Tag Archives: boston sports blog

Celtics Trade 3 Players and Pick for Courtney Lee

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The Celtics are finalizing a trade for Courtney Lee sending Jajuan Johnson, E’Twaun Moore, and Sean Williams to the Houston Rockets. E’Twaun and Sean have non-guaranteed contracts so they will most likely be cut. Johnson has stated that he will demand a trade from the Rockets immediately. Not sure how its going to work out for him, word is the Rockets are really high on him. Honestly, by the way that he has played during the summer league, he should be happy that someone is still high on him.

This is a tough blow for Moore who had said just earlier today that he expected to play the season with the Celtics and was having a great summer league. Everyone will remember his game last year where he put up 16 points in only 18 minutes against the Magic.

With this trade the Celtics roster is really starting to take shape. Props to Danny Ainge for the work that he has done this summer. I am not sure any other GM in the game could have done a better job than he did. He has balanced Celtics in a place where they are title contenders, while also building for the future.

Options for Filling out the Roster

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Player Position Height Weight DOB From Years
Brandon Bass F 6’8 250 4/30/1985 LSU 7
Avery Bradley G 6’2 180 11/26/1990 Texas 2
Kevin Garnett  F 6’11 253 5/19/1976 Farragut Academy HS (IL) 17
JaJuan Johnson F 6’10 221 2/8/1989 Purdue 1
Kris Joseph F 6’7 210 12/17/1988 Syracuse R
Fab Melo C 7’0 255 6/20/1990 Syracuse R
E’Twaun Moore G 6’4 191 2/28/1989 Purdue 1
Paul Pierce – (C) F 6’7 235 10/13/1977 Kansas 14
Rajon Rondo G 6’1 171 2/22/1986 Kentucky 6
Jared Sullinger F 6’9 260 3/4/1992 Ohio State R
Sean Williams F-C 6’10 235 9/13/1986 Boston College 4
Jamar Smith G 6’3 185 Illinois

The Celtics will probably look to add a few more players before training camp. Jamar Smith signed with the Celtics last week but it would likely be a training camp invite and not a full season guarantee. Look for the Celtics to sign a few more players from their summer league squad such as Dionte Christmas. Also previously mentioned are the potential signings of Carlos Delfino or Courtney Lee, but they both do not look promising based on the current cap situation of the Celtics, most likely you are going to see them resign Pietrus and hopefully sign Christmas to a contract. Also they may bring back Keyon Dooling for the veterans minimum as he was a big part of the locker room and gave them a lift in the playoffs.

Celtics Interested in Delfino?

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The Celtics are pursuing options talking to Carlos Delfino. After exhausting all options to doing a sign and trade with the Mavericks for Jason Terry, they ended up using their Mid-Level Exception. This only leaves the Celtics with the bi-annual exception which amounts roughly to $1.9 million per year. Unless Courtney Lee wants to take a contract under his market price, he is likely out of the Celtics price range. So the Celtics have started to look at Delfino.

Here’s a little background on Delfino

Height: 6’6″          Weight: 230         NBA Experience: 7 years, drafted 1st Rd Det 2003

  • Been consistently around 10 points a game and around 1.3 steals per game for the past 4 years.
  • Suffered from concussion problems last year
  • One of the better rebounding players at his position

On ESPN.com John Hollinger gives the scouting report of Delfino

+ Mellow, solidly built wing who likes corner 3-point shot. Rebounding tailed off.

+ Good handle and court vision but no burst or explosiveness. Runs floor well.

+ Solid defender. Average mobility but big for position with great hands.

Celtics to Sign Terry Using MLE

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The Celtics GM Danny Ainge announced yesterday that the Celtics were going to sign Jason Terry using the Mid-Level Exception.  The signing of Terry is no surprise as he has already been introduced to the Boston media and has said that the is going to do everything that he can to help the Celtics win banner 18.

 

“If they need me to wash the uniforms or sweep the floors, whatever role Doc [Rivers] wants me to play, I’m here to do it at 100 percent and I’ll give it my all,” Terry said. “That’s what I’ve done my whole career. Whatever it takes to win, whatever puts us in the best position to win these games and win a championship is what I’ll be doing.”

They had tried to maneuver a sign-and-trade with the Mavericks to save the MLE to potentially use on another player such as the Rockets Courtney Lee. The Celtic’s could not find a third team to facilitate the sign-and-trade and the Mavericks signing of O.J. Mayo basically ended the talks. This means that the Celtics would have to offer the Rockets players and picks to acquire Lee as they can only fill out the rest of their roster with minimum contracts.

NHL Locking Out?

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The NHL’s current Collective Bargaining Agreement expires in just less than two months.  So far, the players like what they are getting, but the owners want more.  The rich trying to get richer, sound familiar? (See NBA/NFL negotiations). The last report shows that the players would make 46% of the revenue for the league, when they made 57% last season. Contracts would also be limited to 5 years in the new proposal.  This is a big difference seeing as Zach Parise and Ryan suter both just signed 13 year deals with the Wild, worth $98 million each.

This sucks. Hockey is just becoming very popular again, especially after the playoffs of the past few seasons.  They already cancelled the 2004-05 season, due to negotiating problems. Commissioner Gary Bettman is actually a pretty decent guy, especially compared to NBA commissioner David Stern.  He said openly that he sees the players as 50-50 partners with the owners.

Since the season is starting on October 11 (hopefully), there isn’t all that much time to get things done.  All we need is another lockout to ruin yet another sport.

Pats-Welker Cant Agree, Will Play Season with Franchise Tag

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The New England Patriots and Wes Welker could not come to an agreement yesterday. He will play the next season at a 1 year contract worth $9.5 million. Now that the deadline has passed, the Patriots cannot renegotiate with Welker until after the season is over.

Other notable players such as Ray Rice (5 years $40 Million) and Matt Forte (4 years $32 Million) struck deals just before the deadline yesterday, getting the payday they deserved.

Welker, with 330 catches in the past three years, wasn’t as lucky.  He had earlier signed the franchise tender to show the Patriots faith, but by doing so may have cornered himself. The Patriots felt no reason to sign a 31 year old reciever who has previously torn his ACL to a long term contract when they have him for this season. Whether they will franchise him again next year, sign him to a longer contract, or just let him go remains to be seen.

I would have liked to see the Patriots sign Welker to a 3 year deal totally anywhere from $24-28 million. That would have been around the same contract that they gave to Randy Moss. Reward him for always being true to the Patriots and the hard work that he has given them. If he plays well anyways they are going to be on the hook for over $11 million to franchise him again, or give him a new three year contract. This just doesn’t seem to make much sense from the Patriots standpoint, unless they are counting Welker to have a down year.

Las Vegas Schedule

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The Celtics tip off the Las Vegas games tomorrow and finish up this Sunday playing ever day except for Wednesday and Friday. All games will be aired on NBA TV.

Here’s the Schedule

Atlanta vs. Boston    3 PM    Monday, July 16th

Chicago vs. Boston    10 PM   Tuesday, July 17th

Boston vs. Sacramento    10:30 PM    Thursday, July 19th

Milwaukee vs. Boston     10:30 PM     Saturday, July 21st

Boston vs. LA (Clippers)    10 PM     Sunday, July 22nd

Celtics Summer League: Orlando Review

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The Celtics led by coach Ty Lue had a bright start going 4-1 in the Orlando summer league, losing only to Detroit and beating up on the Magic, Pacers, Nets and Thunder respectively.

Player College Previous Team Position Age Height
Craig Brackins Iowa State Maine Red Claws PF 24 6-10
Dionte Christmas Temple Rethymno (Greece) SG 25 6-5
Jonathan Gibson New Mexico St Trabzonspor (Turkey) G 24 6-1
Jajuan Johnson Purdue Celtics PF 23 6-10
Kris Joseph Syracuse SF 23 6-7
Stephane Lasme Massachusetts Obradoiro (Spain) PF 29 6-8
Fab Melo Syracuse C 22 7-0
E’Twaun Moore Purdue Celtics PG 23 6-4
Jamar Smith Southern Indiana BK Prostejov (Czech) SG 25 6-3
Jared Sullinger Ohio State PF 20 6-9
Sean Williams Boston College Celtics / Mavericks PF / C 25 6-10
Larry Owens Oral Roberts Nets SF 29 6-7

Suprises in Orlando

Kris Joseph

Showed great length and wingspan (6-11), was flying all over the court. While Joseph had up and down shooting games, he found ways to make his mark by defending and hitting the glass. His shooting will improve, he has good form and is very confident on midrange jumpers, it just doesn’t extend to the three-point line yet.

Dionte Christmas

Got better and better as the week went along, finishing with his best game against the Magic with 21 points, including 19 in the first half where he had a stretch of 11 in a row. The surprise about Christmas was that he showed an all-around game. Known at Temple as a scorer and mainly a shooter, Christmas played tough defense (3 steals) and hit the boards throughout the week.

Jared Sullinger’s Passing Ability

Everyone knew Sully could play. If his back holds up and he adjusts to the size of the NBA everyone believes that he will be a steal. What we didn’t know about was his ability to pass. Faced with constant double teams, Sullinger looked and found the open man and made it easier on the guards as the Celtics looked to run their offense through him more and more throughout the week. He won’t see those double teams in the NBA, but the vision and ability to pass is only another positive to take from the first round pick.

Up and Down

E’Twaun Moore

In the one loss of the week, Moore was clearly outplayed Pistons guard Brandon Knight, seemingly struggling with the quickness. For a guy who is described as cool as extremely calm, Moore was frazzled from the start. The rest of the week Moore shined and showed his ability to run the point. He made good decisions on pick and rolls and had a great assist to turnover ratio. In the final game, he got into a little scoring battle with Christmas as they poured it on against the Magic.

Jujuan Johnson

Johnson showed that he could shoot over most players, but not much else. He hasn’t added much if any weight to his frame from his rookie season and was having a tough time on the blocks going against other players. He rebounded well during the week but was sometimes a little slow on his rotations. I’m holding Johnson to a higher standard because I expected big things from the former Big Ten Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year.

Fab Melo

Melo truly had an up and down week, shocking everyone in the gym one game with a dribble drive and dish on one play and then throwing an outlet pass to Kris Joseph while he was sitting on the bench. He had some great blocks and showed good defensive ability, but didn’t have much of an idea on how to play defense against the pick and roll. It seems that he is going to need a full year under Doc to understand the complex Boston defense and figure out the rotations.