Al Horford: he gawn

benhogan

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Horford will be on the perimeter, moving the ball, finding the open man or shooting open 3s. Unless he gets a mismatch and will take advantage of that in the post.
At this point, Philly would have been more than fine with Landry Shamet instead of Tobias Harris. And they could have signed local guy Marcus Morris Jr at a 1/3 of the cost and received similar production

Philly is Lakers East Coast, they are falling into good stuff in spite of their ineptness.
 

GBA

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In ATL he was paired with Josh Smith who was also a defensive minded 4/5.

Pairing Al with MaMo or a gimpy Hayward at the 4/5 put 100% of rim/lane protection on Al's shoulders.

Go look at Al's efficiency numbers when he played the 4 vs the 5 as a Celtic.
An early small ball 5 maybe, but traditionally more of a small 4 (smith). Same with Millsap really. No arguing both are better defenders than Morris and gimpy Hayward, so it’s no wonder Al’s d looks better with them. He was the one playing the 5 though.
 

InstaFace

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Horford will be on the perimeter, moving the ball, finding the open man or shooting open 3s. Unless he gets a mismatch and will take advantage of that in the post.
At this point, Philly would have been more than fine with Landry Shamet instead of Tobias Harris. And they could have signed local guy Marcus Morris Jr at a 1/3 of the cost and received similar production

Philly is Lakers East Coast, they are falling into good stuff in spite of their ineptness.
Have they been all that inept, other than Bryan Colangelo being a weirdo? The Fultz trade, sure. But on the key decisions that affected the roster, they seem to have consistently acquired complementary talent.
 

lovegtm

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Have they been all that inept, other than Bryan Colangelo being a weirdo? The Fultz trade, sure. But on the key decisions that affected the roster, they seem to have consistently acquired complementary talent.
The Harris trade was pretty brutal, especially in terms of how it worked in tandem with the Butler trade.
 

Devizier

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Only two explanations that make sense to me w/re to the Sixers' handling of Harris/Butler

1) They want to create a massive lineup (7' Embiid, 6'11 Horford, 6'9 Harris, 6'6 Richardson, 6'10 Simmons) akin to the Bucks or the old Nellie Mavericks teams with Nowitzki at SF. You cant coach height and unlike those Mavericks teams every one of those guys can play/create mismatches.

2) Butler was/is a locker room PITA and the other players wanted him gone.
 

lovegtm

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And the new Harris deal on top of it is mindblowing. Love the player, but..
Yeah, def. I’m including the new deal in the original deal, since they were pretty committed to that path once they made the trade. Harris had them over a barrel.
 

Cellar-Door

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https://twitter.com/DerekBodnerNBA/status/1146097348445188098@DerekBodnerNBA

Al Horford's $109 million contract with the Sixers contains $97 million in guaranteed money, as previously reported. The final $12 million, however, comes in the form of a partial guarantee of the fourth year of the contract, not in bonus money.

This makes a significant difference, so it really is a 4/109, PHI just maight be able to get out of the 4th year for like $15M if they don't meet the guarantee criteria. Also means the cap hit is probably something like 28M instead of the 22-23M some were speculating
 

lovegtm

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https://twitter.com/DerekBodnerNBA/status/1146097348445188098@DerekBodnerNBA

Al Horford's $109 million contract with the Sixers contains $97 million in guaranteed money, as previously reported. The final $12 million, however, comes in the form of a partial guarantee of the fourth year of the contract, not in bonus money.

This makes a significant difference, so it really is a 4/109, PHI just maight be able to get out of the 4th year for like $15M if they don't meet the guarantee criteria. Also means the cap hit is probably something like 28M instead of the 22-23M some were speculating
That makes the Celtics' decision to pass look a lot better imo (and I was fine with the decision anyway). $27M/year cap hit for Horford is rough, especially in the Celtics context.

Random thought on Horford: it feels as if the team is losing him for nothing, but they likely don't sign Hayward without him, and maybe they don't sign Kemba without the track record he helped build for the Celtics. In that sense, I think he got them some assets indirectly, and it's better to work with those going forward than to pay him big money in his 33-36 years in order to not "lose him for nothing."
 

Jimbodandy

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Random thought on Horford: it feels as if the team is losing him for nothing, but they likely don't sign Hayward without him, and maybe they don't sign Kemba without the track record he helped build for the Celtics. In that sense, I think he got them some assets indirectly, and it's better to work with those going forward than to pay him big money in his 33-36 years in order to not "lose him for nothing."
Yeah it's not a fantasy team. We had Al for the time that we had him. It was a good run, and he left his mark here.

If I make it to 70, and my term life policy expires, I'm not going to wish I died before 70 so it paid out. Pay value, get value.
 

lars10

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It’s going to be annoying as hell watching Al kill the Celtics on the pick and pop
But probably less annoying watching him not box out or rebound even though he’s often the tallest player out there.
 

InstaFace

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Random thought on Horford: it feels as if the team is losing him for nothing, but they likely don't sign Hayward without him, and maybe they don't sign Kemba without the track record he helped build for the Celtics. In that sense, I think he got them some assets indirectly, and it's better to work with those going forward than to pay him big money in his 33-36 years in order to not "lose him for nothing."
We should absolutely be grateful to him for that (not just his professionalism, mentorship and manifest talent). Kinda like Pedro agreeing to extend after the trade - without him (and, I suppose, Nomar), we don't sign Manny, we don't get close, we probably don't talk Schilling into waiving his no-trade, maybe don't sign Foulke, yadda yadda. Credibility and reputation as a worthwhile destination for top talent is a real thing, and only a handful of organizations in each league don't need to worry about it (and even then not forever - the Patriots may not remain themselves after Belichick, and the Canadiens are not exactly a juggernaut institution any longer).
 

OurF'ingCity

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Yeah there is a very strong argument that Horford opened the floodgates for star players to come to Boston on max deals. After his signing we got Hayward and Kemba in relatively rapid succession (i.e., the next two times the Celtics were able to free up a max slot). The canard that Boston is somehow not an attractive destination for star players was probably never true but it's certainly been put to rest once and for all now, and Horford was a large part of doing so.
 

InstaFace

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Brad Stevens' reputation was probably a factor - it obviously was a factor with Hayward for very unique reasons, but him being viewed as a miracle-worker probably has something to do with Kemba. May have had something to do with Al. But it also cut the other way too - does Stevens look half as brilliant if you don't have Al there to flawlessly execute inbounds plays to win playoff games? A Thank You Al Horford thread that tried to catalogue his top 10 plays in a celtics uniform would have some pretty damned impressive candidates.
 

EvilEmpire

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Yeah there is a very strong argument that Horford opened the floodgates for star players to come to Boston on max deals. After his signing we got Hayward and Kemba in relatively rapid succession (i.e., the next two times the Celtics were able to free up a max slot). The canard that Boston is somehow not an attractive destination for star players was probably never true but it's certainly been put to rest once and for all now, and Horford was a large part of doing so.
I understand Boston just won the Kemba Walker sweepstakes, and that is good, but given that Irving just walked out, and AD, Durant and Kawhi showed no interest in Boston, well, I think the word floodgates is a bit strong.

Kemba Walker is a very good player though. Hayward was before he got injured too.
 

DJnVa

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I understand Boston just won the Kemba Walker sweepstakes, and that is good, but given that Irving just walked out, and AD, Durant and Kawhi showed no interest in Boston, well, I think the word floodgates is a bit strong.

Kemba Walker is a very good player though. Hayward was before he got injured too.
Being able to sign max FA is not the same as signing every max FA. Especially when all we heard was "Max FAs don't pick Boston", and heard that from posters. The last 3 times Boston had the ability to sign one, they did.
 

cheech13

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They also added Kyrie Irving during that stretch. He wasn't a free agent, but Boston was on his short list and he never would have ended with the Celtics if they weren't a destination franchise.
 

EvilEmpire

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Being able to sign max FA is not the same as signing every max FA. Especially when all we heard was "Max FAs don't pick Boston", and heard that from posters. The last 3 times Boston had the ability to sign one, they did.
I get it. After Ainge's long, grueling rebuild effort, Boston finally cashed in with Kemba. You guys are set.

Seriously though, yeah, I'm busting balls a little, but after reading months and months of hopeful speculation about Kyrie and AD or another top tier star, I think Walker is a consolation prize that doesn't match the expectations I was reading. And then to look at the dysfunction that has recently transpired and then proclaim that the "floodgates are open" seems a tad bit optimistic to me.

Don't get me wrong, Of course I'd take Boston's situation over the Knicks a million times over. I think Boston might be in Purgatory right now - solid, but not good enough, while the Knicks are partying down in the 9th circle with delusions that they could move up to the 8th.
 

HomeRunBaker

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I understand Boston just won the Kemba Walker sweepstakes, and that is good, but given that Irving just walked out, and AD, Durant and Kawhi showed no interest in Boston, well, I think the word floodgates is a bit strong.

Kemba Walker is a very good player though. Hayward was before he got injured too.
You can add KG to this list by refusing to sign an extension if he was traded here which required signing a HOF 2-guard to coerce him to do so...….then upon departure he's the first to go on-air and tell Anthony Davis (and the world) that he should run, not walk, to LA rather than play in Boston.

They also added Kyrie Irving during that stretch. He wasn't a free agent, but Boston was on his short list and he never would have ended with the Celtics if they weren't a destination franchise.
And he couldn't bolt out of town soon enough.
 

JohnnyTheBone

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I understand Boston just won the Kemba Walker sweepstakes, and that is good, but given that Irving just walked out, and AD, Durant and Kawhi showed no interest in Boston, well, I think the word floodgates is a bit strong.
I would proffer that Boston had as little interest in re-signing Irving as he did in staying here. Dude isn't close to being worth the trouble. Ainge and company would swap out Irving for Kemba Walker every single time.
 

DJnVa

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I would proffer that Boston had as little interest in re-signing Irving as he did in staying here. Dude isn't close to being worth the trouble. Ainge and company would swap out Irving for Kemba Walker every single time.
The Cavs said that Ainge was fully cognizant of what Kyrie was like and was simply hoping that they could find a way to convince him to stay. They took a shot, it didn't work out. Someone thinking that it reflects more on Boston than Kyrie is....interesting.
 

HomeRunBaker

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I would proffer that Boston had as little interest in re-signing Irving as he did in staying here. Dude isn't close to being worth the trouble. Ainge and company would swap out Irving for Kemba Walker every single time.
It's fine to prefer Kemba as the better fit but that doesn't change the fact that a 2nd Team All-NBA player had zero desire to stay in Boston.
 

Eddie Jurak

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I get it. After Ainge's long, grueling rebuild effort, Boston finally cashed in with Kemba. You guys are set.

Seriously though, yeah, I'm busting balls a little, but after reading months and months of hopeful speculation about Kyrie and AD or another top tier star, I think Walker is a consolation prize that doesn't match the expectations I was reading. And then to look at the dysfunction that has recently transpired and then proclaim that the "floodgates are open" seems a tad bit optimistic to me.

Don't get me wrong, Of course I'd take Boston's situation over the Knicks a million times over. I think Boston might be in Purgatory right now - solid, but not good enough, while the Knicks are partying down in the 9th circle with delusions that they could move up to the 8th.
Well, this offseason is clearly a big step backwards, although I think they probably could have held serve had they been willing to pay Horford. Kyrie to Kemba is a wash (Kyrie is more talented but has issues), Horford/Baynes to Kanter/Poirier is a back backward step.
 

DJnVa

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And apparently Boston had zero desire to keep a 2nd Team All-NBA player.

I mean, it's Kyrie, dude is a little weird.
 

lexrageorge

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It is funny how the "Free agents will never sign with the Celtics" crowd quickly dismiss the Horford, Hayward, and now Kemba signings as if they somehow "don't count". News flash: they do count.

I agree that Boston does have, and will continue to have, challenges when it comes to getting free agents as compared to the big media markets in NY and LA, and there's really nothing that Stevens or Ainge can do about that. However, the fact that Walker still wanted to come here says something. Irving's problems here seem to be 98% Irving. Horford's departure seems to be about money rather than anything to do with the coaches or Ainge. And what KG says no longer matters.
 

bankshot1

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I get it. After Ainge's long, grueling rebuild effort, Boston finally cashed in with Kemba. You guys are set.

Seriously though, yeah, I'm busting balls a little, but after reading months and months of hopeful speculation about Kyrie and AD or another top tier star, I think Walker is a consolation prize that doesn't match the expectations I was reading. And then to look at the dysfunction that has recently transpired and then proclaim that the "floodgates are open" seems a tad bit optimistic to me.

Don't get me wrong, Of course I'd take Boston's situation over the Knicks a million times over. I think Boston might be in Purgatory right now - solid, but not good enough, while the Knicks are partying down in the 9th circle with delusions that they could move up to the 8th.
This is funny.

EE trolls about the Celts year of dysfunction, the purgatory of being in parity which may or may not await them,. and Ainge's rebuilds, and only as an after thought admits his team's woes. The Knicks have generally suffered almost 40 years of incompetence and irrelevance that they have all but trade-marked.

But at least you guys have KP and Zion and all that cap space to sign premiere FAs.

If Kemba fits in, Gordo is 100%, Tatum and Brown climb the curve, and Kanter etal are decent/passable in the post, they should be pretty competitive and an entertaining team to watch and could surprise on the upside.
 

shoelace

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It's fine to prefer Kemba as the better fit but that doesn't change the fact that a 2nd Team All-NBA player had zero desire to stay in Boston.
If the Celtics had traded for Davis, I expect Kyrie would have stayed here, despite his misgivings about Stevens and some of the young players. Once that possibility was off the table, the Celtics had no clear pathway for immediate contention, and Kyrie had an opportunity to team up with a top 5 player in a bigger market that is also his hometown. To act like that's an indictment of Boston, or Boston's desirability as a free agent destination, seems odd to me. I don't think anyone would argue that New York and Los Angeles are more desirable markets, but your narrative seems to consistently be that Boston is a uniquely undesirable market, which hasn't been borne out by the max free agents that have signed here recently. Not really sure how that is even arguable at this point.
 

cheech13

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It's fine to prefer Kemba as the better fit but that doesn't change the fact that a 2nd Team All-NBA player had zero desire to stay in Boston.
He also had zero desire to play next to the greatest player of all time on a championship team. He's mercurial. I don't think anything about his Boston run was a reflection on the Celtics team, the City of Boston, or the organization as a whole.
 
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lexrageorge

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Yeah, it says we offered more than the Hornets and he had no other suitors willing to pay him the max.
There were other suitors (Dallas was rumored to be in the mix, as was LA), but Kemba narrowed his options down to Boston fairly early on.
 

OurF'ingCity

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I am not disputing that specific individual star players have had a chance to come to Boston and didn't - that's obvious and says exactly zero about the Celtics as that is true of literally every team in the NBA, including Golden State and the Lakers.

What I am disputing is the argument (which I am not saying anyone on this board is making, but it was out there generally) was that star players had a specific reluctance to play in Boston over other cities. In other words, all else being equal, a star player would choose another city over Boston purely because it was Boston. As I noted, that was probably never true but in recent years Al was the first one to make clear that it certainly isn't true now.
 

sezwho

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Yeah, it says we offered more than the Hornets and he had no other suitors willing to pay him the max.
Are either of these things so? Hornets reportedly put more overall $ on the table than the Cs and I'd be surprised if there weren't other suitors with max offers in hand.

But at least you guys have KP and Zion and all that cap space to sign premiere FAs.

If Kemba fits in, Gordo is 100%, Tatum and Brown climb the curve, and Kanter etal are decent/passable in the post, they should be pretty competitive and an entertaining team to watch and could surprise on the upside.
I work with a Knicks fan, otherwise a great guy so I finally stopped taking the shots because shooting fish in barrels.

Anyways, my hopes are higher than the bolded and I'll be borderline stunned if these guys aren't competitive and a ton of fun to watch. If the bigs somehow come together to be an asset rather than damage control then a deep playoff run is possible. If Championships are your only currency (don't mean you specifically) then admittedly a ring does seem out of reach at the moment.
 

DavidTai

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The Knicks have generally suffered almost 40 years of incompetence and irrelevance that they have all but trade-marked.
Especially considering all the chatter about basically mooching Kyrie from Boston -and- teaming him up with Durant from GS.

Except it wasn't the Knicks that got them, it was the Nets.
 

sezwho

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He also had zero desire to play next to the greatest player of all time on a championship team. He's mercurial. I don't think anything about his Boston run was a reflection on the Celtics team, the City of Boston, or the organization as a whole.
I'm no Kyrie apologist for sure, but I don't judge him for having no desire to commit long term to heavily future mortgaged non-destination city when Lebron had one foot out the door.
 

djbayko

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If the Celtics had traded for Davis, I expect Kyrie would have stayed here, despite his misgivings about Stevens and some of the young players. Once that possibility was off the table, the Celtics had no clear pathway for immediate contention, and Kyrie had an opportunity to team up with a top 5 player in a bigger market that is also his hometown. To act like that's an indictment of Boston, or Boston's desirability as a free agent destination, seems odd to me. I don't think anyone would argue that New York and Los Angeles are more desirable markets, but your narrative seems to consistently be that Boston is a uniquely undesirable market, which hasn't been borne out by the max free agents that have signed here recently. Not really sure how that is even arguable at this point.
I think you have the chicken and egg backwards. If Kyrie hadn’t teamed up with Durant in NY, there might have been a kernel of truth to your line of thinking. But even with the Achilles injury, the long rumored departures of Kyrie and Durant finally came to fruition. In retrospect, it was as inevitable as Lebron to the Lakers.

Kyrie didn’t leave because Danny didn’t trade for AD. Danny didn’t want to mortgage the future for AD because Kyrie was leaving and there would be no way to entice AD to stay without him. It didn’t hurt that the feelings between Kyrie and Celtics management appear to have been mutual.
 

mauf

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I'm no Kyrie apologist for sure, but I don't judge him for having no desire to commit long term to heavily future mortgaged non-destination city when Lebron had one foot out the door.
Building on this, watching the way LBJ has behaved the past two years has shed sympathetic light on why Kyrie might have been sick of playing with him. I mean, PG13 passed on the chance to join him on the Lakers in favor of staying in fucking Oklahoma City, and unlike Kyrie, he doesn’t have a ring.

Btw, this isn’t a dig on LBJ as a human being — just an observation that he isn’t the easiest guy to work with. Jordan was the same, and probably doesn’t win six rings in the era of the player-empowered superteam.
 

DeJesus Built My Hotrod

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I think you have the chicken and egg backwards. If Kyrie hadn’t teamed up with Durant in NY, there might have been a kernel of truth to your line of thinking. But even with the Achilles injury, the long rumored departures of Kyrie and Durant finally came to fruition. In retrospect, it was as inevitable as Lebron to the Lakers.

Kyrie didn’t leave because Danny didn’t trade for AD. Danny didn’t want to mortgage the future for AD because Kyrie was leaving and there would be no way to entice AD to stay without him. It didn’t hurt that the feelings between Kyrie and Celtics management appear to have been mutual.
Either you or shoelace are likely correct though its unclear about the actual sequencing. That said, I think the overall point that Kyrie Irving's choices shouldn't be considered representative of free agent sentiments about the Celtics.

Boston can almost certainly attract star FAs but not because the city is a destination like LA or NY. Instead, they need to follow the model Ainge was pursuing until it essentially blew up - you build a strong core and then opportunistically add elite talent. Golden State, which was not a FA destination up until about five years ago, used this model to great success as did Miami and Cleveland- we may be seeing New Orleans pursuing this too.

The downside, of pursuing this path is that if you have chemistry issues within the locker room, the organization or the locale, it can derail everything. There are widely circulated reports that the Bay Area's reticence in embracing Durant irked him and contributed to his departure. And there are the obvious questions about the Warriors medical staff as well. In Irving's case, it appears that he, for whatever reason, became disenchanted with the Celtics organization over the past year. Unfortunately, unlike the Warriors, this all happened before they won anything. However its the risk of this particular style of contender-building.
 

lovegtm

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As the person who started this line of free agent discussion today, I want to emphasize that I did not intend to re-litigate the desirability of Boston as a free agency destination. I think it's pretty clear that the Celtics are firmly in the 2nd tier in that regard, which is a fine place to be. Boston isn't Portland or Denver, and it's not LA, NYC, or Miami. Cool.

My main point was that it's nice that they didn't really lose Horford "for nothing"--he likely got them some of the way there with Hayward, and probably some of the way with Kemba (in terms of general winning vibe, even with last year's shit). It was the equivalent of being happy that your team got a pick at the deadline for a departing player, not meant to be a fully general case for or against Boston free agency.
 

InstaFace

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I get it. After Ainge's long, grueling rebuild effort, Boston finally cashed in with Kemba. You guys are set.

Seriously though, yeah, I'm busting balls a little, but after reading months and months of hopeful speculation about Kyrie and AD or another top tier star, I think Walker is a consolation prize that doesn't match the expectations I was reading. And then to look at the dysfunction that has recently transpired and then proclaim that the "floodgates are open" seems a tad bit optimistic to me.

Don't get me wrong, Of course I'd take Boston's situation over the Knicks a million times over. I think Boston might be in Purgatory right now - solid, but not good enough, while the Knicks are partying down in the 9th circle with delusions that they could move up to the 8th.
Given that they're coming at the same price, getting Kemba instead of Kyrie-to-re-sign is a total wash for me on the court, and a plus off the court. It might feel serendipitous, but we're ending up with our all-NBA point guard who scores at will and can carry a team. I also suspect I'll like him better and have less cognitive dissonance making excuses for him, mostly because I won't have to make excuses for him.

Getting him was a coup, you really can't discount it like this without it being pure sour grapes. Kemba could have gone a dozen different places and picked here. Just like losing Horford is going to hurt - though we were never getting 30-year-old Horford back. I'll agree that we're probably not true contenders next year (though we may have a shot at the east if Kawhi goes west and there's any dropoff from the Bucks). But we're trying to put together a devilishly hard puzzle here - and we just found a big piece.
 

OurF'ingCity

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As the person who started this line of free agent discussion today, I want to emphasize that I did not intend to re-litigate the desirability of Boston as a free agency destination. I think it's pretty clear that the Celtics are firmly in the 2nd tier in that regard, which is a fine place to be. Boston isn't Portland or Denver, and it's not LA, NYC, or Miami. Cool.

My main point was that it's nice that they didn't really lose Horford "for nothing"--he likely got them some of the way there with Hayward, and probably some of the way with Kemba (in terms of general winning vibe, even with last year's shit). It was the equivalent of being happy that your team got a pick at the deadline for a departing player, not meant to be a fully general case for or against Boston free agency.
At the risk of futher derailing the thread, is there any evidence that NYC is in the "first tier" of destinations at this point either? We have Kyrie and Durant teaming up in Brooklyn this offseason, of course, but other than that we have...who, exactly? Amar'e Stoudemire? Granted a lot of that is due to the shittiness of Knicks' ownership, but that just goes to prove that factors other than just the locale are more important - it's not like players are looking at the Knicks and going "well I know their ownership sucks but NYC is such a great place to live I'll go there anyway."

Even LA and Miami - which I will grant you are definitely more attractive locales historically - really didn't become "destinations" in recent years until LeBron went there.