Boston Sports Extra

Anthony Bennett – The Rise and Fall

Photo credit: thesportspost.com

16.1 PPG/8.1 RPG at 50% FGM are hardly the numbers that say “Let’s draft this guy with the #1 pick”. Still, that’s what happened in 2013 when the Cleveland Cavaliers selected Anthony Bennett to go first overall. Granted, the crop was slim with talent so anyone could’ve been a hit or miss, though in hindsight it couldn’t have gotten much worse. What a miss he was.

With the likes of Victor Oladipo, CJ McCollum, Rudy Gobert, Otto Porter, and even Giannis Antetokounmpo available, Cleveland rolled the dice and went with the 6’7” 240lb star out of UNLV. His defense was non-existent and he’d shown slight effort offensively to muster up the 16.1 he averaged while being visibly undersized and out of shape. There were red flags coming out of UNLV, so how did he go number #1? Move over Kwame Brown, there’s a new ‘biggest bust of all time’ in town.

Ceiling: Larry Johnson/Floor: Himself

Kwame Brown, Michael Oliwakandi, Kent Benson (who?). All of these players were drafted high but fell off the face of the planet very quickly. Bennett may be the worst of all.

Coined “the most talented player at UNLV in a generation,” Anthony Bennett started receiving serious interest coming off his one and only college season. That was disrespectful to the former UNLV star Larry Johnson, as Bennett didn’t put up superstars numbers. His frame and potential are what had scouts talking, but he was never in the discussion to be the #1 overall selection that year. Some GM’s even had him falling out of a lottery pick. Labeled a combo forward, reports focused on his length (7’2” wingspan) with game and athleticism of a “high-level wing scorer.”

Weird to hear this report in hindsight, right? It gets better. He was believed to have shooting range from distance with the ability to beat his man off the dribble, all while having the explosiveness to play above the rim. The premature projections were borderline outrageous:

“When he’s hitting from deep, he’s essentially impossible to defend. If you put Bennett in a 1-on-1 tournament against the rest of this class, he would win pretty handily.” – SB Nation, 2013

“Down the road, Bennett could give his team the best of both worlds as a small-ball 4. He has the size to match up with bigger 4’s on defense and the skill level to play on the perimeter on offense.” – SB Nation, 2013

Photo credit: nba.com

But the NBA is much more than a 1-on-1 tournament and guys are a lot bigger and faster at the next level. Even at the time, it was a strange pick, and as soon as he stepped on an NBA floor he was an immediate bust. Shoulder surgery certainly didn’t help his cause. His numbers took a serious dip and his career was short lived. Playing for four teams in four years, Bennett lasted 151 games and four NBA seasons. Where did it all go wrong?

The Lone Holdout

Chris Grant – former GM for the Cavaliers – was the only person that questioned Bennett as the first overall pick. There was a meeting before the draft with Cleveland’s front office regarding who should be selected and the 9-1 vote was in favor of Bennett. Who was the lone holdout? Grant. He wasn’t sold on Anthony’s work ethic, among other glaring factors, and noted that Bennett didn’t participate in the Draft combine nor played in the Summer League. There weren’t any clear sneak peaks at what he’d do in the NBA.

To no surprise, his conditioning limited him to 4.2 PPG/2.9 RPG in 12.8 MPG over 51 games. Some blame Mike Brown for not playing him consistently or during meaningful stretches. There may be some validity to this claim, but a strained left knee in March of that year led him to miss significant time. Though short, check out Bennett’s rookie shot chart over the course of the season:

Photo credit: SBNation.com

Aside from not being able to shoot, weight issues contributed to his conditioning, which ultimately led to his degradation. Sure, being the first overall pick comes with pressure that you’d have to overcome. Anthony Bennett did exactly the opposite. Grant also noticed that when things got tough for Bennett, he would often throw in the towel. Going so far as to question Bennett’s desire, David Griffin – current GM of the Cavaliers – was quoted as saying:

“The issue with Anthony was, and we had no way of knowing it at the time, the kid had no desire to overcome adversity whatsoever. As soon as it was hard, he was out”

Bennett sported below average numbers in his rookie campaign. A year later, the Cavs fired Grant and Griffin took over. In the 2014 draft, Bennett was traded in a package with Andrew Wiggins to the Minnesota Timberwolves for Kevin Love. The Philadelphia 76ers were used as a third team to help facilitate the trade, but essentially the trade was Wiggins and Bennett for Love.

But Wait, There’s More

The Minnesota Timberwolves exercised Bennett’s rookie contract third-year team option in 2015, giving him another year and opportunity with the team in hopes of a revival. But the injury bug came back to bite him again in February of 2015; Bennett was out for two more weeks due to an injured right ankle. After recovering, Bennett appeared in only four more games to finish the 2014–2015 season. In 57 games for the Timberwolves, he averaged career and anemic highs of 5.2 PPG/3.8 RPG in 15.7 MPG.

Photo Credit: Chris Young/The Canadian Press vis Associated Press

That same year, Bennett was waived by the Timberwolves via a contract buyout. From 2015-2017, Bennett hopped around the league and eventually ended his NBA career with the Brooklyn Nets. He was released and out of the NBA at the age of 23. In 2017, he signed with the Turkish League and averaged 1.2 PPG. He was released after one season. It was the conclusion of his professional career.

Rise From the Ashes?

No one said being an NBA player is easy, never mind being the first overall pick. Anthony Bennett has been most recently affiliated with the Maine Red Claws, an NBA development team of the Boston Celtics. He’s been traded a number of times to get to this point but hasn’t given up on his NBA dream. Having posted some decent numbers in Maine, it appears that he has the backing and support of his coach and teammates. He averaged 14.8 PPG/6.3 RPG in the 2017-2018 season. The confidence seems to be coming back:

“Just having someone there that believes in me and tells me to keep shooting is definitely great to have in your corner .. While I’ve been in Maine, I definitely have that from everybody. Down the line from the coaches to the players. It’s definitely an important piece to anybody’s game, just having that confidence.” – Anthony Bennett

Bennett scored double-digit points in 17 out of 20 games. In nine of those games, he posted more than 20 points. Seven of those games saw Bennett in the double-digit rebound column. All in all, that is not bad for someone who’s labeled as the worst first overall pick in history. Check out these stats from his time with the Red Claws this past season:

Fifth Times a Charm?

Like weathermen, you can be dead wrong as an NBA scout or GM and still have a job the next day. It’s true that you’ll never know how a player will turn out once the lights come on, but you have to have some sort of an idea how a player’s game will translate to the NBA. The Cleveland Cavaliers and their scouting team didn’t, but Danny Ainge might have an interesting situation waiting for him up north.

Bennett’s worked on his shot and has improved his range to go along with a solid field goal percentage. His rebounding numbers saw an increase as well. It’s nothing that’s out of the ordinary, but some respectable stat lines are occurring more often than not for Bennett in the G-League.

Will he bring life back into his NBA career? Should he have spent time in the G-League in the beginning to develop his game? Will the G-League be the road to get his name back on an NBA roster? Will the Celtics give a former first overall pick a shot to maybe win an NBA title? There’s a lot of questions surrounding Bennett. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

So far, Bennett has worked hard and has yet to throw in the towel. Bennett, now 25 years old, might have time to get his game to where it once was projected to be. Keep an eye out next season on the G-League; Bennett could be making a comeback.

Please be sure to follow me on Twitter @JaxBrown725

NEXT MAN UP MENTALITY

Next man up. It’s a phrase we hear all the time in sports. For Coach Stevens and the Celtics, it’s becoming a part of the nightly game plan. First, it was Gordon Hayward going down for the season. Before that, Marcus Morris wasn’t ready at the start of the season, and is still battling some knee soreness. After scrambling to install some new things in the offensive and defensive schemes for the new rotation, plentiful in first year players, the team got off to a scalding hot, completely unforeseen, 9-2 start.

Nov 3, 2017; Oklahoma City, OK, USA; The Boston Celtics celebrate after defeating the Oklahoma City Thunder at Chesapeake Energy Arena. Mandatory Credit: Mark D. Smith-USA TODAY Sports

“I don’t think anyone expected anything like this,” Al Horford said of the surprising start of the new-look Celtics.

Just when things started to settle down, and the Celtics could just play, Horford himself started showing signs of a concussion, from a blow he took in a previous game vs. the Hawks. He would have to sit out against the Lakers, putting the 9-game win streak in jeopardy. Making matters worse, Jayson Tatum left the game in the first half, with ankle soreness, and didn’t return. Did it matter? Nope, the C’s won comfortably anyway.

“Until we only have four left, I guess we’re just gonna keep playing,” Stevens said after the game.

IS THIS THE MAINE RED CLAWS?

The next game, against the Hornets, provided a bigger test. The Hornets should be a playoff team this year, and Al Horford was still out. Kyrie Irving suffered a blow to the head in the opening minutes of the game, and did not return. Now officially operating without a single member of the big 3 assembled in the offseason, Brad Stevens and the C’s now had a real situation on their hands.

What did they do? Exactly what Stevens said after the previous game against the Lakers– they kept playing.

Down 18 at one point, Stevens told his players at the beginning of the 4th quarter in the Hornets game, according to Terry Rozier, “We are going to win this game, and this place is going to go nuts.”

The coach proceeded to roll out a lineup littered with players that have legitimately received more playing time in the G-league, and overseas, in their careers than in the NBA.

And they won the game.

CALM AS EVER

Afterwards, the coach could be found sitting at the podium, waiting on the media.

A lot of writers are still finishing up their recaps because of the comeback. Stevens chilling at the podium waiting for the crowd.

— Jay King (@ByJayKing) November 11, 2017

Seemingly always two steps ahead of the competition, the people who spend their lives hustling, to get things out for the public as quickly as possible, can’t even keep up with him. Despite the brilliant comeback, with the ragtag bunch put together, the opening questions remained the same as they have been most of the season.

“Brad, can you tell us what you know about _______’s injury?”

Injuries have been one of the biggest storylines of the season for the Celtics thus far. Perhaps only second to the fact that this team has now won 12 straight games, the last two without Irving. It’s something I have had to double check every time I hear it. It’s simply surreal that this team, fighting through adversity from every possible angle, seems incapable of losing. What is happening? How are they doing this?

Chatting with some people around the NBA about how the Celtics are doing this, the responses have been unanimous: “Brad.”

— Adam Himmelsbach (@AdamHimmelsbach) November 11, 2017

BRAD STEVENS, THE MAGICIAN

Narrator: Boston down by as many as 18 pts, also Kyrie sent home at halftime for possible concussion.
Celtics: Whatever.
Pretty convinced at this point these guys have magic powers & can no longer lose basketball games.

— Rachel Nichols (@Rachel__Nichols) November 11, 2017

Maybe Rachel isn’t that far off. After all, the coach has proven his wizardry, time and time again, in pressure situations. When there is supposedly no way out of a bind, Brad Stevens doesn’t panic. He doesn’t back down. The coach looks further on down the bench, calm as ever, and he finds something that will work. He believes in his guys, all the way down to the last man. The coach fights for his players, and always puts the blame on himself. When asked about a mistake rookie Geurschon Yabusele made, intentionally fouling Dwight Howard under 2 minutes, the coach went to bat for his player.

“He’s new to the NBA…What that really boils down to is horrible coaching. Because he should know what he’s supposed to do when he goes in and he should know when he can’t do it. So that’s not his fault, it’s ours.”

TRUST GOES A LONG WAY

Stevens took the rookie out after the play, and was obviously frustrated with him. Yabusele has come along slowly, not getting much PT yet in his young career. He really shouldn’t be seeing the floor, but Brad Stevens went back to him in the 2nd half, and he played a role in the comeback. Brad’s players know he trusts them, and he is not going to let them fail alone. He is going to have their backs, even when he shouldn’t. Stevens is never going to publicly scold someone. He does it behind the scenes, and in a teaching manner, not a belittling way.

In almost every game, Stevens’ deep trust in his players is put on display in a unique way. In the same game vs. the Hornets, Marcus Morris made a critical mistake, shooting the ball up three, with 30 seconds left in the game. He was wide open, but the C’s had a full shot clock, and needed to hold the ball. Stevens kept Morris in, and he hit a huge shot the next possession to make it a 5 point lead, and all but seal it.

DOMINANCE ON THE HORIZON?

Brad Stevens is a master of X’s and O’s, but more importantly, he is a master of people. He knows exactly what buttons to push, to get the proper reaction he wants out of his players. This goes far beyond basketball, and his players are able to respect him as a man first. They see how he approaches life and basketball, and they admire it. He never gets too high or too low. He just stays the course, and keeps working, no matter how chaotic things get around him.

“The Celtics are going to be like the Patriots and dominate a conference for a decade,” Colin Cowherd said on his talk show recently.

It is becoming apparent, with each passing year, that Brad Stevens is going to be the coach of the Boston Celtics until he gets tired of it. All the way up to that day, they are going to keep playing, until they get down to 4 players. And unless that tragic scenario actually plays out, they are going to keep winning basketball games. It’s time to give this man his due credit, as the best coach in this league.