The Suns admit they orchestrated the plan for Josh Jackson to avoid the Celtics


If you thought Josh Jackson refusing to workout for the Boston Celtics, going as far as canceling a planned meeting in Sacramento with Danny Ainge and Brad Stevens after they had traveled across country to meet him, was somewhat strange here's a little context - it was an orchestrated attempt to get him past the C's and to Phoenix by Jackson, his representation, and Sun's GM Ryan McDonough.

Take a look at Jackson's introductory press conference with the Suns yesterday where McDonough admits that the two worked in concert to help him avoid the Celtics:



Now I've certainly heard of players trying to avoid particular teams in the draft before. Lonzo Ball's camp essentially told any team not named the Lakers to not bother drafting him, but a team actually admitting they were involved in a player avoiding another team is a new one by me. I'm sure it's happened before, but openly addressing and confirming it is pretty wild.

After McDonough basically admits to the hijinks on the part of the Suns he turns it over to Jackson who basically downplays the situation saying that a workout with the Celtics "just didn't work out", but he would have liked to have made it happen. Sort of strange that the young player does a better job of sidestepping the question than a seasoned NBA GM, but whatever.

For those that don't know McDonough, he served on Ainge's staff for 10 years in a host of roles including the title of Assistant GM before taking his current role in Phoenix as their General Manager. The move to keep Jackson away from Ainge and the Celtics, and then admit to it, certainly seems like a little one-upmanship from McDonough to his former boss.

I've said this before, but these young players preferring to join a worse situation in terms of team just so they can play more seems very short-sighted to me. Either way, Jackson got served up his first L in Phoenix last night throwing out the 1st pitch at the Diamondbacks game:




Photo Credit - Rob Schumacher/AZ Central Sports

Follow Mark on Twitter: @MarkAL401


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