Jrue Holiday cracks joke about ‘hard’ days of Celtics training camp

BOSTON — The Boston Celtics are back. Just over 100 days after winning the 2024 NBA Championship, training camp is back up and running again. As crowd noise fills the Auerbach Center, the Celtics’ practice facility, the squeaks of sneakers and yells of players and coaches can be heard from the media room.

Curtains are closed until practice ends, but it’s not difficult to envision the intensity flowing through the air of the courts below. The beaches and relaxation of the offseason have been traded in for suicides, drills, and Joe Mazzulla speeches. Jrue Holiday knows this as well as anyone.

And he’s wishing to have last year’s experience back.

Jrue Holiday jokes about tough first few days of Celtics training camp

Last summer, Holiday was traded to Boston right as training camp was starting. As a result, he missed the first practice of the year. While speaking with reporters on Thursday, Holiday joked that he wished he got to miss this year’s initial run.

“Hard day. Tough day,” Holiday said. “Again, I got traded last year, and I think I missed the first day, and I wish I would have missed the first day this year, too. Hard days. Obviously, we want to come back this year and do it again. This is where it starts.”

Holiday was an essential part of Boston’s playoff run last year. A whirlwind of an offseason full of uncertainly quickly turned into the chance to play with his former rival, and the result was a second championship for the veteran.

As the Celtics prepare to run it back next year (with nearly an identical roster), their training camp will be interrupted by a trip overseas.

Boston is slated to play the Denver Nuggets in a pair of preseason games in Abu Dhabi to kick off the NBA’s 2024-25 calendar. They’ll play games on October 4 and 6, but Holiday emphasized their desire to maintain the norm regardless of the switch-up.

“We got to set the tone early the first week,” Holiday said. “Obviously, knowing that we go to Abu Dhabi, and that whole thing is going to be kind of different, just in terms of practicing and playing and everything they're probably going to have us do. So, there are things that we want to set now [to] set  a foundation, and we've been doing that the first two days.

Holiday and the Celtics are ready and eager for next season, and it all starts in training camp.