If you think Danny Ainge is going to blow up the Celtics for 50-cents on the dollar, think again.
Jackie MacMullen has a nice article on ESPNBoston.com today on Larry Bird, Robert Parish, and Kevin McHale reflecting on the ends of their careers and looking at that of the Celtics' current Big Three of Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, and Ray Allen.
But an interesting quote came at the very end of the article, from Bird, on what Celtics president Danny Ainge asked for in return of Ray Allen:
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"Here's the thing," Bird said to MacMullen. "When Danny and I talked about trading for Ray, he wanted Tyler Hansbrough and a first-round pick. If that's the value he's putting on Ray Allen, he ain't getting it. That tells me he's in no hurry to trade him.
"All that talk about Danny blowing it up, about not making the same mistakes as Red, is fine.
"But now that it's his turn to pull the trigger, it's a helluva lot harder than it looks."
Great quote from Bird, and really lets you know what Ainge thinks of Allen at this stage in his career, and really, what he thinks about blowing the team up before it self-destructs at the end of the season.
If Ainge is looking for that much for Allen -- a player who becomes a free agent at the end of the season -- then you can only imagine the package he'd ask for for Rajon Rondo. As it has been reported, Ainge is only looking to make a trade if he is blown away by the offer, and Hansbrough plus a first round pick for Allen would qualify as such, and one that won't be made.