CelticsStrong
Celtics Basketball => Celtics History => Topic started by: Eddie20 on December 20, 2017, 01:38:27 PM
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On The Herd, Sampson just said that Red Auerbach visited him and his parents house and he had a million dollars in his briefcase and said "come play for the mighty Boston Celtics". Sampson said that if he had accepted and declared for the draft he would've gone #1. So obviously the C's never would've traded down and drafted McHale at #3 and Parish would've been stuck rotting in Golden State.
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another example of sometimes the best deal is the one you don't make
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Man, that would have been awesome. If only for a short period.
Imagine Ralph Sampson playing off of Larry Bird's passing ...
Imagine Ralph Sampson's shooting with Bird setting him up ...
Oh my, that would have been beautiful.
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On The Herd, Sampson just said that Red Auerbach visited him and his parents house and he had a million dollars in his briefcase and said "come play for the mighty Boston Celtics". Sampson said that if he had accepted and declared for the draft he would've gone #1. So obviously the C's never would've traded down and drafted McHale at #3 and Parish would've been stuck rotting in Golden State.
Hindsight is 20-20, of course, but McHale/Parish turned out a lot better than Sampson. Interesting story, though—kinda like how Ainge's "king's ransom" for Justice Winslow was turned down (thankfully).
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One of many awesome stories in "The Last Banner"
https://www.amazon.com/LAST-BANNER-1985-86-Celtics-Greatest/dp/0684800853
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Sampson didn't enter the draft until 1983, this makes it seem like Red wanted him after his freshman year in 1980. That seems pretty unlikely. No one was leaving college that early at that point (from Dawkins and Willoughby in 75 until basically the early 90's no one was leaving college before at least 3 years). Additionally, while Sampson was very good for a freshman, he wasn't some dominant unstoppable force putting up huge numbers. It just doesn't seem like a very plausible story.
On another note, if that did happen and he did declare, that 83 draft would have been downright terrible with Clyde Drexler at 14 being the only good/great player