The Boston Celtics announced two huge moves on Wednesday morning. The first was Danny Ainge retiring from his role as the team’s president of basketball operations. The second was that Brad Stevens would be ending his run as head coach and stepping in to replace Ainge.
Naturally, for a myriad of reasons, both announcements were met with their fair share of hubbub.
Once everything simmered down, however, an obvious question emerged: Is Ainge done with basketball for good?
As it turns out, the answer appears to be no.
According to Chris Mannix of Sports Illustrated, the Utah Jazz could be next in line for Ainge’s services.
As Danny Ainge moves on from Boston, a possible landing spot, in some capacity: The Utah Jazz. As rumors of Ainge’s exit rippled through the NBA in recent months, a role with the Jazz has been seen as a potential next step.
— Chris Mannix (@SIChrisMannix) June 2, 2021
“As Danny Ainge moves on from Boston, a possible landing spot, in some capacity: The Utah Jazz,” he wrote.
“As rumors of Ainge’s exit rippled through the NBA in recent months, a role with the Jazz has been seen as a potential next step.”
In his playing days, Ainge was named national basketball college player of the year and won the John R. Wooden Award for the most outstanding male college basketball player at BYU – so clearly he is very comfortable in Utah. His son, Tanner, also happens to serve on Governor Spencer Cox’s Economic Development Board.
Would Ainge do well with the Jazz? That’s up for debate. He had a disastrous 2021 which degraded his stock quite a bit.
Ayesha knows how to stay in the news https://t.co/shn4dxsmTZ
— Game 7 (@game7__) May 27, 2021
Between Ainge’s decision to not pursue a James Harden trade for truly bizarre reasons and his weird rants, this hasn’t been a banner year for the 62-year-old.
That being said, he is still the architect of the Celtics’ lone title in the last 30 years – and that can’t be ignored.
Over the next few weeks and months, expect a clearer picture of Ainge’s next move to come into focus.
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A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
