NBA Butterfly Effect: What if the Ubuntu Celtics stay healthy?

The history of the NBA is a tangled web of what-ifs and could-have-beens. This week at The Step Back, we’re going to pull on some of those threads to alternate futures, focusing in on key turning points in the history of players, teams and the league itself, wondering how things could have been different. Welcome to Butterfly Effect Week.

It’s rare to see newly formed teams compete for an NBA championship in their first season together. LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh — one of the most dominant Big Threes assembled in NBA history — even suffered an embarrassing loss in the NBA Finals in their first year together to the Mavericks. It’s what makes what the Celtics accomplished in Year 1 with Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen all the more impressive.

However, while the Celtics won a championship in their first year together, they failed to win another while their Big Three was together. It therefore begs a simple question: What would have happened to countless legacies if the Ubuntu Celtics weren’t plagued by injuries?

Their first year plagued by injuries (2009) is the simplest to figure out. That year the defending champion Celtics jumped out to a 44-11 record behind Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen. The Celtics looked like a team that would repeat as champions, especially with Garnett in the middle commanding every aspect of their stout defense. However, with the heart of the roster out for essentially the rest of the season — Garnett was limited to 57 regular season games due to a knee injury — the Celtics were unable to defend their title and they fell to the eventual Eastern Conference champion Magic.

Had Garnett been healthy, would the Celtics have beaten the Magic and got to the NBA Finals? It seems likely.

That season was supposed to be the Big Three’s peak. In some ways — like the 24-2 start and 44-11 record with Garnett — it was. With Garnett healthy, the Celtics had a perfect weapon to defend Lamar Odom and take some of the uniqueness out of the Lakers’ attack in the NBA Finals. Combined with a defense that held Kobe Bryant to 40 percent shooting in the 2008 Finals, it would likely have been too much for a Lakers team that ended up dominating the Magic. Plus, considering a Celtics team a year older with the diminished Garnett took the Lakers to seven games the next season, it is hard to see the Lakers winning this series.

But what about 2010? This is the tougher question.

Part of it is determining how a Garnett that never got hurt might have looked. Part is also the Kendrick Perkins injury. As you may remember, Perkins was lost after just seven minutes of Game 6 of the NBA Finals and unable to play in Game 7. That ultimately proved to be the difference. In the final two games of the series, the Lakers starting front court of Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum collected a total of 21 offensive rebounds. Seeing as Bryant shot 15-of-43 from the field over those two games, the extra possessions were needed. If Perkins was around to provide tough post defense on Bynum and eliminate a few extra Lakers possessions, it isn’t crazy to think Boston takes one of the two games.

That leaves us with the question we started this post with: What happens to the legacies of everyone involved if the Celtics never get hurt?

This seems easy from the Celtics side of things. Allen probably still leaves. Despite the success, it is hard to believe the feelings that led to Allen’s departure change. Rajon Rondo is still Rajon Rondo, and he surely would have demanded more respect and credit after being the starting point guard on a team with three straight titles. Sure, winning cures everything, but Allen is a prideful player and the change he got in Miami would still be hard to pass up.

One thing that would have never happened is the trade with the Nets. While the Celtics would still have been an older team in need of a rebuild, no team is going to trade a player as beloved as Pierce who won three NBA championships with their team. While there are two downsides to this (Boston is not in the position they are today with the Nets picks and we lose “I called game“) I would imagine Celtics fans are willing to make that trade off for two more titles.

No Nets trade also means no semi-rebuild, which keeps both Rondo and Doc Rivers in Boston. While Rondo may still get hurt, Rivers seems to be the one coach who has reached and gotten the most out of him, so Rondo’s reputation is probably way better than it currently is. That also goes for Rivers, who never gets put in charge of basketball operations in Boston, which saves parts of his reputation that have been damaged in Los Angeles.

But the most interesting part of the entire exercise is the legacies of the two best players involved in the three NBA Finals: Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett.

For Garnett, the two extra titles change a ton when it comes to his legacy. Instead of being a great player who was wasted for too long in Minnesota and won just one title, Garnett ends with the same amount of titles as Bryant. With that in mind, the question of who the best player of that generation was has been changed from Bryant and Tim Duncan to Garnett and Duncan. A healthy Garnett also probably ends up as the 2009 Defensive Player of the Year and contends for the MVP award. Add both of those plus the two titles to his resume, and Garnett’s place in history is even greater.

But no players legacy would change as much in this instance as Bryant’s. Suddenly the only argument that Bryant has over LeBron James — five is greater than three — is gone. With both players having three titles a piece, James’ greater efficiency, rebounding, playmaking and defense puts him leaps and bounds above Bryant historically.

The discussions surrounding Bryant would still be fascinating. If he had only three titles, all as the 1B to Shaquille O’Neal’s 1A, he would still be considered a great player. But the talk of him being one of the best three Lakers of all-time likely go away. Instead of discussions around Bryant as one of the best 10 players of all-time (which are crazy to begin with, but do you Kobe stans), Bryant would be dropped into discussions as a Top-50 player where he would still rightfully belong.

Next: Does Giannis have enough help for the Bucks to level-up?

As I am sure my Twitter mentions will remind me, things didn’t work out this way. Garnett and Perkins both got hurt. Bryant ended up with two rings that his legacy desperately needed, and writers everywhere ended up with Twitter mentions full of crazy people.

I guess some people get all the luck.