Weren't we told that losing the Lottery wasn't a big deal? Since this was the most loaded draft in years, the story went, the Celtics would happily grab a good player with the #5 pick that would complement Paul Pierce and the burgeoning youth movement, and join in on the team that would compete soon and for years to come.

Yeah; not so much.

Like a rube on a carnival midway, Danny Ainge fell for the first glitzy pitch he saw, trading the pick (Georgetown's Jeff Green) to Seattle for Ray Allen. Nothing against Ray Allen - he's one of the league's premiere shooters (hold your Sebastian Telfair jokes) and has his own IMDB page, but he plays the 2/3, and is sort of an older, creakier version of Paul Pierce. So now we have two guys who play the same position, are used to being the alpha dog on crummy teams, and like to shoot a lot.

What's more, the Celtics also included in the trade Wally Szczerbiak (we won't miss his mad-bomber attitude or spelling his name 82 times a year, we must confess) and Delonte West, who we had figured would be a part of this alleged youth movement. Now he gets to be part of a youth movement in Seattle, with Kevin Durant and a brain trust that may not shake things up every six months with no visible purpose. Good deal for him.

So what now? Scuttlebutt is that, since the Celtics didn't have to part with Theo Ratliff and his trade-friendly contract, they can take another run at Kevin Garnett. That would be the Kevin Garnett who doesn't want to come here. And that would be the Kevin Garnett who would require Al Jefferson to get, taking away the cornerstone of the team's alleged youth movement. So, in the unlikely event that this deal gets swung, we'd have a team that would contend for the East for a few years, probably not be able to beat any of the Western superpowers, and have to start all over again in about three years.

Personally, we'd have stuck with the youth movement.

The Celtics did finagle another early second-round pick from Seattle as part of the deal, so they grabbed USC point guard Gabe Pruitt and hefty LSU forward Glen "Big Baby" Davis with the #32 and #35 picks. How used to them we should get, we have no idea, since some other con man may come along with some other shiny object that will catch Danny's eye.

Locally, Boston College did well for itself, sending two guys to the NBA in the first round. Sean Williams (still considered a BC guy) went to Jersey at #17, and Jared Dudley went to Charlotte at #22. UMass' Stephane Lasme went to Golden State in the middle of the second round.

Oh, yeah...Red Sox/Rangers tonight, Frank Thomas hits his 500th home run, Craig Biggio gets his 3,000th hit, hockey somethin' somethin'...we're too crabby to look at the big picture this morning.