Big bang in Boston: Stevens leaves the bench and replaces Ainge

What was given is over. The Celtis project demanded changes that were coming, and they all happened suddenly, without time to think and much to talk about. Danny Ainge leaves the offices after a management that spans almost the last two decades and he is replaced by a Brad Stevens who, attention, leaves the benches and only assumes the position of General Manager. Total and absolutely unexpected bombshell in the NBA, which says goodbye to one of the most relevant figures in the offices of the entire 21st century, the man who replaced the eternal (and eternalized) figure of a Red Auerbach who died in 2006, just three years after his ward, a member of those Larry Bird Celtics who conquered three rings in the ’80s, you will reach the staff of the most winning franchise in NBA history; Then alone and today, of course, with the Los Angeles Lakers, his intimate enemy.

This has two conclusions (among many others): the first, that one of the most relevant figures in the history of the Celtics is leaving, the maker of the big three (Garnett, Pierce y Allen) which gave the city of Boston its only ring in the last 35 years, a gargantuan crisis, almost inexplicable, that was only interrupted by the good work of Ainge in the offices. The second, that his conservatism has taken its toll on him and that he has been continually singled out by fans, journalists and analysts as the man who prevented a promising project, which fell two victories away from the Finals just eight months ago, from taking the final step. towards the ring. A horrible year, harmed by the coronavirus and injuries, with play-in By means and infinite doubts, it has precipitated the departure of a character who took advantage of the greed of a man named Prokhorov to make a worthy reconstruction. And that today, almost eight years later, he has seen how his team has been eliminated in the playoffs precisely because of the one who mortgaged with that transfer. The one that brought aging Garnett and Pierce to Brooklyn in exchange for draft rounds from which Tatum, Jaylwn Brown, Smart … and others who are gone (Rozier and company) have come out.

The situation for the Celtics is delicate: Brad Stevens arrived in 2013, just after the aforementioned transfer, and set course for a stage of magnificent progression thatIt wiped out all the members of the 2008 ring (the last to leave was Rajon Rondo) and set course for a stage that has had seven consecutive playoff appearances and three Eastern Conference finals. Two of them were, by the way, lost against LeBron James, who also eliminated them in the first round of 2015. Stevens comes out after a formidable balance in general, but poor when the public demands the ring; and, according to the latest information (Shams Charania, Adrian Wojnarowski …) very burned after the bubble, with a lot of difficulty keeping the chemistry of the group afloat and with the public discussion between Marcus Smart and Gordon Hayward, now out of the team, as the highlight of destruction.

The Celtics are now going to thinking corner. He has a summer ahead in which they need a new coach, a position for which, for now, Jason Kidd (nobody knows why) and Lloyd Pierce, reviled after his abrupt departure from the Hawks, have sounded. Whether they are or not, Stevens will have to do the work in the offices that Ainge has not been able to get.r, and with which the coach himself has gone from being the heir of Gregg Popovich to a good coach for bad teams. The Celtics continue to need the bench and inner power, in addition to surrounding Jayson Tatum, everyone’s hero, with enough weapons to win an elusive ring that they have only been able to see up close once in 35 years. An excessively large crisis for a historic franchise. Or, put in any way: a failure.