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Peter May On The Doleful Draft
Says teams are trying to trade away their picks, especially
Houston at 22...
Boston Herald
Celtics content to watch, wait
by Steve Bulpett
Wednesday, June 30, 1999
Coach and president Rick Pitino will be like most fans as tonight's NBA
draft unfolds. He will be a spectator.
Oh, he and the Celtic brass will work the phones at their Healthpoint
headquarters in Waltham, but he cautions not to expect any puffs of white
smoke coming from the inner sanctum. While there are those who believe
Pitino cannot simply watch a parade go by without joining in, he insists
he's happy to be sitting this one out.
The 1999 NBA draft has already yielded him a starting center, Vitaly
Potapenko, and that's more than all right with him. There is little he
thinks that can help the Celtics here. All the club has in hand as of now
is the 55th overall selection.
``This is the weakest draft I've ever seen in terms of star quality,''
Pitino said late yesterday. ``I had Mark Jackson as the Rookie of the Year
with the 18th pick (in 1987) and you may see that again.''
As a result of the shaky field, teams were burning up phone lines
yesterday trying to entice other clubs with picks. Said one general
manager: ``Teams are talking themselves into love with certain players.
The ones they realize they're only kidding themselves are now trying to
unload their picks. It's actually pretty funny to watch.''
Pitino has seen the same situations unfolding.
``Everybody wants to trade their pick,'' he said. ``No one's happy with
this draft. You look even up top and everyone's trying to move the other
way. Teams that have the good picks want out.''
Pitino wouldn't entirely rule out the Celtics getting involved, but it
would have to include more than a shiny new draftee.
``We're not going to be in this draft unless it means getting a player
that we want besides the draft pick,'' he said. ``We're talking to 10 or
15 teams, just throwing things back and forth. But all we're doing is
keeping a dialogue going, like, `Would you do this?' and, `Would you do
that?'
``Something may crop up at the final second, so we're just trying to keep
our finger in everything.''
Pitino appeared to find it interesting that Pat Riley became involved in
the Miami draft and that there's talk of the Heat sending P.J. Brown,
Voshon Lenard and the 25th pick to Vancouver for the No. 2 choice. (If it
works, Miami would take Lamar Odom and then try to sign Charles Oakley as
a free agent.)
Speaking of Miami, it appears that most every trade ``rumor'' involving
the Celtics has Pitino's former Kentucky pupil Jamal Mashburn coming to
Boston as part of the scheme.
Trying to put things in perspective, Pitino said: ``Jamal off the court is
like a son to me, but that's neither here nor there. I wouldn't sign my
son Michael to a contract. Jamal has two years left on his contract and
you can see what happens from there.''
Pitino said he still wouldn't mind dealing the 55th pick.
``If you have 10 bucks, you can have it,'' he said. ``That's a joke,'' he
added after a pause.
Certainly general manager Chris Wallace and the scouting staff is taking
the entire exercise seriously, knowing that even if they don't make a
pick, they may be making decisions on some of these players as free agents
in the next year or two.
``We're putting together a list of about 75-80 players that we should be
keeping an eye on,'' Wallace said.