More Celtics Thoughts

When the trade of Ray Allen on NBA Draft Day was announced to the Seattle fans - they booed the move because they didn't want to lose Ray Allen. When it announced in Boston that the Celtics had swapped the 5th pick for Allen - most of the "experts" panned the move because they thought the Celtics should have held on to the 5th pick.

I immediately liked the move and still do. The critics panned the trade for a number of reasons - seeing as I have nothing better to do at the moment - I'll go through the criticisms one by one and show how they are wrong.

Some people complained that either Ray Allen was too old or that adding him to the starting rotation made the Celtics too old. Yes Allen will shortly be 32-years old and that is old in shooting guard years but Allen has always kept himself in excellent shape and is coming off his highest scoring season of his career. The Celtics just need him near the top of his game (20+ points per game) for 3 more years. Assuming that Rajon Rondo, Ray Allen, Paul Pierce, Al Jefferson and Kendrick Perkins are the starting five for Boston next season then that means that the average age of the Celtics starters would be 26-years old. It seems to me to be a good balance of youth and experience.

Others contend that the Celtics now have three guys who need "their shots" and there is still only one ball. This viewpoint seems to be missing the point that under Danny Ainge and Doc Rivers the Celtics are an up-tempo team which should average over 100 points a night with this line-up. The three players also have different "games". Allen is an outside shooter who can drive, Pierce is a drive to the basket guy who can also shoot from outside, Jefferson is a down on the blocks guy. Their games don't interfere with each other. If anything - their games are complementary and make it much harder for teams to double on any one player. Getting Allen, Pierce or Jefferson "their shots" won't be a problem.

The last complaint is that the Celtics would have been better off keeping the pick. I disagree. After Oden, Durant and Mike Connelly - all the remaining players were a crap-shoot with none of them guaranteed to be any better then current Celtic Ryan Gomes. People forget that in his last season at Providence Gomes averaged 18.9 points and 9.4 boards per game while shooting better than 50 percent from the field. With the Celtics he has proven to be a solid 12 point, 6 rebound guy whose best days are still ahead of him. There is no guarantee that any of the forwards picked after Durant will turn out to be better than 12 point, 6 rebound per game professionals.

The people who say the Celtics should have kept the 5th pick also fail to mention that doing so would have meant also keeping Wally Szczerbiak and his albatross contract. The Celtics are a much better team with Ray Allen and Glenn "Big Baby" Davis than they would have been with Jeff Green (assuming he would have been the Celtics pick at 5), Delonte West and Wally Szczerbiak.

Three teams in the Eastern Conference made the playoffs with a .500 or worse record and 47 wins were enough to win the Atlantic Division last year. I look for the Celtics to win about 45 games next year and make it to the second round of the playoffs. The trade for Ray Allen makes that possible.