Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Coulda, shoulda, woulda

Those who remember my draft-night rantings (not preserved on this blog, so no link available) will recall how much I wanted Danny Granger to drop one more spot to the Celtics. Doc Rivers apparently agreed, as his absent-mindedly let drop in his live draft night interview that other than Gerald Green there was nobody the Celtics would rather have had slide 'except maybe' Granger. In retrospect, would I be perfectly happy to have let the Pacers have home court advantage in last year's playoffs if it meant moving up one pick in the draft? You betchya.

Coincidently, Granger went for 22 points and 11 rebounds last night to lead the Pacers past the lower Mississippi watershed Hornets. When Gerald Green has played this year he's shown himself to be arguably the 3-4th best player on the worst NBADL team in the league. All those draft night comparisons to Kobe and Tmac that Green's agent was throwing around? It's worth pointing out that when Kobe was a year younger than Green is now he had just wrapped up his first All Star game appearance. When Carmelo Anthony was a year younger than Green is now he carried Syracuse to a national championship. The sports morons on Boston TV who spent draft night debating whether Green would start right away and force the team to trade Pierce? About as ignorant as advertised.

Does this make Green a bad draft pick in retrospect? No. The Celtics are a mess, so I have no problem with Ainge swinging for the fences by taking high-risk, high-potential high schools players in the middle/end of the first round. Sometimes you get Kendrick Perkins. Sometimes you don't.

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