Boston Celtics: Two years later, trading for Kyrie Irving was the wrong gamble

Roughly two years ago, the Boston Celtics acquired Kyrie Irving from the Cleveland Cavaliers. Looking back, was the trade worth the gamble?

Almost two years ago to the day, the Boston Celtics made one of their biggest trades since Danny Ainge got Kevin Garnett for Al Jefferson and a cast of other characters from the Minnesota Timberwolves in 2007.

Ainge landed Kyrie Irving from the Cleveland Cavaliers and, just like the Garnett trade, this was the one. This was the trade that would lead the Celtics to their next championship run and banner 18. Irving was a top 10 player and the trade was the culmination of another Ainge heist – the 2013 trade that sent Garnett, Paul Pierce, and Jason Terry to the Brooklyn Nets for their first-round picks in 2014, 2016, and 2018, along with a bunch of other players who shall not be named either now or later.

Those draft picks brought the Celtics two young stars in Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum and now, as the icing on the cake, it brought them superstar Kyrie Irving.

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Combined with the offseason signing of all-star Gordon Hayward, and the imminent departure of LeBron James from Cleveland once he became a free agent in 2018, the Irving deal elevated the Celtics to the team to beat – not just in 2017-18, but for years to come.

The Celtics made it to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2018 – without Irving or Hayward, who were both injured. That ratcheted up the expectations even more as many, including Fox Sports 1’s Colin Cowherd, declared the Celtics the next NBA dynasty. With Irving and Hayward coming back, plus the development of the young players who led them to the ECFs, the Celtics were considered the favorites in the Eastern Conference in 2018-19.

Now we all know what happened in 2018-19. The Celtics were one of the most disappointing teams in the NBA, finishing 49-33, nine games behind the Raptors and fourth in the conference. But Irving told Celtics fans not to worry about the seed because he didn’t see anyone beating the Celtics in a 7-game series.

Why? “Because I’m here.”

Well, he was only good enough to lead the Celtics to a 5-game series win over the Victor Oladipo-less Pacers in the first round. In the conference semifinals, the Celtics lost in five games to the Milwaukee Bucks and Irving had a horrible series, going 37 for 102, which, I’m not good at math, but that’s under 40 percent. And that includes a good Game 1 where he went 12 for 21.

So, fast forward to July and Irving leaves town for the Nets and the Celtics are a completely different team. Gone is Irving and Al Horford, replaced by free agents Kemba Walker and Enes Kanter. How the 2019-20 Celtics fare and whether or not they are better without Irving remains to be seen. But here, on the anniversary of the Irving trade, the question is:

Did the Celtics win the Kyrie Irving trade?

At the time, it was a no-brainer. Of course, they did. They gave up a hobbled Isaiah Thomas, who they weren’t going to sign anyway; they gave up Jae Crowder, who had been replaced by Hayward; and they gave up Ante Zizic, a bench player. The one big piece they had to part with was that 2018 first-rounder from the Nets, which turned out to be, not the third pick, which they got in 2014, or the first pick, which they got in 2016, but the eighth pick. But in return, they got a young superstar in Kyrie Irving, the hero of the 2016 Cavs championship. Another win for Ainge.

But now looking back, was it?

Irving is now gone and they were arguably worse with him than they were with Isaiah Thomas. The one year they made the ECFs, Irving didn’t even play in the playoffs due to injury. And if you look at the Celtics record with and without Irving, their winning percentage was higher without Irving – both in the regular season and the playoffs.

So, when you look back and ask, What if they didn’t make the trade? Would they have been better off? Thomas would have walked, Crowder probably would have been traded somewhere else, but the Celtics would have had the eighth pick in the draft, Collin Sexton, who averaged 16.7 points per game in his rookie year.

Granted, it was for a bad team, but there’s certainly potential there for Sexton to be a future all-star, if not a solid NBA starter. Paired with Terry Rozier, the Celtics certainly would have been good enough last year to get bounced in the second round, as they did with Irving.

Only time will tell how good Sexton becomes, but at this point, the Celtics have basically nothing to show for the Irving trade. The Cavs have a player in Sexton who could be a building block for the future. Would they have rather kept Irving for two more years? Sure, but they were going to eventually lose him. So you tell me – who won the trade?