Boston Celtics GM Danny Ainge spoke to Steve Bulpett of the Boston Herald about a variety of topics, one of which was what the Celtics will need to improve on this season:
“We need Marcus (Smart) to take steps forward. We need Avery to continue to improve. We need Isaiah to continue to get better at his efficiency. And I think all those guys will and they have. The same with Kelly. So we feel like all our guys haven’t reached the peak of their careers. (Jae) Crowder, too. They’re all getting more efficient and becoming better shooters.”
Before signing a player, Ainge thinks deeply about that player’s overall impact, not just their ability to fill one particular need:
“Sure, it’d be great to add a knock-down shooter, but you don’t want to change the identity of your team by sticking someone out there that doesn’t have that same defensive intensity and toughness that is the foundation of us being a good team,” he said. “It’s just not as simple as finding a second baseman and putting him in there. In basketball, you have to do a lot of things — pass, dribble, shoot, rebound, defend. That’s why we like Jaylen (Brown, the team’s first-round draft pick), as an example. He does a lot of things. It’s like Marcus isn’t your prototypical NBA point guard, but he can play (the) 1-4. He’s in there playing a power forward in a playoff game and doing well. He’s a basketball player, and you can play him with a lot of different combinations of people. That’s what I like about our team.
“But, yeah, it would be nice to add a rim protector that didn’t hurt our offense. It would be nice to have a shooter that didn’t hurt our defense. But I feel like we have a lot of guys that are good shooters. But the kind of guys you’re talking about, those guys are hard to find.”
