Winners and losers from the Kyrie Irving trade to the Celtics
2. Winner: Jae Crowder’s shooting
One huge beneficiary that will probably go under the radar is Jae Crowder. He’ll benefit from having to play with LeBron James.
Everyone that joins a James-led squad is better off for the experience. The attention that defenses give him means that it creates wide-open looks for Crowder.
Defenses will also have to stay honest with a lot of shooting around James. There’ll be Kyle Korver, J.R. Smith, Channing Frye, Kevin Love and Isaiah Thomas.
That’ll allow for Crowder to just spot up and hit wide-open looks where the next closest defender is somewhere near Akron.
In Boston, the shooting talent wasn’t nearly the same, and thus Crowder didn’t produce at the highest level.
Everyone benefits from being around LeBron, but I feel like Crowder might have a huge improvement.