Kenyon Martin says Celtics didn't want him, and now they'll pay

“It’s their fault; they lost. There was talks, there was negotiations, they chose not to do it. It was out of my control. I’m a Knick now, so they lost. I’m just here to prove I never lost it. I guess I’m a better person than I am a basketball player. But the chip I’ve always played with hasn’t gotten bigger. I’m here to prove what I can do; that’s against everybody, every night. It doesn’t start with the Celtics. It’s whoever puts on that uniform opposite us.”

And from an ESPN Boston column this morning by Jackie MacMullan:

"It was real close," Martin told me before last night's game. "Like, the deal was almost done. From what I understood, Doc wanted me and the players wanted me, but in the 11th hour …"
In the 11th hour what?
"They didn't pull the trigger," Martin said. "And I'm not talking a few days ago or even a few weeks ago. This was a couple of months ago.
"So now I'm here and I'm going to make them pay -- I'm going to make all the teams that passed on me pay."

At the moment this is looking like a very poor decision by Danny Ainge.   With Tyson Chandler out Martin is starting and playing quite well for the Knicks; meanwhile the C's are struggling with a lack of size in the absence of Kevin Garnett.  The 5 game streaks by each team in opposite directions, culminating in last night's New York victory at the Garden have made this a burning issue today.  We'll wait and see how it plays out for the rest of the season, but it sure seems like the C's dropped the ball.

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