How Lucky Is Danny Ainge?

When Bloggers Collide. 

No wait—people enjoy seeing that, but it’s too dramatic.

When Bloggers' POV Differ.

That’s not sexy. But it’s more accurate.

The debate started with a simple comment I made (with a subliminal wink) on a Red's Army blog. It’s now passed to a second Red's Army column, and has spilled over to Celticsblog for more discussion and debate.

All I said was, “Is Danny lucky? Or is it destiny?”

I'll preface this by telling you I read a number of blogs around the NBA. I especially like checking out what my fellow Celtic bloggers and their posters have to say—it's a good group. 

As part of my reading, I put a quick comment on John Karalis’ Red’s Army’s blog regarding Danny’s recent moves...and "accidentally" inspired a more thorough examination in John's next piece.

John, I like seeing your take on all things Celtic—and we both agree that Danny’s recent Plan Bs seem to have been far more successful than his Plan As.

But is the baby-faced favorite son with the spoiled-brat image just plain lucky...or is the Celtics' good karma pushing them towards an unstoppable "Ainge-proof" destiny? 

Or option C: Does Danny not get the credit he deserves?

Make no mistake—there are a number of people out there who aren't Danny Ainge fans, and who will decry the Danny Years if they end up unsuccessful.

"Success" is a loaded term for Celtics fans who witnessed the rise and fall of the franchise that built pro basketball—and saw championship series and seventh-game victories snatched from foes we are always a point or two better than.

Danny Ainge, though, has his own way of doing things.

Red Auerbach himself called Danny "lucky" when Danny was introduced as Boston's new President of Basketball Operations, lo those 4 years ago. Luck is part of Danny’s history.

After all, how else does a Toronto Blue Jays shortstop who can’t hit a big league curveball get to play PG for one of the greatest teams in the history of the NBA?

So the "lucky" idea isn't unique to anti-Danny circles—it's straight from the steel-trap mind of the cigar-smoking Celtic oracle himself.

And frankly, the Celtics could use a little luck. 

For 30-plus years, this team had legendary and unparalleled success under one of sports' most dynamic and charismatic geniuses.

That success was followed by a 20-year title drought induced by terminal managerial mediocrity and the unexpected deaths of a team leader (Reggie Lewis) and a potential franchise savior (Lenny Bias). 

If we're going to acknowledge luck at all, we've got to admit that terrible fortune had befallen the kingdom.

Enter: Danny Ainge

There's talk in the hardcore world of blogs and message boards about how lucky, skillful, or unskillful Ainge has been at the helm of the Celtics. The positions are quite varied.

Most of the buzz concerns "The Trade," as it can now be called, and its ensuing domino effect. NBA blogs in general and Celtics blogs in particular seem to be drawn to the issue. There are threads dedicated entirely to Ainge. For quite a while, there's even been a website called "Can Danny."

I won’t address here the minority POV that Wyc Grousbeck and Danny Ainge have totally screwed things up this summer. The 'Win Now vs. Develop Youth' debate is best left for another time.

As for the green-tinted assumption that Kevin Garnett will bring the Celtics back to their former glory...(cue Stevie Wonder)  we “Haven’t Done Nothing Yet.”

But hey, even a blind man can see we're instantly light years better than we were.

In any event, after studying Danny’s work, I’ve come to the conclusion that he's largely made his own luck. Preparation and vision are important aspects of success, and much success can look like...luck.

In the world of NBA GMs, we don’t know how many doors are metaphorically knocked on, nor how many incidental personal meetings occur between decision-makers for each of the 30 teams...but I’m sure it’s going on all the time.

A GM who fails to recognize opportunity when he sees it may forgo some great deals. We have no idea how many great deals for a particular team were left in the air. In an NBA front office, your "luck" is your vision.

By coincidence, I was looking around in a bookstore last night when a volume called Beyond Coincidence (Martin Plimmer/Brian King—authors) caught my eye.

I started to thumb through it.  I’m not kidding here.

What I found— luckily:

(Bear with me. It'll all pull together.)

A psychologist named Dr. Wiseman (again, not kidding) "doesn’t believe the concept of good luck or bad luck is a matter of chance."

Wiseman "spent the last 10 years finding out why some people lead happy successful lives while others face repeated failure and sadness.” He also wanted to see if unlucky people could improve their luck. He wrote about his results in a book titled The Luck Factor.

Much of Wiseman's findings can be summarized in an illustrative situation described in Beyond Coincidence.

But first... 

"Lucky" people:

1) Smile more. Make more eye contact. Demonstrate more open body language.

(See: Danny Ainge. And Glen Davis, by the way.)

2) Persevere with Chinese puzzles. Unlucky people discard them in seconds, convinced they could never finish.

(Danny with the Garnett trade. It was his Chinese puzzle.)

3) "Given a newspaper and told to count the number of photographs, spot the half-page message on page three declaring: LOOK NO FURTHER, THERE ARE 42 PHOTOGRAPHS IN THIS NEWSPAPER.” Unlucky people plow through to the end, missing the "opportunity" to curtail their work.  Lucky people were more observant and ended then - with the correct answer.

(Danny ’s first opportunity didn't come to fruition, so he moved on to another one—all the while persevering for a KG trade.)

And about that illustrative situation:

In a controlled experiment, Dr. Wiseman instructed two people, one who considered himself lucky, the other who didn’t, to go to a cafe and wait for "someone connected to the experiment to contact them."

Wiseman placed people at each of four tables, one of whom was a real businessman who'd be a "useful contact" for either of the subjects. In individual testing, both subjects sat down at the table with the businessman. The lucky person struck up a conversation, and even offered to buy the businessman a coffee. The man accepted and they chatted away.

When it was the unlucky person’s turn, he sat down at the table with the man, ordered coffee, and never said a word.

“Same opportunity—different lives.”

That’s what luck is partially about: creating opportunities and seizing them where you can.

Danny Ainge prepared himself to play two major sports at the highest level. When one didn’t work out, he went with Plan B.

That's what successful or lucky people do.

Luck isn't about waiting for things to happen—it's about preparing for many options and then pushing on doors until you find something good...and recognizing it when you do.

While Danny's stated plan was to "collect assets" early on, he was ready to deviate from it as the situation changed. That kind of fluidity and vision help create the "luck" that lucky people take advantage of.

Danny collected assets. He looked seriously at going young. He chose to go for experience and to "win now." That's where he sees the best opportunity for this franchise to get back on top.

Ainge's Plan Bs are really Plan Rs and Ws. If he got to Z, he'd start over again at A. 

He's constantly rethinking and trying new possibilities. That's what Danny does.

Was Danny lucky to play with the Celtics after a pretty bad decision to play pro baseball? 

Or did Danny mean to do that?

Like people who go to college and get two majors, or musicians who learn to play two instruments, or a mechanic who can work on domestic and imported cars, Danny overprepared himself.

And it turned out successful. Lucky? What do you think?

The Danny Ainge Celtics haven’t won a thing yet. I’ll still kid about him, and it’s obviously been a wild ride so far. But Danny is making things happen.

This all started with a slightly tongue-in-cheek comment on another board. It was a lucky thing I read Red’s Army. It was a lucky thing I found Beyond Coincidence. 

I mean...I meant to do that.

Is Danny lucky? Well, Red Auerbach said so. That's good enough for me.

That lucky Danny Ainge.