Re: Paul's right

[Alexander Wang <awang@mit.edu>]

Joe writes:
>The missing piece of championship 17 will either come from a lottery draft
or it
>won't come at all. It won't have come in 1997 from a Scott Pippen
acquisition. It
>would not have come this summer from Jermaine Smiley O'Neil.
>
>I'd hope the two extra first-rounders will be the most lasting legacy of the
>Pitino era (I've rewatched this summer more than a dozen Y2K game tapes,
and the
>further familiarity with our retard monkey outbreak halfcourt defense breeds
>nothing but evern greater contempt). The Celtics will play hard and better
this
>year, but they are also in effect rolling the best odds in the NBA on one
of only
>maybe two true franchise-center drafts in the past twenty-five years.
Twenty-five
>freaking years. It will be against this  maybe 15%+ chance at developing a
>15-year Shaq/Duncan antidote on which we desperately dangle our three
>first-rounders in pursuit of underachieving, set-for-life, 7-foot gumby-doll
>impersonaters like Jerm O'Neil. I wish him the best under  Bob Knight
(hopefully)
>and Ike Thomas you'd think there is significantly much more at stake in
Boston to
>waste on even his ideal upside.

A couple points here. The three first rounders that we were going to deal,
according
to published reports, were our first rounder this year (which ended up
being Moiso),
Denver's pick, and our 2002 pick. Let's face it, regardless of how good
this upcoming
draft is, a franchise center is not going to last past #5, so Denver's pick
(protected
top 5) is not going to get us that center. So trading for O'Neal wouldn't
have reduced
our shot at that franchise center.

The Utah pick is not going to give us a shot either. And even assuming the
Celtics
finish where they've been the last few years (9th-10th worst record), the
actual
chance of making it to the top 3 through the lottery is about 3.5%, not 15+%. 
The chance of getting the top pick is around 1%. The fact that the Celtics
have 
three draft picks in no way gives them the best odds in the NBA of scoring
a top
center. Unless they actively tank the season, which will never happen under
Pitino,
their chances of getting one of these franchise centers are virtually zero. 

Alex