Boston Celtics team president Danny Ainge appeared on ESPN’s “Hoop Streams” show in April 2020 to talk about Boston’s 2008 NBA Championship among several other topics. At that time, it was hosted by Cassidy Hubbarth and joined by former Celtics champion center Kendrick Perkins as well as Amin Elhassan.
Spurred by Garnett’s Hall of Fame election that had recently been announced, Hubbarth soon arrived at the origin story of the so-called “new Big Three” (as Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, and Ray Allen have been called in reference to the 1980s banner-hanging frontcourt trio of Larry Bird, Kevin McHale and Robert Parish).
Buy Celtics TicketsAsked about the conversation in which the BYU alum convinced the Big Ticket to accept a trade to Boston, Ainge replied at length.
“KG was very polite, letting me in his home,” began the Celtics president.
“We talked about the possibility. I’d gotten permission from Minnesota to go talk to KG and see if we could talk him into doing a trade, and he was very respectful. And I think that he was very interested … At first, before we had made the trade … before Ray (Allen), KG wasn’t sure we were good enough to win.”
“And so he was waffling between us and I think the (Los Angeles) Lakers might have been involved to try to get KG,” he added.
Ainge narrowly beat out a competing offer from the Los Angeles Lakers to land Garnett once he managed to leverage draft assets in a deal to bring former UConn standout Ray Allen to join Paul Pierce and the rest of the team on draft night in 2007.
“We’d actually made a trade for KG before, but because (he) would not sign a contract extension, I wasn’t going to give up a lot of our young assets just to have (him) for one year,” explained the Celtics’ head honcho.
Once together, the team quickly clicked, and forged an incredible chemistry had coach Doc Rivers famously referred to as “Ubuntu”, after a Nguni Bantu term that means, roughly translated, “I am because we are,” an embodiment of the sacrifices all three stars were making to win together.
“There was so much hope in the face of Doc, in the face of Paul and Ray and KG,” said Ainge, referring to the anticipation and esprit de corp that emerged almost immediately with the group of new teammates.
“All of them, and all of our other players, there was so much hope in what had happened that offseason, that there was just an incredible enthusiasm when training camp started.”
Former Celtic big man Kendrick Perkins weighed in, agreeing.
“Our practices were so crazy that Doc used to have to call (Garnett) out … it almost gets a fist blows and this is not a real practice unless some people (are) about the fight. And … every practice it was like — seriously — what Doc was like (was), ‘Alright, that’s it. That’s it. That’s enough. That’s enough.”
While that may not sound like chemistry to a casual observer, the intense competitive fire all three of the new Big Three brought to the team was not only a laser-focused desire to do what none of the trio was able to do on their own, it also became infectious.
To the point of boiling over at times.
But that fire fueled an epic title run ending in Banner 17 and a spot in Celtics lore only smaller than some others because of bad luck and injuries.
As much as they went at each other in practice, they also deferred to the hot hand in games, and built a chemistry bigger than a team or the word used to convey it as a concept.
The whole interview is a gem, and worth a listen if you haven’t heard it already — just play the video above.
Listen to the “Celtics Lab” podcast on:
Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3zBKQY6
Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3GfUPFi
YouTube: https://bit.ly/3F9DvjQ
