BOSTON — His media chores complete after Thursday’s practice, Celtics coach Brad Stevens plopped himself on a treadmill high above the courts at the Auerbach Center and started a light walk. You had to be looking from the right angle to realize that the reason he wasn’t getting his daily run in was the large laptop in his clutch.
Chances are Stevens was watching game film and not, say, the “Succession” season 2 finale. This profession requires coaches to be otherworldly multitaskers.
A few minutes earlier, Stevens was informed how he received zero votes in the NBA’s annual survey of the league’s 30 general managers when the roster-builders were asked to identify the “best head coach” in the league.
Only seven coaches got at least one vote. Gregg Popovich. Erik Spoelstra. Mike Budenholzer. Steve Kerr. Steve Clifford. Doc Rivers. Quin Snyder. But one year after landing the top spot on that list while accruing 47 percent of the 2018 vote (meaning he got 14 of the 29 votes not belonging to Danny Ainge), Stevens smiled at getting shut out.
“Great,” said Stevens. “Could not care less.”
Let the survey be proof that this is a very what-have-you-done-for-me-lately league. Stevens earned top billing a year ago after guiding the Celtics to the fringe of the 2018 NBA Finals while playing without injured stars Kyrie Irving and Gordon Hayward. It was Boston’s second consecutive trip to the conference finals.
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Then last year happened. The Celtics fell woefully short of the Finals-or-bust expectations heaped upon them and Stevens essentially got booted from the top of the coaching power rankings like a shopping mall Santa dismissing Ralphie in "A Christmas Story."
Stevens understands how these things work.
"I know we're all better after every experience we go through,” said Stevens. "I know that we're just as likely to be overrated as anything else. So I don't really put a whole lot of attention into what anybody else thinks.”
Don’t expect Stevens to tape the GM survey to his office wall and use it as fuel for the 2019-20 season. He does not need further motivation.
"I'm trying to do this job as well as I can,” said Stevens. "I’m as disappointed in how last year went as anybody. Ultimately, I'm trying to be a lot better. I know our team is trying to be better.
“How we're ranked and what people say, I've said this many times before, the unduly praise that people give when things are going well is just as uncomfortable as the criticism that really sometimes is relevant, sometimes it's not. I think you just gotta sift through the noise and try to do your job as well as you can.”
Stevens has been his own harshest critic. He spent the start of the summer scrutinizing everything that went wrong for his team and identifying ways not to repeat the missteps.
Stevens brought in new voices for his coaching staff and altered the way his players do pre- and post-practice work with a focus on working more as a team. There are a lot of question marks around this Celtics team, not the least of which is how Stevens maintains a top defense given the departures in Boston’s frontcourt.
Stevens seems invigorated by the challenges ahead. And he can take solace knowing that he has at least one GM in his corner: His own.
"Brad just keeps getting better,” said Ainge. "These experiences, he’s a young coach, works harder than anybody, very bright. I have all the confidence in the world that last year was a learning experience for him, just like all of our young players.
"Like I said many many times before and I’ll continue to say, he’s the least of our worries.”
Just like a GM survey is the least of Stevens’ worries.
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