The Pros and Cons of Hiring Ainge's Right Hand Man

If the Germans had hired Patton, they may have won the war.

C'mon.... lets get a little more in depth than this. I give you guys an opportunity to essentially write out a detailed pro and con article with nuance and this is what I get back??

But that would be like leaving your wife for another woman and then cutting off part of your dick to give to the ex-wife.

Biggest pro: He knows how much Danny values each asset. Danny can’t really bluff him.

Biggest Con: he may approach the negotiation with a foot on both sides trying to make a fair trade instead of the most he can get.

It’s 6 on a Friday. I’ll provide more thoughts later.

Pro- he's probably been in discussions with Ainge on potential AD packages. So he knows what Ainge will pay and how he values AD
Pro- He knows the value and potential of all the Boston assets better than anyone.

Biggest con- he might be afraid to go for the it all.

Well you could look at it a few ways. If you go and hire away Ainge’s boy, is he happy for him getting a promotion with another team or is he bitter that we took him. If he is genuinely happy for the dude then I think we can benefit from a potential Boston trade. But we had better make sure this guy is all in with us and not a pseudo double agent for the Celts trying to screw us.
Then there’s the possibility Ainge isn’t thrilled with us taking the dude and he low balls us throughout negotiations. Does this dude fall for it or tell his old boss to screw off.
When you get a guy from an organization that you’re about to trade with it’s all a little fishy to me honestly. I go somewhere else, we can’t screw this up

I think the pros outweigh the cons. I wouldn't pick him just to negotiate the trade, but I wouldn't let Boston being the likely trade partner keep you from hiring Zarren.

Pros

- Neither side will play games or try to screw each other, a fair deal should be pretty easy to reach.
- Zarren will know the dirty little secrets like if they have the beginnings of a stress fracture in their foot Jrue Holiday style.
- Zarren will know how to value Boston's assets and do a better job of picking Smart over Brown or Brown over Smart. See CP3 trade where hind sight says maybe they should have gone with Bledsoe instead of Lemonhead.


Cons

- Zarren won't try to screw Ainge. The Pels arguably have the leverage in a situation with multiple bidders. Will Zarren ask Ainge for what's reasonable or squeeze him for everything he knows he'll give up?
- Zarren will be biased towards the Boston package. This probably only matters if someone else is offering a non Zion top 3 pick, but I assume Zarren would give the benefit of the doubt to the Boston assets he knows well.

I'm probably not the best person to answer that question. I don't follow college enough to know if the players available 2nd or 3rd are worth turning down a Tatum package for.

I also have no desire to squeeze every asset out of Boston. I would consider "Tatum/Smart/Sac Pick/Memphis Pick/Future Boston Pick" both good and fair and would take that deal if offered. I imagine squeezing Boston would probably get you Brown and another pick. That would be a fantastic haul but I probably would say yes without hesitation to the first package and never get to the squeezing. What I want out of an AD to Boston trade makes me comfortable with Zarren's likely biases.

I think it's fair to be concerned about zarren's tires to Boston, but at the same time I just don't believe a guy given the chance to run the show would even consider "botching" the trade by giving AD for less than fair value. How's that gonna look on his resume when Ainge hangs it up and the public perception is that he did a sweetheart deal with his old boss against the interests of the team he works for.

I'm not an boston's owner, but to me, I feel like that move, even it was to my benefit would show that he's a guy that doesn't put his team's best interest first.

Just seems like it'd be a massive risk for him career wise for him to pull such a move. Especially when he'd be under such a microscope early on and especially during any AD deal.

I think a guy like Zarren is too smart to try to pull that kind of move.

He wouldn’t sell the pels short due to some loyalty to the celts. He’d be sabotaging his career.