Your Morning Dump… Where Kris Dunn wants to be a Celtic?

Every morning, we compile the links of the day and dump them here… highlighting the big story line. Because there’s nothing quite as satisfying as a good morning dump.

Former Providence guard Kris Dunn said reports that he does not want to be selected by the Celtics with the No. 3 pick in next week’s NBA Draft are inaccurate.

“I mean, it would be unbelievable to be selected by the Celtics,” Dunn said in a telephone interview Thursday morning. “My dream is just to get drafted, and that I have a chance to be a top-five player, it’s a blessing.”

Boston Globe

I’m sure that Kris Dunn would love to be drafted by the Celtics. He’s a local kid (New London, Connecticut). But, alas, it seems that Kris has people “looking out for him.”

If you didn’t trust the Vertical’s reporting about Dunn’s “””camp”””, an incident that occurred later on in this carefully orchestrated telephone conference call should’ve made you a believer.

Dunn has not completed workouts with individual teams, though. According to a league source, Dunn’s camp wanted him to compete against other projected top-10 guards like Buddy Hield and Jamal Murray during workouts, but the feeling was not mutual. Murray, for example, came to Boston last week and took part in an individual workout.

When Dunn was asked Thursday about the decision not to visit with individual teams, another person in the room with him stepped in and said he would not be discussing his workouts during the interview.

Nice. An unnamed flack running interference for Dunn during an interview.

Like I said last week, it is patently obvious why the agents of players with leverage would use that leverage to their advantage, but this is bordering on ridiculous.

Look, the reality is that Dunn’s team of agents are all salivating over that next contract. The rookie contract is nothing. They’re clearly willing to let Dunn slide in order to land in what they consider to be a better situation to showcase his abilities for that big juicy RFA deal. Or at least what they hope is a big fat RFA deal. But there’s a real question of whether this micromanaging of the draft process is going to make competently run teams take a pass on a guy who, for all his talents, plays the most overstocked position in the NBA these days. And then where are you? Playing for Denver, maybe, and racking up big numbers for a team that can’t find its metaphorical rear end with two hands and a flashlight?

Page 2: Where it’s a numbers game

Given the present situation, the Celtics have a problem with the upcoming draft. And it really has nothing to do with basketball.

With eight picks at their disposal, math is the Celts’ most obvious enemy when it comes to June 23.

The numbers simply don’t add up, which is why the first four words of this column are “given the present situation.” Danny Ainge will be trying extremely hard to consolidate his assets between now and then.

Boston Herald

In the following week you’re going to see just about every outlet go on about how they’ve got the Celtics’ draft situation covered.

Nobody’s going to do a comprehensive job. The number of picks the Celtics hold in this draft is unprecedented in the current 2 round format; the total percentage of all picks held by the Celtics is unprecedented in the 30 team era.

If I’ve done my math correctly, we’re looking at 8! possible draft pick combinations. That’s 8 factorial. Or 8 x 7 x 6 x 5 x 4 x 3 x 2 x 1. Or 40,320 possible draft combinations. This is a situation where you could write an article called “The Top 100 Celtics Draft Scenarios” and not even cover one percent of the potential draft pick combinations, much less the potential players available in those spots.

Page 3: Where it’s a numbers game, Part II

Ainge met with Jeff Schwartz in NYC this week, according to a source. Schwartz represents Kevin Love and Harrison Barnes.

— Andrew Perna (@Andrew_Perna) June 16, 2016

You may have seen Chuck’s piece on this news item yesterday.

For context, here are a list of current NBA players repped by Jeff Schwartz (and also Brandon Ingram):

Finally: We’re getting as much basketball as we possibly can this year.

We’re heading for a Game 7! pic.twitter.com/5J2JH3khYg

— SB Nation (@SBNation) June 17, 2016

I was talking to my dad Thursday afternoon, and he asked me who I thought would win last night. At first I told him I was going to go with “I don’t care.” (because I think the Warriors are overrated and I don’t like LeBron on general principles), and then I picked the Cavs, because the Cavs are, in my opinion, better than the Thunder and the Thunder pushed Golden State to the brink.

As it turns out, I was wrong. SB Nation won everything last night.

The rest of the links:

MassLive: Jimmy Butler discusses trade rumors, remembers who Boston Celtics acquired before him on draft night | 2016 NBA Draft news: Kris Dunn open to playing for Boston Celtics, discusses draft workout strategy

Boston.com: Kris Dunn says it would be ‘unbelievable’ to be drafted by Celtics | The Celtic fan’s guide to falling in love with Buddy Hield

NESN: How Did Dragan Bender Learn English? Thank Chandler Bing From ‘Friends’

CSNNE: Blakely: For right price, Dudley would be good fit with Celtics | Ryan: Would still move ‘heaven and earth’ for Kevin Love

ESPN Boston: Let’s make a deal: Could Celtics pry Jimmy Butler from Bulls?