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Ten best trades•No. 1: On April 29, 1956, Auerbach sent Ed Macauley, a three-time, first-team All-NBA forward, and the draft rights to Cliff Hagan to St. Louis for the draft rights to Bill Russell. The Celtics also drafted Tom Heinsohn out of Holy Cross as a territorial pick and selected Russell’s teammate at the University of San Francisco, K.C. Jones, in the second round. So they ended up with three future Hall of Famers.Macauley helped St. Louis beat Boston in the 1958 NBA Finals when Russell was slowed by an ankle injury. Easy Ed retired after the following season and was voted into the Hall of Fame in 1960. Hagan averaged 18 points over 10 NBA seasons with St. Louis and also voted into the Hall of Fame. Not bad, but Russell won the NBA MVP Award five times and led the Celtics to 11 championships in his 13 seasons. Enough said.•No. 2: Auerbach acquired Detroit’s 1980 first-round pick the previous September for Bob McAdoo and it turned out to be the No. 1 choice in the entire draft. Purdue center Joe Barry Carroll was favored to be the top pick, but Auerbach liked Minnesota forward McHale better. So he dealt the Nos. 1 and 13 picks to Golden State for the third pick and Robert Parish. Golden State drafted Carroll and Rickey Brown. Auerbach drafted McHale third.Parish and McHale combined with Larry Bird to lead the Celtics to three championships in the 1980s. Each of the original Big Three made the Hall of Fame. Carroll averaged 17.7 points and 7.7 rebounds over 11 NBA seasons, but mostly for bad teams and will forever be linked with one of the most lopsided trades in history. Brown averaged only 4.4 points in five NBA seasons.•No. 3: Ainge acquired Garnett from Minnesota on July 31, 2007, for cash, Al Jefferson, Ryan Gomes, Sebastian Telfair, Gerald Green, Theo Ratliff, the return of a future Minnesota first-round pick acquired in the Ricky Davis deal and Boston’s 2009 first-round pick.Garnett was voted first-team All-NBA and Defensive Player of the Year last season while leading the Celtics to their 17th NBA championship. Jefferson has developed into a scoring machine and Gomes and Telfair start, but the Timberwolves are not close to making the playoffs. The trade has been such a bust so far, McHale was demoted from vice president of basketball operations to head coach earlier this season.•No. 4: In 1951, Auerbach made the first of his great trades, sending the draft rights to 6-foot-11 center Charlie Share to the Fort Wayne Pistons for Bill Sharman and Bob Brannum. Sharman’s shooting ability complemented Bob Cousy’s passing perfectly and they formed the best backcourt of the 1950s. Sharman won four titles with the Celtics and coached the Lakers to the 1972 crown. The Hall of Famer was voted in 1996 one of the NBA’s 50 greatest players of all time. Share averaged 8.3 points and 8.4 rebounds in nine NBA seasons and won a title with St. Louis in 1958.•No. 5: Dennis Johnson had the reputation of being a bad apple, but he turned his image round in Boston after he was acquired from Phoenix for Rick Robey on June 27, 1983. DJ paired with Ainge in the backcourt for Boston’s title teams in 1984 and 1986 and Bird called him the best teammate he ever had. Robey was a backup on Boston’s 1984 title team and played only 111 games over three seasons in Phoenix before retiring.•No. 6: Some at the Celtics draft party at the Garden groaned when the Celtics acquired Ray Allen from Seattle on draft night in 2007 along with Glen Davis for Wally Szczerbiak, Delonte West and the draft rights to Jeff Green, the fifth pick in the draft. Allen was three weeks shy of his 32nd birthday and coming off surgery on both ankles. But the idea of playing alongside Allen and Paul Pierce convinced Garnett to agree to a trade to Boston. Allen slowly adjusted to becoming the third option and has been the team’s most consistent player this season. Davis had his moments off the bench and filled in well as a starter in place of Garnett. The Sonics moved to Oklahoma City and have fallen to the bottom of the standings.•No. 7: Hall of Famer Nate “Tiny” Archibald led the NBA in scoring (34.0) and assists (11.4) when he played the point for the Kansas City-Omaha Kings under coach Bob Cousy in 1972-73. Archibald sat out the entire 1977-78 season with a torn Achilles’ tendon, but Auerbach took a chance and acquired him from the Buffalo Braves on Aug. 4, 1978, with Billy Knight, Marvin Barnes and two second-round picks for Freeman Williams, Kevin Kunnert, Kermit Washington and Sidney Wicks. Archibald enjoyed five productive seasons in Boston and was voted second-team All-NBA in 1981, the year he helped them win a title.•No. 8: Bailey Howell’s scoring had slipped in four consecutive years before the Celtics acquired the 6-foot-7 forward for center Mel Counts on Sept. 1, 1966. Howell averaged 20 points and 8.4 rebounds in his first Celtics season and 18 points over his four years in Green. He helped them win the last two of their eight straight championships in 1968 and 1969 and entered the Hall of Fame in 1997.•No. 9: The Celtics drafted the high-scoring Charlie Scott out of North Carolina in 1970, but he opted to play in the rival ABA. When Scott wanted to join the NBA, the Celtics agreed to trade his rights to Phoenix on March 14, 1972, for future considerations. Those considerations turned out to be rugged forward Paul Silas in return for a player they never had. Scott scored a lot of points for Phoenix, but Silas proved instrumental in helping the Celtics win titles in 1974 and 1976. The 6-foot-7 Silas averaged 12.3 rebounds in his four seasons in Boston and joined teammates John Havlicek and Dave Cowens on the 1976 first-team All-Defensive squad.The Celtics acquired Scott for Paul Westphal on May 23, 1975, and he played for their 1976 title team. Then the Celtics dealt Scott in another great deal for them. They sent him to the Lakers on Dec. 22, 1977, for Kermit Washington, Don Chaney and the first-round pick used to take Larry Bird. This trade wasn’t placed higher because the genius was the drafting of Bird a year before he graduated, not the trade itself.•No. 10: Just six weeks after he took over the Celtics, Ainge made one of his better, but most overlooked, trades. The draft rights to Kendrick Perkins and Marcus Banks were acquired from Memphis for the draft rights to Troy Bell and Dahntay Jones. Perkins starts at center for the Green and provides them with needed toughness inside. Jones averages 6 points a game for Denver, Banks rides the bench in Miami and Bell is out of the league.
•No. 7: Hall of Famer Nate “Tiny” Archibald led the NBA in scoring (34.0) and assists (11.4) when he played the point for the Kansas City-Omaha Kings under coach Bob Cousy in 1972-73. Archibald sat out the entire 1977-78 season with a torn Achilles’ tendon, but Auerbach took a chance and acquired him from the Buffalo Braves on Aug. 4, 1978, with Billy Knight, Marvin Barnes and two second-round picks for Freeman Williams, Kevin Kunnert, Kermit Washington and Sidney Wicks. Archibald enjoyed five productive seasons in Boston and was voted second-team All-NBA in 1981, the year he helped them win a title.
also, i'm not sure that #10 should make the list. i'm still not sold on perk as being anything more than greg kite.
Quote from: Andy Jick on February 09, 2009, 11:03:58 AMalso, i'm not sure that #10 should make the list. i'm still not sold on perk as being anything more than greg kite.huh ?? not sure how much you saw greg kite play. kendrick perkins is already 5 times the player kite ever was ......... and still improving.
Quote from: tenn_smoothie on February 24, 2009, 07:12:34 PMQuote from: Andy Jick on February 09, 2009, 11:03:58 AMalso, i'm not sure that #10 should make the list. i'm still not sold on perk as being anything more than greg kite.huh ?? not sure how much you saw greg kite play. kendrick perkins is already 5 times the player kite ever was ......... and still improving.Kite was pretty awful. Bob Ryan once called him “the least talented player in the NBA.”
Roy...I agree. I hadn't even read your post at the end before I thought, "man, tiny needs to be a little higher on that list."also, i'm not sure that #10 should make the list. i'm still not sold on perk as being anything more than greg kite.
Quote from: Andy Jick on February 09, 2009, 11:03:58 AMRoy...I agree. I hadn't even read your post at the end before I thought, "man, tiny needs to be a little higher on that list."also, i'm not sure that #10 should make the list. i'm still not sold on perk as being anything more than greg kite.Me three. #7 really stands out. Look at the junk he gave up.And it wasn't a trade, but how about Red drafting Bird a year early, even though the team sucked at the time.