Boston Celtics' analyst floats negative Porzingis trade reaction for worst media take of the year
The Boston Celtics' immense success has made them micro-analyzed by the national media in recent years. For every well-thought-out analyst like Chris Mannix, there's a clout-chasing former player looking to go viral on the internet, like Gilbert Arenas. Then there's Kendrick Perkins, the franchise's former championship center, whose commentary is serious yet often blasphemous.
On a recent episode of his self-titled podcast, Ringer founder Bill Simmons nominated Perkins's reaction to the Marcus Smart for Kristaps Porzingis trade as the worst media take of the NBA season.
"Perk hating the Porzingis trade and saying Marcus Smart was the heart and soul of the Celtics, was my favorite bad take of the year," Simmons said to his co-host Ryen Russillo.
"The Marcus Smart stuff you literally haven't heard since the season started," said Russillo. It's funny because a lot of people went with that. I never felt like, ugh, oh, what are you going to do? You don't have Marcus Smart. I never felt that once."
Boston Celtics' Kristaps Porzingis trade always made sense
Trading for a significantly better and younger player than the one you sent out seldom fails in sports. The idea that the Celtics could never cut ties with Smart because he was the team's emotional leader was always ludicrous. The team needed a change from his erratic play and influential voice in the locker room.
At his peak, Smart is an instrumental glue guy at his peak, which is nowhere near the All-Star ceiling Porzingis offers when healthy. The fact that the transaction was essentially a one-for-one swap always boded well for the Celtics. It allowed them to supercharge the roster while getting their most imposing threat in the paint since Kevin Garnett.
To chalk up Porzingis' success last season with the Washington Wizards as "good stats, bad team" is also lazy. The Latvian's post-ups were one of the most dominant plays in basketball, a metric you can't inflate with a substandard supporting cast. It's no surprise he returned to prominence immediately after ditching his role in Dallas as a glorified Ryan Anderson, a big man who primarily chucks threes.
If Porzingis stayed healthy, adding him to a team with Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, and Derrick White would always work. Throw Jrue Holiday into the mix, and it's one of the greatest regular-season teams of the 21st century. Perkins routinely makes a fool of himself on live television for being allergic to accurate predictions. Plenty of his takes are laughable, but questioning the best acquisition on the title favorites ranks in a class of its own.
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