Does Brad Stevens deserve blame for LeBron James 76ers signing?

· Yahoo Sports

The Boston Celtics have not had a fun offseason. To start July, they traded star guard Jaylen Brown, who was once the longest-tenured Celtic, to the rival Philadelphia 76ers for veteran wing Paul George, two first-round picks, and two second-round picks. Celtics President of Basketball Operations Brad Stevens implied that the flexibility provided by that move would be more apparent in the future, but, at present, the blockbuster trade has left a sour taste in the mouths of many Celtics fans who are hungry for another title.

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Then, on Friday morning, ESPN insider Shams Charania broke the news everybody had been waiting for, reporting that four-time MVP LeBron James opted to take his talents to The City of Brotherly Love via a two-year, $8 million contract. James, a former member of the Miami Heat and the Los Angeles Lakers, has played for some of the Celtics' biggest rivals. He's even burned the C's in the playoffs before, albeit not in the last several years.

His return to the Eastern Conference could reignite that distaste for Boston, and maybe even vault the Sixers into championship contender status. If so, is Stevens partially responsible?

Did Brad Stevens deliver LeBron James to Philly?

Stevens knew the risk of sending Brown to a rival, in-division team like the 76ers. And he also knew that James was a free agent, as the 22-time All-Star announced his plans to leave the Lakers on Tuesday, June 30.

The very next day, Brown was sent packing to Philly. Stevens told reporters that he lost sleep over the deal, yet he still pulled the trigger when the time came.

"That is a hard thing to trade a guy that you, first of all, care so much about, secondly, have so much respect and admiration for, to a team that just beat you in the playoffs, and that you're going to literally play six times before the playoffs next year with our two preseason games," he said of trading Brown to the Sixers. "But I do think that, ultimately, when you do a deal, you have to be thinking about you first and the optionality it creates for you."

Perhaps Stevens and company were thinking too much about themselves and not enough about their opponents, because Brown's arrival in Philadelphia may have created an unwanted domino effect.

Two days after Brown's departure, James' agent, Rich Paul, presented a whiteboard listing the potential destinations of his most high-profile client. The Celtics were off to the side of it with "Brad & Tatum" scribbled on and then the new-look Sixers lineup was closer to the middle, with a line connecting right to one name: LeBron.

"Philadelphia, everything changed," Paul said. "How could you not have the attention (of LeBron) when you have (Tyrese) Maxey, (V.J.) Edgecombe, Brown, and (Joel) Embiid?"

The 76ers employed all of those players besides Brown last season, so was the addition of the former Celtics star the tipping point? James himself hasn't said that, however, Dave McMenamin of ESPN reported that Brown helped recruit the future Hall of Famer.

"A trio of Sixers players — Tyrese Maxey, Joel Embiid and the newly acquired Jaylen Brown, another surprising addition for Philadelphia this offseason — worked on James directly," McMenamin wrote.

James already had ties to the Heat and Cleveland Cavaliers, who he once raised banners with and was rumored to rejoin, but there wasn't a prior history with the Sixers. Brown changed the calculus for the 76ers and made them a force in the East, indirectly catching James' eye in the process (no pun intended).

"This is my last decision," James stated on Twitter (now known as X). "I still want to sacrifice. I still want to work. I still want to grind. I still want to compete, to win, and to have a chance at the feeling of winning another championship. I believe I can help make the Philadelphia 76ers a championship team and I am so excited to energize a new fan base and start this incredible journey one last time."

Is Brad Stevens "calling his shot" against the 76ers?

Boston's front office knew James was on the market when Brown was traded. So, to think Stevens, a guy who just won NBA Executive of the Year for the second time in his career, had no idea this could happen is far-fetched.

A possible explanation is that Stevens thought of this outcome, but simply didn't believe it warranted enough of a problem to scare the Celtics into changing their path forward. Although he has the utmost respect for Brown and James as players, to some degree, he's betting against them.

Stevens could be calling his shot and believing that even after the additions of Brown and James, the Sixers still aren't a major threat to the Celtics. That's a significant gamble, and it will be up to Celtics star Jayson Tatum and a few other former champions like Derrick White and Payton Pritchard to prove him right.

Financially, one could argue that the C's are now in a better spot than they were with Brown. Plus, one could say that James was already close with Maxey, a fellow client of Paul, and that he may have wanted to go to Philly regardless of Brown's presence.

Even if both of those points are true, Stevens still took on a lot of liability when he dealt Brown. Doing in-division trades is like playing with fire and James' final decision just poured some gasoline into the mix. If the Celtics get burned, Stevens should shoulder the blame.

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This article originally appeared on Celtics Wire: Does Brad Stevens deserve blame for LeBron James 76ers signing?

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