Boston Celtics better off landing star big when they did instead of in Kyrie Irving trade
The Boston Celtics reportedly could've acquired Kristaps Porzingis during the 2019 season as he was rehabbing an ACL tear with the New York Knicks, and all it would've cost them was Kyrie Irving; who was emotionally over being a Celtic the minute he got there considering it's been revealed he never wanted to be with Boston in the first place.
As NESN's Adam London relayed, though, the Cs were better off trading for Porzingis when they did since Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown have been able to become the undisputed top options on the team in the years between the Latvian's stint and Irving's infamous two-year run in green.
"The Celtics were better off to acquire Porzingis when they did," London prefaced before saying, "After Irving departed Boston, Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown were able to cement themselves as the true faces of the franchise and they led the team to great success in the years that followed. Porzingis, meanwhile, went on a redemption tour in Washington after things didn’t work out in Dallas, and the C’s only needed to part with one high-end asset to land him last summer."
A Kyrie Irving trade in 2019 could've expedited Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum becoming top stars with Boston Celtics
London's point about Tatum and Brown not having to compete with Porzingis in 2019 is definitely a good point. At the time, Porzingis was seen as the best of the three of them, having been named an All-Star in 2018 as the Knicks' No. 1 option. Who knows what the pecking order would've looked like then after Porzingis recovered from his ACL tear and debuted with the Cs in 2019-20.
That never happened, but if an Irving trade transpired before the 2019 deadline, it could've helped the Jays become top stars even quicker. That's especially true had Irving been traded for a player like Chris Paul, whose relationship with James Harden was disintegrating with the Houston Rockets and would end up in OKC over the offseason anyway.
As London said, though, everything worked out with Porzingis arriving in the 2023 offseason in a shocking trade for Marcus Smart that brought Boston draft capital. No need to look back now, even if doing so makes you really wonder how things could've been different for the Jays.