A Near Flawless Draft Night

(Photo courtesy of Steve Neimand)

By: Greg Payne

Well, to me, last night could not have gone any better. Rajon Rondo and Ray Allen are both currently still members of the Boston Celtics, which was my primary concern heading into last evening.

Allow me to give a shout out to the newest Boston Celtic, Lester Hudson of Tennesee Martin. We did in fact use our 58th overall selection to select this "combo" guard who averaged a very impressive 27.5 ppg last season.

Did you hear that sound? That was me jump starting the Lester Hudson bandwagon. I don't know too much about the guy (make that nothing), but I'm officially a fan because he's one of my guys now. BUT at the same time, I'm not looking at him as next season's savior, and neither should you.

Danny Ainge had some nice comments about him though:

"I like his toughness, and his ability to score. He's one of those guys who really knows how to score the ball."

"He's a terrific shooter and a physical scorer. He can shoot over the top of the defense."

While Hudson might be able to score the ball, it's extremely unlikely he'll play anything close to significant minutes next season, and he might not even make the team come October. We'll see if he can find a way onto the summer league team so we can watch him play alongside Billy Walker, J.R. Giddens and Gabe Pruitt. If Hudson does make that cut, we should have a pretty explosive summer league team. This could be some pretty powerful television, or a strong series of live web broadcasts, if nothing else. Alley-oop anyone? Why thank you. May I have another? Sure. In fact, take two.

But no, now that this night is behind us, the real work begins. Danny Ainge and Doc Rivers have expressed publicly before that the free agent market has held their interest all along and once moratorium (when teams can begin negotiating with players) begins next Wednesday, look for the smoke to start flying and the fire to really begin heating up.

Are we having fun yet? I sure am. I'm ecstatic that our core is still in tact, I'm pumped we picked up a scoring bruiser who looks like he could own Chuck Liddell in a UFC match and I'm electrified at the fact that the best is yet to come this offseason.

Good work, Danny. Sometimes, the best moves are the ones you don't make.

Stay Tuned.