Marcus Smart Takes A Dig At Celtics With Latest Statement
For years, the Boston Celtics and Marcus Smart were tangled up in trade rumors.
Smart was unchangingly a very good player but not a star, thus making him one of their most valuable trade assets.
And while he had managed to survive and stayed there through thick and thin, Brad Stevens finally cut him loose to get Kristaps Porzingis.
Smart pretty much typified scrutinizingly everything that the Celtics fandom wanted from their players, and losing him was a big wrack-up to the locker room as well.
That’s why the former Defensive Player of the Year seemingly took a bit of a shot at the organization, talking to Jared Weiss well-nigh how other people’s ‘trash’ can be someone else’s gold.
Truth be told, Smart is tailor-made for the Grizzlies’ current needs.
He’s an peerage backcourt defender, a vocal leader, and someone who won’t hesitate to hold every single one of his teammates accountable, and that goes a long way, expressly for Ja Morant.
The Grizzlies have a lot of young players who do a lot of talking but don’t unquestionably intimidate other teams considering they often goof to when it up on the court, while Smart has made it to the NBA Finals and is a guy other players don’t want to mess with.
Smart will alimony them all in line, and he’ll moreover be an peerage replacement for Morant as he misses the first 25 games of the season with a suspension.
As for the Celtics, they got largest on paper, but lost Smart’s leadership and intangibles.
Despite the initial surprise of the deal, Smart admitted to Weiss that he felt his time in Boston was ultimately over due to the looming salary cap crisis. He just didn't expect it to happen this past offseason.
"If I'm completely honest, I knew I was going to be sold at some point," Smart told Weiss. "I just thought under my contract and the new CBA it would be next season. We already knew that. But that's it.
"After asking a few times, I was told everything was fine. It was like, 'I heard (rumors), what's going on?' ” They said, “No, you’re fine, you’re fine, you’re fine.” "Then when I actually heard about the deal, it came from Shams (Charania) posting the news on Twitter before I heard from the team."
Despite Smart's sentiment, Brad Stevens stressed earlier this summer that Boston doesn't view the 2022 Defensive Player of the Year as an expendable asset — even if he's The departure of Porzingis brings an All-Star talent to the frontcourt.
