Isaiah Thomas made his long-awaited 2017-18 NBA regular season debut on January 2nd against the Portland Trail Blazers. Thomas posted an impressive 17 points on 6-12 shooting in just 18 minutes, but most importantly, he looked like the same player he was in Boston last season. The injured hip was not an issue for him on Tuesday night.
In the interest of taking things slow, Thomas didn’t play in Wednesday nights marquee matchup against the Boston Celtics. The Celtics defeated the Cavaliers 102-88, but the drama surrounding Thomas’ postponed tribute video in Boston is still ongoing.
Thomas requested that the Celtics run their planned tribute video for him during the Cavaliers’ next and final visit to Boston. Thomas’ reasoning is sound, outside of the fact that having his representatives request a schedule change for a tribute video is exceptionally contrived. Thomas wanted the video played in a game that he was actually going to participate in, and on a night where his family and friends can be in attendance.
The problem with Thomas’ plan, if you want to call it a problem, is that the Cavaliers’ next visit to Boston on February 11th is also the night the Celtics are going to retire Paul Pierce’s jersey. Pierce has gone on record stating that he would rather not share his night with Thomas, and here we are.
NBC Sports Boston caught up with Thomas to ask him about Pierce’s most recent comments, and Thomas held his ground.
“That’s Pierce’s night. But the video tribute ain’t the whole night. I just wanted my family to be here to see it. That’s what it came down to. I wanted to be able to play. And I wanted my family to experience the love and appreciation this city and this organization was going to give me on that night. And when my representatives reached out to these guys, they were all for it. They agreed on it. I know people. I don’t know why they’re so mad about it. I’m not taking nothing from Paul Pierce. He did 15 years here, so there’s nothing that I can take from him. But if they choose to do it that night, that would be great, and I would be honored, and my family and friends can see how much they appreciated me here.”
There are really no winners here, and all of this is nonsense. Pierce’s Celtics career certainly deserves its own night, but like Thomas said, he’s not taking the whole night, he just wants one video. At the same time, Thomas got us here by determining when his video should be played, which is kind of unheard of. That isn’t how these organic moments are supposed to work, and while Thomas had a good reason for requesting a date change, it created this problem in the first place.
The Celtics should also take some criticism for letting this play out in the way that it has. They’ve got the schedule. They know when and where everything is supposed to happen, and by the sound of things, they overbooked Paul Pierce’s jersey retirement. Regardless of how the dust settles on all this, February 11th is sure going to be interesting.
