Here is the NBA draft lottery process:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBA_draft_lottery#Process

It is worth noting that in 83% of all possible scenarios the 4th seed will get a pick in the top 5. Meanwhile 82% of the time the 7th seed will pick 7th or 8th.

Looking at this year's draft, that looks like a serious drop off in talent.

Paul Pierce wouldn’t mind rejoining the Celtics.

“Yeah, why not? Maybe play for them, maybe work for them,” the forward said Friday after the Nets lost to his former team, 91-84, at TD Garden.

Pierce played 15 seasons with the Celtics, who drafted him in 1998. His contract expires after this season and he’ll be an unrestricted free agent.

He received a warm ovation from the crowd and finished with 10 points in 33 minutes, though emotions weren’t as high as in late January, when he returned to the Garden for the first time since he and Kevin Garnett were traded.

“It’s always emotional when you step into a gym you’ve spent your whole life playing in,” Pierce said. “The tribute last time made it so much more emotional and the cheers. But every time I come into this gym, because I’m always seeing friends and people who have been around all the years, it’s always going to be emotional, because you miss them from knowing them so long.”

http://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2014/03/08/celtics-vitor-faverani-has-season-ending-surgery/FegcRMfs3N0IeaqYMQYZqI/story.html

I think this is threadworthy. Of course it would be a windfall for the Celtics and Ainge would look like a hero, but is it in the best interests of the Celtics to accept him back?. Of course the huge caveat is no one knows what the makeup of next year's team will actually be.  My feeling is I would be happy to have him back if the price is right and he is OK with coming off the bench. 

So it may be premature to mention this, but hidden in the details of the league’s day-to-day business in recent months has been this fact: The groundwork is already being laid for another lockout.

 

That is the consensus among league executives and prominent agents. But it is articulated particularly well by Charles Grantham, who worked for the union from 1978-’95, serving as its executive director for the last seven of those years (he left a year before Billy Hunter, who was deposed last year amid scandal, took over). No replacement for Hunter has been named, and that’s just one element feeding lockout fears.

 

 

 if new NBA commissioner Adam Silver began working on the next CBA just after the last deal was signed, that puts the union more than two years behind. Chris Paul was only named union president in August of 2013, and the field of candidates for executive director was only narrowed to two last month.

 

 

But in order for the players to be working on these kinds of strategies, they need a director.

 

“There are a whole lot of reasons why this kind of planning should already be underway,” Grantham said. “Management clearly has started their planning—they are putting forth their manpower, their resources, into the next negotiations. For the union, it is a matter of catching up, and the problem is, even when they do catch up, there is the problem of not having as much stability or experience.”

 

Here’s how the agent puts it: “We know the storm is coming. It looks like we won’t get the raincoats until the day it arrives.”

 

link

 

But here’s what might come as a surprise: The Carleton University Ravens are good. Not just “good for a Canadian school,” but really, legitimately good. They have a point guard who would start for most any team in America and a big man who drop-steps more beautifully than most players dunk. They scored 95 in an exhibition win over Wisconsin, 10 more points than any team has scored on the Badgers all year.¹ They hung with Cincinnati on its home floor, beat TCU and Towson by 26 apiece, and they took Syracuse to overtime, playing the Orange tougher than most of the ACC.²

 

I will add the last team to beat them in championship was my old team the U of Saskatchewan. We beat them in Ottawa no less.

http://espn.go.com/blog/boston/celtics/post/_/id/4711236/practice-wallace-knee-likely-done-for-year

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/10517078/nba-weighing-expanded-court-4-point-shot

On Jamal Crawford's involvement with his HS alma mater:

 

Inside, everything is drenched in Beach basketball's blue and orange. On the far wall, retired numbers for Phil Heath—a basketball player from Beach who later played at the University of Denver before becoming a bodybuilder and winning three straight “Mr. Olympia” titles from 2011-2013—Terrence Williams, Nate Robinson, and, of course, Jamal Crawford line the space next to the “CRAWFORD COURT” scoreboard. There is no doubt as to who paid for the renovations to the gym. Everywhere is branded with “CRAWFORD COURT” signage, as if a populist emperor had rechristened his capital.

 

Crawford still lives just walking distance from the court bearing his name—there are actually two Crawford Courts, since he also funded the renovation of an outdoor court at a local park—and he spends just about all of his off time here. Crawford was, for instance, at the Vikings' win on February 15th. Even when not here, he tweets support after every Vikings game for his #BeachBoyz.

 

Crawford's mythic high school career at Beach as a guard-slash-demigod culminated with the 1998 state championship— the second in the school’s history—and sparked the school’s era of dominance. Rainier Beach has won five state championships over the last 12 years. In that time, Crawford has done as much as anyone to support Seattle basketball and cultivate the familial bond among the community of local stars from here to Tacoma that calls itself “The Home Team.”

On the current team:

 

Those most recognizable student is 6’7” senior and Louisville commit Shaqquan Aaron, who moved all the way from California to go to high school at Beach. Strange as it this seems if framed in a non-basketball context, such a thing would have been entirely unthinkable a few years ago.

 

Aaron, flanked by two teammates, surges down the court on the fast break. But instead of finishing at the rim himself or laying the ball off to a teammate, he sort of just tosses a lob into the empty space towards the basket and leaves the scene—like a referee tossing a jump ball or the machine from Jurassic Park delivering a hapless cow to velociraptors— trusting that one of his teammates will finish. He was correct. A couple possessions later, someone throws a lob to a cutting Murray that looks far too overcooked and surely he can’t get to—and oh my God how is he still climbing higher and how is he catching that and yeah he just dunked that didn’t he yikes. Behind me, that college student seems to be realizing that the truth is surpassing the legend. “I haven’t seen real basketball like this in a long time,” he says.

 

But this isn’t real basketball. It can’t be. This is like one of those over-the-top sports movies in which every play is a thunderous alley-oop or swaggering pull-up three. In the second quarter, senior forward Dajuan Piper gets out on a fast break with no defender in front of him and unleashes a ridiculous two-handed rock-the-cradle number. As he lands and turns to run back up the court, he stays hunched over low with his arms outstretched, staring into our section with a confrontational expression that says something like, “Oh word? You didn’t think I could do that?”

He'll debut tonight against the Lakers in L.A.