Even though the Boston Celtics haven’t been rebuilding for long, they want the rebuild to be over.
That tends to happen when you emerge as a low-key Eastern Conference contender not three years into your reinvention. The Celtics have picks, prospects, trade-friendly contracts and cap space. That’s a lethal combination. It’s led many of us to believe that they’ll do something drastic, via trade or free agency, to help expedite their promising rebuilding process.
But while team president Danny Ainge acknowledges that he too wants to put a bow on their latest restructuring effort, he won’t let the Celtics rush into anything too brash just for the sake of moving the needle slightly, if at all, per CBS Boston:
“Right now, we’re trying to become a better team as fast as we can without selling out. We want to become a more significant team this upcoming year, and at the same time we want to build something that is sustainable for a long period of time,” Ainge told WBZ-TV’s Dan Roche on Sunday night’s Sports Final.
Ainge added that while ownership and fans would prefer an instant turnaround, it’s his job to preach patience and make sure the team doesn’t do something rash that will set the organization back in the long-run.
“Ownership would like to see something happen faster and I know my coaches and players want to see something faster. I’ve been in their positions and I get it, I want to see something faster too. But I have to protect us from doing something irrational from doing something that gets us a little bit better. If it’s something that gets us to being a true championship contender faster, we’re all for it. As long as it’s a sustainable formula and not a one-year quick hit, sacrificing future assets,” he said. “Everything depends on how much money a player wants, how many assets you have to give up to get that person. There are a lot of what ifs, and that’s what we’ll be doing the next six weeks, trying to figure out what’s available to us. The things we like to do we still have to find partners for, which is very challenging.”
Kudos to Ainge for his patience. That isn’t easy in this situation.
To wit: According to Basketball-Reference the Celtics joined the Golden State Warriors as the only teams to rank inside the top 10 of offensive efficiency, defensive efficiency and pace during the regular season. They could see the value in their model and try to push the bill, targeting impact players who help them win now, even if it’s at the expense of playing time for youngsters.
But we’ve seen teams fall victim to onset success before. The Phoenix Suns doubled down on a fringe playoff model after a surprisingly successful 2013-14 campaign. The Milwaukee Bucks invested in Greg Monroe after shocking the NBA sphere by making a playoff appearance in 2014-15. Neither of those teams made the playoffs this past season, and they’re both caught in this weird rebuilding limbo, trying to balance competing with developing.
The Celtics face that same dilemma, only they’re successfully winning the juggling act without committing to any one path too hard. Right now, they have options. Plenty of them.
And it behooves Ainge to wait around until the right one comes along, whatever it maybe, whenever it may be.
