jon McGlocklin, Bob Love!
1966 Jim Barnett - still on the board: Matt Guokas, Neil Johnson, Archie Clark
1967 Mal Graham - still on the board: Phil Jackson, Lou Dampier
1968 Don Chaney - good pick
1969 JoJo White - home run
1970 Dave Cowens - Home run (4th pick in the draft)
1971 Clarence Glover - still on the board: Mike Newlin, Spencer Haywood!!, Clifford Ray
1972 Paul Westphal - great pick but traded away before becoming All-Star; Julius Erving was still on the board.
1973 Steve Downing - still on the board: George McGinnis, Caldwell Jones, Larry Kenon
1974 Glen McDonald - still on the board: George Gervin!!

--- and so it goes --- Of course can't fault Red for his late '70s, early '80s choices of Larry, Kevin, and, of all people, Danny!!

Yes, it is a lame barometer of success compared to hit rate relative to draft position and whether or not a player would have gone higher in a redraft.

[DarkAzcura]

I wish I had my post about success rates of first round picks and second round picks still. It was something like 25% of players selected 16-30 received second contracts. We are talking about any type of contract after the rookie contract. It’s incredibly difficult.

It’s shocking how little perspective people want to apply when it comes to drafting. It’s easy to critique, but it’s an utter crapshoot. Whenever I see someone attempt to use that as a huge criticism of Ainge, I turn off, lol.

The only time I’m willing to admit he drafted poorly was during the Big 3 years. He was good from 2003-2007 and good from 2013-2020. 2008-2012 were rough, I’ll admit, and I can see how that sticks out to some because it really hurt us from extending the window. In the end, though, when you have a 18 year run, you are gonna have bad years. It’s a crapshoot.

[ConstableGeneva]

Read on Twitter

[hugepatsfan]

There was an ainge thread on the general board and I'll report here what I said there...

Ainge was a terrific GM and that was very obvious. No one is perfect and he of course had misses. He was the GM of a team that's very disliked by NBA twitter. He was one of the most disliked players when he played, during an era that many of the NBA writers grew up watching. And BOS was a deep playoff run team for most of his tenure. So the stakes were always high with him and he was an easy target for NBA twitter and hot take artist slander.

He never tanked so he wasn't consistently getting high picks, but every high pick he got he nailed. Tatum was not the consensus #1 pick and he absolutely nailed that evaluation. Brown was the best pick to be made and that was not a consensus decision either. Obviously Jokic would have been the better pick, but in no realistic way was he in contention for the #5 pick he took Smart with. Lavine was close enough to in range that he could have been an outside the box pick there, but he pretty much nailed that one based on what were seen as the tier of prospects for that pick.

He drafted a long list of good players outside the lottery in Rajon Rondo, Al Jefferson, Tony Allen, Kendrick Perkins, Avery Bradley Terry Rozier, Glen Davis, Grant Williams, Kelly Olynyk, Rob Williams. Sure, he had a ton of busts too but that's what happens when you pick in the 20s every year because your team always goes deep into the playoffs.

He swing trades for KG, Ray Allen, Isiah Thomas, Kyrie Irving.

BOS has been a historically bad FA destination - he made by far the 3 biggest FA signings in team history with Horford, pre-injury Hayward and Kemba. BOS has never been a place that stars flock to if they have their choice of destination. For 15 years he consistently acquired all star talent in every way you can do it. Over and over again. He consistently drafted good players. Did well with 2 head coaching hires in Doc and Stevens. Obviously both had/have flaws but we've seen so many total dud hires in the NBA.

He wasn't without flaws. He was very hesitant to pull the trigger on trades for second tier stars. He was allergic to the idea of ever giving up value for a role player. He missed out on some "home run" picks later in the draft outside the lottery because he generally went in with the mindset of just hitting a single. There's of course room for second guessing and criticism. But the idea that he wasn't a great GM overall is silly. You're nitpicking if you want to get on your soapbox and go cray with Danny Ainge slander.

[165bows]

Searchable list of every single Ainge transaction:
https://prosportstransactions.com/basketball/Search/SearchResults.php?Player=&Team=Celtics&PlayerMovementChkBx=yes&BeginDate=2003-5-9&EndDate=2021-6-2&submit=Search&start=700

[ThumbsUpBaby]

Ainge will always have a special place in my heart as a Celtics fan. But I do think we needed a change and fortunately it worked out. Still think Ainge deserves some credit for this team right now.

[BostonCouchGM]

I wish I had my post about success rates of first round picks and second round picks still. It was something like 25% of players selected 16-30 received second contracts. We are talking about any type of contract after the rookie contract. It’s incredibly difficult.

It’s shocking how little perspective people want to apply when it comes to drafting. It’s easy to critique, but it’s an utter crapshoot. Whenever I see someone attempt to use that as a huge criticism of Ainge, I turn off, lol.

The only time I’m willing to admit he drafted poorly was during the Big 3 years. He was good from 2003-2007 and good from 2013-2020. 2008-2012 were rough, I’ll admit, and I can see how that sticks out to some because it really hurt us from extending the window. In the end, though, when you have a 18 year run, you are gonna have bad years. It’s a crapshoot.

oh please. It only seems that hard because most are bad at it. There should never be major mistakes made on draft night. You have all offseason to evaluate these players and do your homework on them. You know measurements, stats, personality, skills, athleticism, etc. If you draft a knucklehead with maturity issues you can't be surprised if they fail. If you draft a guy with subpar athleticism and measurables they have to be elite in all other attributes or they'll fail. If they're undersized for their position they'll rarely succeed. If they can't shoot they rarely develop into shooters. If you are a rebuilding team like we were in 2013 you don't take the older prospect over the younger guy with elite traits. The problem with Danny was he was all over the map. Undersized, older, younger, raw, can't shoot, knuckleheads, injury prone, high floor, low floor, low ceiling, high ceiling. He's failed at drafting every way imaginable.

The thing that bothered me the very most about Ainge was how he overvalued players on the roster and took too long to cut bait, because his hubris wouldn't allow him to admit he failed with draft picks, and that prevented him from drafting guys. For instance, I was as high on Nesmith as anyone. I would have plugged him in as starter or in the 2nd unit from jump and given him major minutes. I wouldn't have made the Richardson move or the White move. Once he sat, and got rusty and lost his rhythm it was over for him. He's legit ruined. His confidence is shot and his jumper is as broken as you'll find. He fails to hit the rim, he's hit side of the backboard, he's banked from straight on, off the left, right, front and back of the rim. He has no idea where it's going. I'd cut bait or move him. I'd rather have Begarin over here next year than Nesmith. Danny would keep him until he had zero trade value. And he'd pass on great players when he had multiple picks to take a chance using Nesmith or lack of roster space as a reason. Thankfully Brad doesn't seem like that. We'll soon find out.

[soxfan2003]

much of Danny's success is fortuitous timing. Lucky that his bff McHale gifted him MVP candidate KG, lucky an inpet Owens couldn't talk his Russian owner, desperate to make a splash, out of the massive haul they gave up for KG and Pierce and that his own owner kept making Danny go back to the table with more and more demands after Danny would have stopped. And then lucky Colangelo is such a horrible G.M. that he a) didn't realize what a fraud Fultz was and that Tatum was the best player from that draft b) gave a division rival a 1st rounder to move up 2 spots when Fultz was going to still be there at #3. He's mostly a bad drafter but good with trades. There's much worse out there but this is an industry rife with buffoons in front offices so it's not saying much tbh.

Exactly. If only NBA teams hired you as their GM instead of those buffoons. After all, you would rather have Lonzo, Bridges, and RJ freaking Barrett over Jaylen Brown so your eye for player evaluation is obviously great.

Thanks for the laugh!

To be fair, Ainge himself may have drafted Lonzo if Lonzo was willing to work out for the Celtics and the Celtics weren't in desperate need of shooting. Celtics had core pieces of Smart/Brown so drafting Lonzo didn't make sense unless the Celtics were willing to move Smart or Brown.

It is really fit and Fultz just being overrated as a PG prospect -- I said it before the draft on this forum -- that made drafting Tatum the logical choice in the absence of a trade.

The skill that Ainge/Zarren/Wyc showed is timing the trade with Philly in such a way to minimize the chances Philly would back out and select Tatum for themselves. If Philly did that, it would have been disastrous but not many people like to admit mistakes and Ainge probably recognized that. Ainge took a calculated gamble there since after Fultz worked out for Philly, even Colangelo himself reportedly was having 2nd thoughts. He had to because no one from Philly denies the workout like Fultz workout in Boston was another disaster and several members of their basketball ops were telling Colangelo to go in another direction (probably Tatum but not guaranteed to be him).

Reportedly, Tatum's first workout with Boston wasn't that good but just not a disaster like Fultz and so if memory serves the Celtics invited him back for a 2nd workout in which he cemented that he was at the top of the Celtics board.

When NBA teams suggest they don't draft for need, they are lying since if its close, need becomes a factor like it probably should.