Getty INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA - MARCH 10: Brad Stevens the head coach of the Boston Celtics watches the action against the Indiana Pacers at Bankers Life Fieldhouse.
Last season, many speculated whether Brad Stevens and the Boston Celtics would part ways in part because of how mediocre the Celtics looked. While we all know how that turned out – and Celtics fans couldn’t be more grateful for it – now that the Los Angeles Lakers have a coaching vacancy, speculation surrounding who will be Frank Vogel’s replacement will run wild, and Brad Stevens’ name will more likely than not be brought up at some point. Luckily, an NBA Insider has already dispelled the possibility before it had the chance to come up.
Chris Mannix of NBC Sports Boston gave his own insight into Brad Stevens hypothetically leaving the Celtics for their longtime rival, and Mannix did not mince words.
“I think he’s in this job with the Celtics for the long term.”
@SIChrisMannix says he’d ‘astonished’ if Brad Stevens had any interest in the Lakers’, or any other head coaching opening, in the near future 😅
“I don’t think it’s possible to say that Brad Stevens will never be a coach again. He’s far too young to make that proclamation. I’d be astonished if he had any interest in coaching the Lakers. The Lakers, right now, is a bad coaching job. That’s a team that, yes, it has LeBron James, and theoretically, if he’s healthy, Anthony Davis, but you have like a one-year window maybe to succeed before that team goes into a massive rebuild with no draft capital to make that rebuild.”
It’s hard not to agree with Mannix’s reasoning here, especially after all the scrutiny that their now previous Head Coach Frank Vogel went through over this past season. It’s hard to see Stevens be willing to put himself in with all the drama that goes both with coaching the Lakers and coaching LeBron James.
Mannix believes Stevens is here to stay as GM
Remember that if Brad Stevens truly wanted to leave the Celtics, he could have done so already when the opportunity was there. Remember when Stevens turned down a lucrative 7-year/$70 million contract to be the Head Coach at the University of Indiana last year?
That should have been more than enough evidence that even if he was taking a hiatus from coaching, Stevens was committed to the Celtics organization through and through. Mannix echoed such a sentiment, especially in light of how well he’s done as GM.
“Brad Stevens seems very comfortable in this front office job. He is excellent at it,” Mannix said. “I think he’s in this job with the Celtics for the long-term.”
Stevens Has Taken an Un-Danny Ainge Like Approach as GM
Because so much has gone right for the Celtics on the court, what’s fallen under the radar has been the moves that Brad Stevens since taking over for Danny Ainge as President of Basketball Operations. Many were skeptical if Stevens’ magic as a coach would translate as he took on a front office role. Yet it hasn’t taken long for Brad to prove he was the man for the job.
While Stevens deserves all the praise he’s getting for making the moves he did, what doesn’t get enough attention is that his approach as the team’s executive has been very different from his predecessor’s. Most notably with how he’s handled his first-round picks. Having taken over just last June, Stevens has already traded two first-round picks and has a potential pick swap waiting seven years from now.
The players that he’s acquired from those trades – Al Horford and Derrick White – have played vital roles in where the Celtics are now, making Stevens look brilliant, yes, but even more so, he should be applauded for this strategy because trading first-round picks for complementary players was not Danny Ainge’s MO.
Ainge was one of the most revered executives in the league during his time running the Celtics for how often he made lopsided trades in his favor, but he was routinely criticized for how conservative he was with his assets. The only times Ainge ever traded a first-round pick was if he was doing the following:
-Trading for a Hall-of-Famer or future Hall-of-Famer (Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett, Kyrie Irving)
-Trading for a guy he liked in the draft (Rajon Rondo)
-Trading a projected late first-rounder for a badly needed scorer (Isaiah Thomas)
-Swapping first-round picks in the draft (Think 2011 and 2017)
But Ainge never traded such an asset for a rotation player. Because Stevens has done the opposite multiple times already, his approach has helped the Celtics have their most exciting season arguably since the last time they won a championship.