Doc Rivers stood near the baseline of the Celtics’ practice court in suburban Boston. He had notes in his hand, but he barely glanced at them as he spoke to the men in front of him. It was October 27, three days before the start of a new NBA season.
These mostly new Celtics wouldn’t have to wait long to see how good they were; coming up on opening night: the Miami Heat, in Miami. That would have been a good game purely based on the Heat’s win over the Celtics in game seven of the conference finals last season. But when they won the NBA title and signed Ray Allen, too, it became the matchup that everyone had to see. It was the promise of great basketball mixed with messy family business. Allen left Boston in July, and no one here pretended like the move was insignificant. Rivers gave one of the rare unprofane quotes about him, but it also wasn’t complimentary.
“You know what it was like here with Ray,” Rivers said to the group. “It was all about him. But I’m telling you why I’m here—why we’re here—and it’s to win a fucking championship. That’s what it’s about. We’ve got a lot of depth here, and sometimes you’re gonna be pissed at me because you won’t play as much as you want. Just remember that it’s all about winning.”
Allen versus the Celtics had been happening since July, in obvious and subtle ways. Rivers didn’t miss it when Allen commented in his first Miami press conference that the offense in Boston was “more traditional” and that he couldn’t wait to play in Erik Spoelstra’s more flexible “position-less” scheme. Paul Pierce was angry that Allen never called to talk about what he planned to do. Kevin Garnett said that he wasn’t going to call Allen because “I lost his number.” And everyone knew the history of Rajon Rondo and Allen.
The point was clear to all here: Allen was not a friend anymore even though he continued to say that his business decision didn’t cancel his personal relationships. He was beginning to learn that his old teammates, for better or worse, didn’t know how to compartmentalize. It was all personal to them, and if they didn’t approve of the way you left the club, you were an outsider forever.
Besides, honestly, Allen went to the Heat. They hated that team, and he went to them for more guaranteed years but less guaranteed money. What did he expect? Part of Rivers’s summer was spent studying the Heat. He and his assistants rewatched the series several times.
Standing there facing the team, Rivers brought up some of last season’s issues with Miami.
“LeBron is LeBron, and Wade is Wade. There are no surprises there,” he said. “But Chalmers and Battier… those motherfuckers killed us last year. We don’t just have to control them this year. We gotta shut those fuckers down.”
He was convincing as he spoke, and all the eyes on him were indicative of how much weight he had in the room. His players believed in what he said, although most experts didn’t. No one was picking the aged Celtics, now without Allen, to get by the Heat and to the finals. They had chances to do it the last two seasons and failed. If they were able to pull it off, it would be recorded as an upset. More important, if they were to do it, this season would be their final shot at it.
One of their weakest positions, for a variety of reasons, was the one Allen vacated. They projected Courtney Lee to be the starter and Jason “Jet” Terry, thirty-five, to back him up. That could all change when Avery Bradley recovered from his shoulder surgery, but he wouldn’t be ready to play for a couple of months.
In front of the group, Rivers anointed Garnett, Pierce, and Rondo as his leaders. He also gave the trio a warning: “Sometimes being a good leader is knowing when to follow, too. Understand what I’m saying? Y’all have got to know the difference.”
They all nodded, even Rondo. He was entering his seventh season, and Garnett and Pierce no longer viewed him as a kid. In fact, they saw the twenty-six-year-old point guard as the key to their season. When he and Allen coexisted uncomfortably as teammates, it was the Big Three and Rondo. Not only was he one of three now, some nights he was expected to be number one of three.
Danny Ainge watched his team as practice began, and he had no illusions about Rondo. The general manager had been fascinated by the guard since he first saw him play in high school. He liked everything about him, from his vision on the court to the way he viewed the world.
“He loves to be different,” Ainge said in appreciation, pointing in his direction. Every other Celtic was wearing either a green or white practice jersey. The muscular Rondo, looking like an NFL slot receiver, was shirtless. Ainge was close with the players, and it wasn’t unusual for him to joke with them, shoot against them, or counsel them. They also knew that his office was nearby, overlooking the court on which they practiced. He was going to get and make a lot of phone calls about them this year, so they all had to be ready.
The season hadn’t even begun, and a blockbuster had been finalized that morning. Ainge and his assistant GM, Mike Zarren, were amazed that the Thunder traded James Harden to the Rockets. Ainge and Zarren knew both GMs well. They’d done business with the Thunder’s Sam Presti in 2011 to complete the Kendrick Perkins deal, and the Rockets’ Daryl Morey worked with Ainge and hired Zarren. Morey had observed well, because his blizzard of transactions to store assets and free up salary was Ainge-like. Morey never tried to hide his influences, saying of Ainge, “Danny is the killer GM. He’s open-minded and super smart, a former player who knows the game and understands analytics. It’s hard to think of one better than Danny.” His old boss thought about the trade and seemed jealous of what Morey had accomplished.
“James Harden is a foundational player that you’re trying to sign, not trade,” Ainge said. “He’s a young Paul Pierce; that’s the guy I’m trying to sign.”
Ultimately, the Thunder fell short of offering the twenty-three-year-old Harden a max contract after big commitments to Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, and Serge Ibaka. Morey, in turn, did what Ainge would have done. He collected every valuable thing he had and offered it to Presti. He sent veteran guard Kevin Martin, rookie guard Jeremy Lamb, two first-round picks, and a second-round pick to the Thunder. Plus he said he’d give Harden a max deal. After all that… analytics said the Rockets won the deal.
Ainge and Zarren agreed on the analytics but sparred good- naturedly elsewhere. They had opinions on everything, from the league to the media to the pros and cons of the Affordable Care Act. They argued often and with passion. Zarren’s politics leaned toward left-center, and Ainge was usually on the opposite side, on the right. A trip to his office usually meant Fox News playing on the TV. At times, he and Zarren would debate so energetically and loudly that people would stop by and ask, “Are you guys all right?”
As if a well-rehearsed comedy duo, they’d pause on cue, quizzically look at the questioner, and say, “Why would you ask us that? We’re fine.”
They never lost sight of timing, though. When the practice was tense and focused, they paid attention to it.
As the team went over sets for Miami, Garnett never smiled once. He pushed his teammates to talk on defense. He followed up an assistant’s coaching point with a point of his own, adding, “I think it’s important to include that.” When a spirited scrimmage lost its flow because it was taking too long for subbing players to change from green jerseys to white (and vice versa), Garnett snapped at the support staff, “There’s a bunch of motherfuckers standing around the court, and not one person can throw a jersey out here?”
There was then a scramble by a couple of kids to grab a fistful of green and white jerseys, simply to avoid the glare of Garnett. The practice lightened as it neared its conclusion, and Rivers was happy to wave over a tall, white-haired man in his seventies. He stopped practice, called over two rookies, and promised, “I’ll give you both fifty dollars if you can tell me who this man is.” They both had vacant stares. Neither of them could do it.
“This is John Havlicek,” the coach said. “A true Celtic. You know how we always talk about Reggie Miller running around and always moving without the ball? This guy did it first. Let’s bring it in here, guys, with Hondo. On three, let’s repeat it, ‘Havlicek steals the ball…’”
They’d spent the entire offseason talking and projecting. Rivers had done that more than anyone. There hadn’t been much time to unplug from the NBA. He’d been a proud father on draft night when his son Austin was selected tenth overall by the New Orleans Hornets. It was pure joy as a father and sobering as a coach: Austin was his then-fifteen-year-old boy, arm slung over his shoulder, in the closing minutes of game six against the Lakers in 2008. It all seemed so far off then: his high school graduation, college at Duke, and now being chosen in the lottery. Austin would be playing against Garnett, Pierce, and Rondo, guys he grew up admiring.
Rivers hadn’t had much time to reflect on it because he’d also been thinking about getting the Celtics ready for at least one more year of contention. He was overjoyed when Garnett returned, albeit with a no-trade clause, which gave him control of where he’d go next. He was disappointed when Allen left, and when news began to trickle out that Allen had a problem with Rondo, Rivers stood in front of that train. He redirected the conversation and told the media that since he was the coach and he gave Rondo authority, Allen’s problem was with him.
Rivers was a summer broadcaster as well. The Olympics were in London, and he was a TV analyst for the games. Watching the league’s best players was instructive, and it was also a smart place to be for those interested in projecting future super teams. The owners didn’t like it, particularly the small-market ones, but this was where player friendships and alliances were strengthened. This was where great players, who played and practiced and socialized and won gold together, got confirmation that they could be teammates in the league as well. Chances were high that some pairs—or trios—from the Olympics would be NBA teammates one day, too.
Finally, it was time for Rivers to worry about his own team. The truth was that he really didn’t know them at all. Not as a collective, he didn’t. He knew how much he could push three guys and how deep they could reach down to find something—anything—to help the team win. He’d seen them all hide injuries from the media and opponents, play hurt, and win games. The three had institutional knowledge that the others didn’t, so even with this first game at the Heat, three of them could get to and recall Miami-related intensity levels that the rest of the team couldn’t understand.
Four years ago in Boston, LeBron James stood in a darkened Garden as David Stern handed out championship rings to the Celtics. They’d gotten those rings, in part, at his expense. It was his turn to return the favor on October 30. The rings were distributed, and for the first time, James had jewelry to tie all his accomplishments together. This season, the Celtics were attempting to stop him and the pattern of league history: Once all-time great players win one championship, several more usually follow in bunches.
Really, that was the simplest way of describing what the season was for Miami and Boston. The Heat were trying to restate their greatness, and the Celtics were trying to repress it. In the first game of the season, the Heat were closer to meeting their goal. It was the first minute of the season, so Rivers didn’t overreact to it, but the first 3 points of the game arrived when Mario Chalmers found Shane Battier for a 3-pointer. We don’t just have to control them this year. We gotta shut those fuckers down.
The game settled down, and with just under three minutes left in the first quarter, it happened. Allen checked into the game, wearing the number—34—that he always had before becoming a Celtic. It was startling to see him there with the familiar Heat villains. He got polite handshakes and hugs from most of his former coaches and teammates. But when he approached Garnett, KG looked straight ahead with no acknowledgment, and Allen tapped him on the shoulder.
One minute later, Allen drifted to the left corner where guard Norris Cole found him. His first attempt for the Miami Heat was a 3, and he nailed it. He’d had surgery on his right ankle in the spring, and in the fall, he looked like a refreshed player. When he went to the free-throw line, the Heat crowd broke into a chant of “We love Ray.”
They were having fun, and so were the Heat players. They led by 17 points after three quarters and cruised to an 11-point win. James, Wade, and Chris Bosh played like stars in the win. While Chalmers had 11 assists, he didn’t kill them. Number 34, coming off the bench and putting in 19 points, did.
It was too early to make any definitive statements about what each team was and what to expect in the postseason. Each side still had a long way to go before developing its personality. But one month later, the Celtics gave one of their first clues about who they were going to be.
Playing at the Garden against the Brooklyn Nets, a week after Thanksgiving, the Celtics didn’t seem ready for the game. They fell behind by 21 points midway through the second quarter, and it appeared they were on their way to a long night against a better team. Late in the first half, Garnett attempted a shot near the baseline, and the Nets’ Kris Humphries fouled him hard, hitting his left shoulder instead of the ball. As soon as Humphries turned around, there was a player with both hands around his throat: Rajon Rondo.
There was more pushing and shoving, and the commotion led to some players being pushed into fans’ seats under the basket. It took players and coaches from both teams to get things back to normal. Rondo was ejected, the Celtics lost the game, and the NBA announced a two-game suspension for the Celtics’ leader. The team hadn’t developed any offensive consistency, but what it would and could do was fight.
Most nights, there was no artistry to the way the Celtics played. They ended 2012 with three losses, all by 20-plus points. They added another loss, this one by 10, in their first game of 2013. They were 15–17 when they left town for a quick two-game trip to Atlanta and New York. They were able to get themselves straightened out, but not without another suspension and unplanned Madison Square Garden fight.
The Hawks were first, and when Rivers arrived at the arena, he was given a presidential greeting. Many of the workers at Philips Arena lived in Atlanta when Rivers played there in the 1980s, and they gave him familiar smiles as he entered.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” former Celtic Cedric Maxwell joked after Rivers had gotten through the crowd. “Everybody talks to Doc like they go back years with him. Doc makes everybody feel good, makes them laugh, asks how everybody is doing. And then you ask him later, ‘Doc, who was that you were talking to earlier?’ He’ll smile and say, ‘I have no idea.’ I’ve never seen anybody do it better.”
There were thousands of Celtics fans, wearing green, spread throughout the Philips crowd. Another former Celtic, M. L. Carr, was at the game as well. He sat in the stands, entertaining clients for one of his businesses. When Carr played for the Celtics in the 1980s, he had two primary roles: While on the bench, wave a towel to get the home crowd involved (or to taunt rival fans on the road); while in the game, do what’s required—often a shove or hard foul—to slow the other team down.
Carr watched the game and was asked if he missed being in the NBA. At that moment, the game became physical, and Carr perked up. “I do now,” he said with a smile.
The Celtics won the game and didn’t think anything of an incident where Rondo asked official Rodney Mott about a call and, while questioning the referee, made contact. The NBA reviewed the footage and didn’t like what it saw. The league called Rondo and wanted to speak with him about it but was stonewalled. The verdict, then, was that Rondo was uncooperative and that he was suspended for the Knicks game.
It was his third suspension in eleven months. He was developing a reputation, the wrong kind. With all the speculation about Pierce and Garnett and their future, there wasn’t enough conversation about Rondo. Ainge’s decision on him wouldn’t be age related like the others. The questions had been lurking since Rondo threw the water bottle at the TV: If this was the real Rondo, and always would be, how long could they put up with it? And was their approach with him—usually an immediate public defense—a model of loyalty or enabling?
In New York, most of the Celtics’ energy against the Knicks came from the oldest player on the team. The thirty-six-year-old Garnett still played with an edge, and that was apparent as he and Carmelo Anthony wrestled for position in the paint.
The wrestling, and talking, went on for a while, and double technicals from the officials didn’t stop it. Even timeouts didn’t stop the talking. Anthony cussed at Garnett as both men went to their respective benches, and Garnett naturally cussed back. When Garnett was questioned about it after the Celtics’ win, he brushed it off as just basketball intensity. But Anthony disagreed.
As Rivers walked the outer concourse of Madison Square Garden, heading to the area where the Celtics’ bus was parked, he saw an agitated Anthony trying to get on to the Boston bus to confront Garnett.
“Come on, ’Melo,” Rivers said to him. “Don’t do this, man. This isn’t you.”
“Nah, Doc. Fuck that. There are some things you just don’t say to a man. That was some disrespectful shit.”
Rivers tried again to calm Anthony, and this time he listened. In the meantime, Garden security had formed a wall between Anthony and the vehicle. Rivers took his seat at the front of the bus and exhaled as players, toward the back, buzzed about what would have happened if Anthony had boarded and put his threats into action. It was comedy and chaos wrapped into one.
On the short flight back to Boston, as most players played cards or slept, glowing lights from the coaches’ laptops illuminated the front of the plane. They’d won three games in a row, and they’d done it with their defense, which was still a team strength.
As the plane landed, one of the assistant coaches was excited to share a defensive insight he’d picked up from his in-flight study. After all, the team had forced Anthony into a putrid 6 for 26 shooting night. On the ground now, approaching one thirty a.m., the impromptu coaching point from the assistant continued. Players gathered belongings and prepared to go home.
“Are you kidding?” reserve guard Leandro Barbosa, from Brazil, said to the coach. “Vamos! It’s late.”
That could have been Rivers’s silent urging of these Celtics as well: Let’s go. They’d appear to do just that and then retreat. After the Knicks win, they won three more in a row to push their overall streak to six. Then they followed that with a six-game losing streak. It was the first time they’d had a skid like that in six years.
It was going to be a season of “firsts” for Rivers, and soon he was going to have to honestly answer what that meant for his future with this team.
In late January, Rondo hurt his knee in Atlanta, and he and the team thought it was just a sprain. After further tests, doctors confirmed that the point guard had torn his ACL. He had been named to his fourth straight All-Star Game, this time as a starter, but he wasn’t going to play in that game or any other this season. His year was over after thirty-seven games.
Rivers was defiant, publicly, when he explained the news. That was just his way. He’d been that way since he was a kid; his parents never allowed him or anyone around him to cover themselves in excuses. It sounded good, but he knew it wasn’t realistic. No one in the locker room was going to give them what Rondo did. It was almost February, and they were in trouble.
As Ainge began to make calls around the league, seeking the best short-term fix for his hole at point guard, other names on his roster came up as well. Teams wanted to know how he felt about dealing Pierce and Garnett. It was what GMs did most of the time. Everyone in the Celtics office knew the annual joke: “Every year we call Miami and ask what it will take to get LeBron. Either we laugh, or they laugh at us. But one day they might not laugh.”
Ainge listened. The thought of trading his fading stars didn’t scare him. No one ever accused him of being sentimental. He just didn’t want to rush into anything. Any trade of KG and Pierce, even at this stage of their careers, would require a huge return.
Garnett heard the chatter and found a way to gain even more Celtics fans when he spoke about it.
“I bleed green; I die green,” he said. “That’s what it is. But it is a business. If it crosses the path, I’ll deal with it. Trades are a part of this league. Every year you’re going to hear things.”
He had the savvy to say it that way without pointing out that a trade wasn’t going to happen unless he wanted it to. It’s precisely why he had the no-trade clause inserted into his latest contract. It’s also a detail that made his dispute with Allen all the more fascinating. The no-trade clause is something that Allen didn’t have in his five Boston seasons, and the absence of it, along with the insecurity it brought, was one of the reasons he didn’t trust the Celtics at the end.
Allen’s teams, his new one and former one, couldn’t have been more different. As the Celtics struggled, the Heat soared.
It may have been a coincidence, but the Heat’s play approached historic levels after a team-bonding Super Bowl party. Two weeks after it, they still hadn’t lost a game. They’d gone to Oklahoma City, watched Kevin Durant drop 40, and still won their seventh straight. A full month after the party, still no losses.
Forty-six days after their party, they were in Boston. Their winning streak was at twenty-two. They were on the second night of back-to-back games and on the road for the fourth consecutive game.
It looked like a good spot to predict a loss.
The Celtics, 16–12 since losing Rondo, hadn’t collapsed without their star guard. But there had been no flash from the locker room, no revelation of a great player who just needed an opportunity. It looked like that player could be rising against the Heat. Jeff Green missed the previous year due to heart surgery, but he was back and playing well—and exceptionally well against the Heat as the Celtics built a 17-point lead in the first half.
Green, often matched up against James, seemed to have access to LeBron’s tool kit. He made 3s from the corner. He drove to the hoop with his right hand and finished with a soft floater from his left. When Shane Battier drove toward him, he blocked his shot and started a break. He had 26 points at halftime, and the Heat didn’t slow him down in the third.
He poured in 12 more third-quarter points, and you could see thought bubbles over the heads of eighteen thousand fans in the Garden: Ah, so this is why Danny traded Perkins. Green—what a name for this team—was exactly what the team needed going forward. No one was talking about the old Big Three or anything else. Garnett was sick and didn’t play. Pierce was content running the offense and had 8 assists. Allen had just 6 points and missed all his 3s for the visitors. This was all Green.
He had 38 after three, but the team’s lead had been reduced to 13. It was still 10 with just over seven minutes to play. That was also when the fun stopped. Green had 43 points then, and he didn’t score again. The Heat won in the final ten seconds on a jumper by James.
Twenty-three wins in a row. For a single season, it was the second-longest streak in league history. They added four more wins after Boston before the run stopped at twenty-seven. The Celtics, as they had all season, went the other way. They were 36–30 after their loss to the Heat and then finished the regular season 5–10.
It was back to New York for the playoffs, and it was the first time since the advent of the Big Three that Boston had begun the postseason in the lower tier of the bracket. Garnett and Pierce were spent, and they were doing that thing that Rivers had seen for the last few years. They were telling half truths about their injuries, trying to play through and cover up the things that hurt the most.
They were down 0–3 to the Knicks and clinging. Realistically, getting one win was the goal to avoid the shame of it. They got two.
Rivers knew it from all of his boxing videos: It’s hard for fighters. Most of the time everyone else knows it’s over, big picture, before they do. The instinct to scratch, defend, block, clutch, throw jabs is all there even when their time is up. He knew it about them because he was one of them, too.
This had been the final push for the Celtics, and they hadn’t made it out of the first round. It was the end of the season already, and it was the first week of May. It wasn’t fair to compare the end of their previous season to this one without considering context. Still, last year they were one win away from keeping Miami out of the finals, and this year Miami wasn’t thinking about Boston.
Ainge delayed a rebuild the last couple of seasons, trying to get all that he could from the Big Three. Now it was time. He’d begun to plan for a fresh start, which would obviously mean new players. One thing he hadn’t planned for was a new coach.