<![CDATA[There was a mini-stir, umm, stirred up when Isaiah Thomas wrapped up his post-Clippers-loss media availability by questioning Brad Stevens’ substitution patterns during a decisive million-to-nothing Clippers run (give or take a few points, I forget).
Anyway, words were said and then more words were said by radio, TV, and podcasting types (more on that in a minute). But Brad Stevens isn’t sweating it. He says Isaiah texted him after the game and it’s all good now.
“I didn’t really put much thought into it. I didn’t even really register it until it became more of a talking point in the media and it was brought to my attention,” Stevens said. “Soon thereafter I got a long text from Isaiah. … When you get interviewed right after a tough loss or even when you get interviewed right after an emotional win, sometimes the emotions speak. And so, I understand there’s frustration, I don’t lose a lot of sleep over it.”
[…] “He’s a competitive guy,” Stevens said of Thomas. “I think that’s one of the things that I really like about Isaiah, is every loss really hurts. We play a lot of games. Good teams — really good teams in this league lose 30 games. So you have to be able to move on from it, but at the same time, it has to hurt. It has to sting. So I love that part. I love the fact that the losing hurts. And with that comes an emotional response once or twice. And that’s OK. It’s not as big of a deal to me as maybe it is with regard to the way it’s being talked about and everything else. My focus is on, how can we play better?”
Follow the link to hear the whole interview in Brad’s own words.
This was never a big deal, and I guess Stevens is at a point where he almost expects a frustrated outburst from the most competitive and emotional guys in the locker room.
For Isaiah’s part in this:
Isaiah Thomas says no one should read into his postgame comments from Monday in LA. He was just frustrated after a loss.
— Boston Celtics (@celtics) March 8, 2017
Isaiah Thomas on his comments: "I've gotta do a better job. And I will. And I understand that."
— Jay King (@ByJayKing) March 8, 2017
So this is pretty much where we expected to be after all this. No one was ever insinuating there was a rift or anything growing. I love everyone’s passion and their desire to win… and trust me, I understand what it’s like to be frustrated. I’ve worked with Chuck on this site for 11 year now… I know.
But, I stand by what I said in our latest Locked On Celtics podcast. While this isn’t a big deal, it’d be nice for IT and/or Jae Crowder to save those words for a private situation. We don’t need the Shanks of the world sniffing around the locker room and turning nothing into page C-1 headlines.
Here’s last night’s show so you can listen for yourself.
[protected-iframe id=”d0a9820846f5671d9f29382c072666e7-114320562-1227608″ info=”//embeds.audioboom.com/posts/5684259-locked-on-celtics-march-8-isaiah-criticizes-stevens-big-deal-or-not/embed/v4?eid=AQAAACJUwFgjvFYA” width=”100%” height=”300″ frameborder=”0″ style=”background-color: transparent; display: block; max-width: 700px;” scrolling=”no”]Having trouble listening? Go directly to our show page on Audio Boom. From there you can download the audio (lower right side of the page) to save for later or grab the RSS feed to plug into your favorite podcast listening service. You can also download the Audio Boom app from your app store, subscribe on iTunes (and please rate us!), Stitcher, TuneIn, and Google Play.
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