Danny Ainge for years had been a failure as an NBA Executive. Ainge's best accomplishment prior to winning the NBA championship in the spring of 2008 was giving a big assist to the Los Angeles Lakers and causing headaches for the Detroit Pistons and Sacramento Kings in the playoffs without even being in the building. The lowest point of his post playing days career happened while serving on the bench for the Phoenix Suns and having "Big Shot" Robert Horry throw a towel in the former players face during a game. Horry would take his two rings earned in Houston and bypass the Suns and win championships with the Lakers and Spurs en route to a career filled with 7 championship rings including the famous rebound and hit a three against the Kings in 2002 and then sticking a nail into the coffin of the Pistons quest for a second championship in the Chauncey Billups/Larry Brown era while coming off the bench for the Spurs.
Not sure if you can get any lower as an executive but then one day his good buddy and former Celtic Hall of Fame teammate Kevin McHale did Danny a favor. He gave up "The Big Ticket" Kevin Garnett for the future of the Timberwolves franchise and there has been no looking back for Danny Ainge as the Celtics went on to pick up Ray Allen and a championship in 2008 with a crushing defeat of 2009 champion Los Angeles Lakers arguably because Garnett missed the 2009 post season.
Well Danny has his Big Ticket back and he didn't waste any time talking Rasheed Wallace into donning the Celtic green but on this day July 18, 2009 the biggest surprise probably occurred compliments of former Celtic all-time great and Indiana Pacer executive the immortal Larry Bird decided not to exercise the option on Marquis Daniels and versatile, scoring tweener. Ainge picked up the Pacer outcast and now it appears the dog with the sharpest teeth is back in beantown for a run at championship number 18.
Marquis Daniels is a young athletic NBA veteran that is going to be very versatile member coming off the Celtic bench. He can run the floor keeping up with speed demon Rajon Rondo and he is athletic enough that he can play defense for short periods of time coming off the bench making big guard Ray Allen and small forward Paul Pierce that much more energized and effective. Daniels can create off the dribble and has a good enough shot that he can provide a scoring punch with the second unit. He has shown the ability in Pacerland to rebound, score, bring the ball up the court and do the key things that make up a Championship team.
Consider the numbers in 60 games with the Pacers he put up twenty plus points 18 times, pulled down 8 or better rebounds 11 times which was no easy task with Troy Murphy setting a Pacer single season record grabbing just about everything that came off the glass. These are not mind-boggling numbers but it shows the flash and ability of Daniels that can be called upon in limited minutes coming off of the Celtic bench. More importantly Daniels blocked 29 shots and had 68 thefts these are not numbers that will get past head coach Doc Rivers or team leader Garnett where they constantly preach about defense winning championships.
Take a look at up and coming super star Rondo who doesn't need to score to make a huge impact on the Celtics well with the established All-Stars on the Celtic roster one can expect Daniels will be fast to assume his role in quest for hanging another Celtic banner up in the rafters.
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Give Danny a break. Tree Rollins tried to eat him once. GO CELTICS!
ReplyDeleteAh one of my favorite memories, don't you find it interesting that Ainge has really been the beneficiary of moves made by his former teammates. Granted both Bird and McHale with the Pacers and T-Wolves needed to make some moves for the future and Minnesota certainly got a great player in return for Garnett in Al Jefferson who without injuries will be around for some time.
ReplyDeleteagreed--daniels put up good numbers across the board...adds great depth--very underrated player
ReplyDeleteAdd Doc Rivers to the list too. He certainly benefited going from mediocre to genius courtesy of Herman Munster-McHale.
ReplyDeleteHave you ever seen the Muenster episodes when Herman plays sports. He could hit the ball a mile in golf but left his big boot prints in the green and it was detrimental for the guy trying to break up a double play with a hard slide into second as Herman was taking the pivot for two.
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