The Boston Celtics’ 2019 campaign didn’t go as most expected, as it ended with them being bounced in the second round by a dangerous Milwaukee Bucks team. However with a team as immensely talented as Boston coming up short of where they were last season, there’s plenty of blame to go around, and most of it has landed squarely on the shoulders of Kyrie Irving.
As an isolation-heavy volume scorer, Irving does have problematic traits, but this has been his playstyle forever and his Celtic teammates know it. When guard Marcus Smart was asked following their Game 6 loss to Milwaukee whether Irving was the problem, Smart adamantly defended his teammate and friend.
“Bulls—. That’s bulls—,” Smart told ESPN when Irving’s leadership was being questioned as the reason behind their early playoff exit. “Not one of us on this team knows what Kyrie has been through. Probably a few amount of people in this world know what Kyrie goes through. It was hard for him as well.”
“He was forced into a situation where it was business over the friendships,” Smart said. “He had to come into a situation knowing this is a group of guys that had something going before [he came] here. ‘How will I fit in?’ He didn’t want to disrupt that. That says a lot. This is Kyrie Irving we’re talking about it, and he’s worried about coming in and disrupting us. We took him in with full arms. We tried to understand. But like I said, we never really understood because we’re not in his shoes. That’s just a bulls— statement to say his leadership skills killed us.”
“We just couldn’t find a way to do it. It’s nobody’s fault. It happens,” Smart said. “… It’s four other guys out there, 13 other guys on the team. Coaches and everything. To just blame it on one guy is bulls—.”
Though Marcus Smart may feel this way about his teammate, it’s unclear how head coach Brad Stevens and the rest of Irving’s comrades feel. Even more importantly, it depends what Danny Ainge and the rest of Boston’s front office believes about Irving, as he could hit the open free agent market this summer if he so wishes.
Of course, the Celtics did advance deeper last year without Irving than they did with him this postseason. This will certainly come into consideration when the Celtics make their decision this summer, but so will how his teammates feel of him and Marcus Smart closed the season with a resounding co-sign.
