Evan Turner woke up Friday morning to a four-year, $70 million offer from Portland that changed his world.
“I’m coming from playing my ass off the last two years for three-and-a-half million each year, to get here,” the now former Celtic said after reaching agreement on the deal.
Turner, currently in Santa Barbara, California, working on his 3-pointer with a shooting coach, had gone to sleep knowing that his agent, Kevin Bradbury, was talking with several teams, most prominently the Knicks.
But Portland came in fast after falling short in its bid for small forward Chandler Parsons, who had just reached agreement with Memphis. As often as Turner said he wanted to return to the Celtics, discussions with his former team hadn’t even entered the money stage.
The message from Celtics president Danny Ainge was clear — the team first had to pursue the bigger targets of Al Horford and Kevin Durant before getting to that stage with Turner.
“Danny explained that they had to go with the big-name people first,” said Turner. “Portland is a decent fit for me — a no-brainer, really. We never really even had a chance to talk to the Celtics.”
But given the Celtics’ other plans, it’s unlikely they would have been willing to re-sign Turner for an average of $17.5 million per year.
“I don’t think so, really,” Turner said. “But I don’t blame Danny for the way this went.”
The Celtics hadn’t abandoned Turner. Celtics coach Brad Stevens called Turner yesterday with the intention of keeping the swingman in the loop.
Stevens had already told Turner on several occasions that he was in his corner — that he loved the way Turner’s ballhandling and versatility enhanced the Celtics offense. Stevens often talked about how much he admired Turner’s sheer love for the game.
Turner thus went into the offseason knowing he had the support of the Celtics coach. But there was something in their conversation yesterday that left both men understanding that nothing was certain.
“Brad told me that he wanted me to be part of (the Celtics’) future,” said Turner. “He told me that he liked coaching me, and that he would like to coach me again.”
But Turner admittedly had questions about how he would fit next season, and pointed to two factors — one the development of Marcus Smart (himself an increasingly versatile player in the Celtics’ small-ball lineups) and also the team’s decision to draft small forward Jaylen Brown.
“I don’t know how this was going to work, going forward, with the young guys,” said Turner. “It might not have been as good a fit.”
Compare that to what Turner was hearing from Portland general manager Neil Oshey. The message coming out of negotiations was that Turner would start — never a guarantee with his role in Boston.
“They said that I would be playing next to C.J. (McCollum) and Damian Lillard, which is pretty cool,” he said. “It’s gonna be fun.”
At the same time, Turner said he’s going to miss his team and city of the last two years.
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