This One Mistake Won The Celtics An NBA Championship

It's June 27, 2013, the Miami Heat have just won their second consecutive NBA title. Jason Kidd and Grant Hill just announced their retirements and the 2013 NBA draft is about to begin. The first overall pick was going to the Cleveland Cavaliers and with their stellar track record of numbers. one chooses that their selection would surely be a future Hall of Famer who would alter the caliber of the franchise, the Cleveland Cavaliers selected Anthony Bennett from Toronto Canada and the University of Nevada at Las Vegas turned out not to be on June 27 In 2013, the Cavaliers selected Anthony Bennett with the first overall pick in the draft, a player who would play Just Four Seasons in the NBA.

He never averaged five points per game and is widely considered the biggest bust in NBA and NBA history. In some ways, the Cavaliers who drafted Bennett weren't even the worst. decision that an NBA front office made that day Kevin Garnett Paul Pierce Jason ter everyone goes to the Brooklyn Nets Celtics get three number ones 2014 2016 2018 humph Wallace Evans uh just a lot of things clearly, clearly, the Celtics are on what many Described as one of the worst trades in NBA history, the Celtics traded their two Allstars, Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce, for four veteran players. A rookie who played 5 minutes per game.

Three first-round picks and a pick swap. A big haul for the Celtics, but. Fans of the last 50-cent-on-the-dollar trade were shocked and horrified that the trade was described as completely lopsided, trading two All-Star caliber players and one entry-level veteran for five players, most of whom probably won't even see the court in a Celtics. Jersey and four picks that may or may not prove unforgivable, but little did fans know that 11 years later,

this

trade would set off a sequence of events that would lead them directly back to a title. Today's video is currently sponsored by DraftKings. All new customers who bet.

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That's the Jimmy High Roller promo code only at draftking Sportsbook in basketball. The years 2013 feel like a lifetime ago, the league was completely different, we hadn't been introduced yet. For some of our favorite players, three-pointers didn't dominate the game and the Boston Celtics looked like

this

: The core of their 2008 Championship-winning squad is still intact without Ray Allen, this team and this team are worlds apart and have nothing in common. common more than the name on the front of their jersey, this 2013 team was good, but the door on their

championship

aspirations was quickly closing and time would tell that they would never win another

championship

, which they would however, without realizing it, would set off a chain of events that ultimately led to a championship more than a decade later, they didn't know it at the time, but this team was about to make the ultimate sacrifice that would inevitably guide the future of this organization back to a championship and it all started with an exchange.

It was a big trade agreed to last night and this is what Burman is certainly not happy with, the Boston Celtics are reportedly sending Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett to the Brooklyn Nets for a player package that includes Jared Wallace and three picks from first round. the rebuilding movement in Boston is clearly in full effect now, within a week, Celtics Nation has bid farewell to Doc Rivers Pierce and Garnett, meanwhile, the Nets put together an Allstar starting five, looking pretty good in the summer In 2013, the Celtics broke headlines by trading Kevin. Garnett and Paul Pierce to the Brooklyn Nets for what fans at the time felt was very little in return, the deal itself wasn't great, but trading the heart and soul of the team was an emotional blow to Boston fans. . team that Boston fans came to love completely Stripped, but this trade meant that the Celtics were going to be in rebuild mode for the foreseeable future, but the Celtics general manager at the time, Danny, had a plan, a line of time that would take the Celtics to the lowest level. depths of the league before inevitably bringing the organization back to glory and that timeline began just 6 days after this fateful trade on July 3, 2013, the Celtics hired former Butler University head coach, Brad Stevens, now Stevens had never coached in the NBA before he was only 36 years old. years and handed one of the worst rosters in the league, the five players Hall, the Celtics got in exchange for Pierce and kg were as inconsequential as expected Keith Bogin and MarShon Brooks played a combined 10 games for Boston Chris Joseph played a La A whopping 24 minutes in a Celtics jersey Chris Humph was on a new team after just one season and Gerald Wallace retired in just two seasons, meaning the near future of the most successful and historic franchise in the history of The NBA would be determined by their four newly acquired draft picks at the end of the 2016 season, 3 years after the infamous trade with Brooklyn, the Celtics roster looked like this, the two remaining players from the 2013 roster were Avery Bradley and Jared Solinger, the team was painfully average over those three years and They used that 2014 first round pick they received from the Nets to draft James Young, who didn't really work out, but they did have an All-Star guard and Isaiah Thomas and three remaining picks from that trade with the Nets, which they managed to do. with these selections it would become a masterclass in NBA management and nothing short of a miracle, it all starts with the Nets being pure water in 2016, winning only 21 games, the third worst record in the NBA, this gave the Nets great odds in the draft lottery and it resulted in them landing with the third overall pick in the 2016 draft, a pick that now belonged to the Celtics.

At the time, these picks the Celtics received were a complete shot in the dark, a lot of people believed this 2016 pick was going to be a mid-range pick. to the late first round because no one thought the Nets would be as terrible as they now were first round picks in 2014, 2016 and 2018 now probably won't be lottery picks due to the fact that the Nets will probably be I would be doing well in those shifts. This pick wasn't just a lottery pick, it was a top three pick and with this third pick Boston selected a 66 two-way guard from Cal who was receiving comparisons to Jimmy Butler with the third pick in the 2016 NBA draft who They selected the Boston Celtics.

University of California Berkeley's Jaylen Brown Jayen Brown got off to a slow start with Boston, but the potential was clearly there and with the addition of Al Horford, who signed in the offseason, the Celtics would have their best season in a decade. winning 53 games, earning the number one seed in the East and reaching the Conference Finals, their fortunes were changing after the fateful trade in 2013 faded into the past, but that trade with the Nets would prove to be the gift that kept on giving. of his In the 2017 season, the Boston Celtics prepared for one of the strangest events that can happen in the NBA.

As bad as the Nets were in 2016, they managed to outdo themselves the following season by winning just 20 games and having by far the worst record in history. league and this meant that even though the Celtics finished the season as the sole favorite thanks to that 2013 trade with the Brooklyn Nets and the 2017 pick swap that came with it, the Celtics had the number one overall pick in the NBA draft, now this has happened before. both in 1978, when the Blazers finished the season as the sole seed and the Pacers simply traded their first overall pick before the draft, and in 1982, when Cavs owner Ted Steppan traded his first-round pick a few years before driving a la The Lakers had the number one pick in the draft after winning a championship; in fact, Steppan was so reckless with his trades that the league had to step in and establish a rule that essentially prevented the owners and GMS from shooting themselves in the foot, so the fact that the Celtics have this pick in First place was miraculous, but what Danny did next was not a matter of good fortune but rather genius, instead of using his first overall pick, he decided to trade and swap picks with the 76ers, giving them the first overall pick to return. for the third pick in the draft and a future first rounder, the Celtics front office already knew who they wanted in the draft and it wasn't Marel Folz or Lonzo Ball, they also knew they were going to get their preferred player regardless of whether they were picking first or third, so in one of the boldest moves in draft history, they traded the first pick for the third and got the player they wanted and got a future first-round free.

In the process, the player they selected in the 2017 draft was simply the player they needed with the third pick in the 2017 NBA draft the Boston Celtics select Jason Tatum out of Duke University for 2017 the Celtics went from being an average team adrift in no man's land to earn first place in its conference and secure one of the best The young duos throughout the league were their next task: build a championship team around their new young and still talent they had one more pick left from the kg Pierce trade, so on August 30, 2017, 2 months after drafting Jason Tatum, Boston traded Jay Crowder, Isaiah Thomas. and that 2018 first-round pick they received from the Nets in exchange for Kyrie Irving, at the end of the 2017 offseason, the Celtics roster had completely changed once again, the first seeds of a team were being placed champion, but time would show that this team was not fully prepared for the big stage, the Celtics were fine reaching the Eastern Conference Finals in their first season with Kyrie and winning almost 50 games in their second season with the team, but it became clear that Irving did not share the same priorities. or expectations as an organization, so in the 2019 offseason, Kyrie decided not to return to Boston and ironically signed a 4-year contract with the Brooklyn Nets.

This was a huge blow to the Celtics, it caught them completely off guard, they lost an NBA player. and they got nothing in return the first step back for the organization during their rebuild at this point the Celtics knew they had a solid foundation with Tatum and brown and if they wanted to win it would be with a team built around these two so that's what which they did over the next year, selecting Pritchard in the 2020 draft, acquiring Luke Cornette in a trade during the 2021 season, signing undrafted free agent Sam Hower, and trading to bring back Al Horford in the 2021 offseason to the start of the 2122 season, the Celtics finally had some continuity with their team. 10 players from their 16-man roster returned from the 2021 season, but 8 years after their 2013 trade with the Brooklyn Nets, long after the residual fallout from the trade seemed to have reached its natural conclusion.

There was one last gift the trade had to offer the Celtics now, if you remember, in the 2017 draft, the Celtics used their pick they got from the Nets to select Jason Tatum, but not before trading the first pick for the third Well, that future first-round pick came into play in 2019 when the Celtics selected Romeo Langford with the 14th overall pick. Now Lenford didn't quite work out for the Celtics, so in February 2022 the team included Langford Josh Richardson and two. first-round picks and a trade with the San Antonio Spurs for Derek White and just like that, nearly a decade after what was described as one of the worst trades of all time, the Celtics turned agent Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Jason Terry in Jason.

Tatum Jaylen Brown and Derek White eight years later turns out the trade wasn't so bad after all, but the Celtics weren't done yet after an appearance in thefinal in 2022, the team was hungrier than ever, they were close, they had the tools they knew they had. They were still missing some pieces and knew where to get them, but to have a shot at a title they would have to make their biggest sacrifice yet on June 23, 2023, just 3 weeks after their season ended, the Boston Celtics went bankrupt. starters in a three-way trade with the Memphis Grizzlies and the Washington Wizards through this trade the Celtics acquired Christ Staps Porzingis which they had to give up their leader and the Heart of their team Marcus Smart a trade that was described as one One of the toughest decisions the organization has had to make in recent history, but it had to be done, the Celtics were one step closer to their ultimate goal and just before the start of the 2023-2024 season, Boston made one last move that would prove to create victory. formula they had been looking for Drew Holiday is a Celtic just days after being traded from Milwaukee to Portland in exchange for Holiday the Celtics have sent Rob Williams and Malcolm Brogden to the Blazers Portland also gets a 2024 first-round pick via Golden State and a 2029 first round pick, this is what Jaylen Brown and with the acquisition of Drew Holiday, the Celtics would dominate the 2024 season, having one of the best seasons in NBA history, resulting in a NBA championship over the course of a decade, the Celtics underwent a massive rebuild. which featured 112 players, 30 draft picks, four coaches, two GMS, one of the worst seasons in franchise history, five conference finals appearances and, finally, they had their championship squad.

This all stemmed from four measly draft picks the Nets threw in as consolation in a lopsided trade. 11 years ago, look at the Celtics today and all their talent, their record-breaking season, the championship they won and you will see a team that was destined to win a title, they have called it a super team, an easy path to the Finals were too good to its own good, but when you step back and look at the long road the Celtics took to get here, you will find resilience, sacrifice, patience, risk taking, great management and coaching and an organization that has been crafting and building its team champion for more than a decade, this Championship was no coincidence if they found themselves in the same situation.

I'm not sure how many organizations would have the foresight or composure to make some of the moves Boston made throughout this process to get where they are. Today, in the summer of 2013, the Boston Celtics made what was thought at the time to be one of the worst trades the NBA has ever seen. But unbeknownst to them, 11 years later, this infamous trade would set off a sequence of events that would put the Celtics over the top. a crash course in NBA history and a championship