First year head coach. No more Pierce and KG. A new era for the Boston Celtics. A rebuild was among the team, a high draft pick in the upcoming draft, how long did you think it would take to be a contender again?
10 years later this year ended up being the ONLY year the Celtics wouldn’t make the playoffs in the 2008-2024 stretch. The Isaiah Thomas trade accelerated the rebuild like no other. He kept the team a playoff contender up until those Nets draft picks finally cashed in.
Now we’re looking at what’s arguably the most talented roster we’ve ever had. With Brad off the sideline and in the basketball operations chair. Even though a title would secure this, it’s still been one of the most successful rebuilds of all time.
by ECviews
25 Comments
It was so much fun watching those teams. We played so hard and constantly won games we weren’t supposed to win. I still remember running laps around my house after Jeff Green hit the game winner over LeBron with 0.6 seconds to go. I remember falling in love with Brad quickly, as well as a lot of the players we had.
I knew we had all those picks coming up from the nets but at the time I didn’t think that highly of it. It wasn’t guaranteed it was going to be a high pick even though it was likely and at the start of the rebuild the picks were still years away. Yes those picks ended up changing the direction of the franchise but I think the IT trade did just that as well when no one was expecting it.
It was a cool trade and I was personally actually an IT fan since his first year in the league. I loved his underdog story and he was pretty damn good in Sacramento. I was shocked that THIS was the last pick. Then he got traded to the C’s and I loved it but didn’t think it was going to help us win as much as it did.
Never in a million years did I think the rebuild would go that fast. I absolutely loved the team still and never had to question coaching, effort, etc. Roster talent was the only hiccup and that was okay at the time. Everything else made them so easy and fun to route for. I enjoyed going into playoffs as a lower seed underdog. Even though we lost, that Hawks series when we first got IT was fun. There was so much Celtic culture there on those teams (part of why I think Smart was the heart and soul — continuity from that group would have been amazing with this team). So no, I didn’t think it would go that fast but I also thought very very highly of Danny as a GM at the time so I knew we were headed in the right direction. I was just enjoying every moment of it and never thought of the rebuild as a bad time for us fans. I knew everything was going to be okay and just kept enjoyed each and every game and every player that came through the doors. I just didn’t know it was all going to happen so fast.
Shoutout to IT for instantly turning us into a playoff team, then a high seeded team, then getting us a return that turned our team into a contender from JT’s rookie season which is probably a huge reason he is the winner that he is. He was shaped by other great players, mindsets, mentalities, and expectations for all 7 years (minus 2021 probably with no Smart or JB).
I expected a lot more pain than we got lol. The only year we were down bad was the legendary Jordan Crawford GOAT week. We quickly learned Jeff Green is not that guy in terms of an all-star caliber player. I thought we were at least scrappy and not pushovers all year, which was a positve. Avery, Sully, Bass, rookie Kelly O..not the most talented roster lol.
Then everything changed halfway through next season when we trade for IT. Happiness flooded back to the parquet.
I enjoy rebuilds when they are intentional and done right. As a fan, its important to enjoy the growth of your team’s future stars, its a real key to enjoying sports.
Equip your organization with the best scouts and guys with eyes for prospects. Trade your best players for interesting young players. Take in the salary dumps for late firsts. Overpay in dollars for short term players that will be valuable trade pieces later on.
They knocked it out of the park here, and I felt that way at the time too.
jeff green was so frustrating man. he looked like a top 5 player in the league some games and was nearly invisible for many others.
holy Kris Humphries
Solid Brandon Bass transition period.
“In Danny We Trust” was my motto. I had full confidence in Danny and Brad to turn things around and build a great team. Some of that was just blind optimism, a lot of it was justified though
I do miss being the underdog with no expectations, less disappointment, but any pain is worth it for a ring
Like others, I was invested and definitely felt optimistic. The upcoming draft picks was something to bank on (and pray that they conveyed) and we actively rooted against the nets.
This era was when I learned just how difficult it was to consistently win in the NBA regular season. It was clear we did not have the talent to compete at any level and free agents weren’t going to pick our team over others.
I thought Brad had a bright future and felt it was the perfect team for him to take over, as there were no real expectations for winning anything.
I wish the Red Sox would take notes from this. Even though we always want to win here in Boston, fans can accept a rebuild if the team is transparent about it and there is a clear direction. Luckily the Celtics outsourced their tanking to the Nets, so they could still be that bad but scrappy team that gave teams fits, but wyc and ainge never tried to pull a fast one on us trying to bullshit their way through like Henry is
Loved Brad at Butler so I was super excited we were bringing him in. 11 years later I could not be happier with that decision.
He’s genuinely one of the greatest basketball minds on the planet, and as good as he was as a coach (perennial top 5 with an argument for maybe the best understanding of Xs and Os in the entire league) he might be even better as POBO.
Out of all the great decisions the Celtics made during the rebuild, I believe bringing in Brad Stevens was maybe the most important.
What happened was pretty much the best-case scenario. We got all these years of exciting young teams to root for that ultimately built to a top-in-the-league contender. Now we just need to win a chip.
I was tentatively optimistic if I’m being honest.
Once we had lost Ray Allen a few years before, I had realized that our window was likely closed.
Since Ainge was in charge and had engineered the formation of the Big Three in the first place, I had to have faith that he could do it again, given time.
I was sad that we were only able to get the one ring out of it, but still, I was pretty content.
Despite that one year, the C’s quickly began retooling and were contending again.
One of my favorite periods watching the celtics, loved Avery and Jeff green. Not to mention the scary Terry era
Thank God that Prokhorov got tired of spending money real fast in Brooklyn. That’s the biggest reason we are where we are. There is a good chance that one of those draft picks would have ended up being a lottery pick but nobody could have guessed they would basically bottom out in 2 years and we would start collecting top 5 picks right away.
That first Brad year we started out hot and we debated should we push for the 3 seed and maybe make a move. I think we fizzled out some but at a point we were fighting for that 3 seed. I think this is when division winners got top 3 seeds
ITT: a bunch of people who knew IT was a star and budding superstar
Y’all fall of it lol. It was cool and he was the man and we learned fast how legit he was, and the wins came right away, but don’t all act like ya knew IT was him
Danny Ainge should have a statue for what he did the last 15 years in Boston. I though Stevens was a shit coach but he picked right up where Ainge left off. Rebuilding a contender is tough. Doing it on the fly and still competing almost the entire time is unheard of.
Brad Stevens was the guy who decided to trade Paul and KG?
It was very nice of the Nets to tank on our behalf. Really helped accelerate that rebuild.
Fun rebuild tbh never boring
Liked him as a coach and as a gm. I’m a fan 👍🏻
IT will always be close to my heart for this reason, the dude made watching the Celtics fun when it was supposed to be a painful ass time. Smart did the same on defense. Can’t hold it against them for facing prime Lebron and (if they beat him) the Warriors. Cards were stacked against em
I thought it was so over when we got Humphries, then we were so back when we got IT4
That we became a destination for free agents says everything you need to know about how well the rebuild went.