Twenty years ago, Dana Barros remembers sitting down late at night after another brutal Celtics loss in an era full of brutal Celtics losses. Though memory has faded through the years, Barros believes he flipped on the television to rewatch Boston’s last-second loss to Toronto.
Despite nearly perfect defense from Adrian Griffin, Vince Carter drilled a 3-pointer as time expired to beat Barros’ Celtics, 96-94.
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Barros was on the injured list at the time dealing with back spasms, but intended to inspect the film to learn what he could from his team’s 34th defeat that season. The guard ended up seeing, for the first time, the rant that has stuck with Rick Pitino ever since.
“Larry Bird is not walking through that door, fans.”
Pitino was in his third season coaching the Celtics. He was nearing the end of a tenure that began with high hopes of reviving Boston basketball but ended with a long list of failures.
“Kevin McHale is not walking through that door and Robert Parish is not walking through that door. And if you expect them to walk through that door they’re going to be gray and old.”
By March 1, 2000, the night of Carter’s game-winner, players believe Pitino had grown weary of all the losing and sick of the constant scrutiny. He lashed out in that epic rant, which, as we mark its 20th anniversary, has lingered as a caricature of and as an epitaph for Pitino’s dismal era in Boston. It owns a place in the pantheon of Boston sports as one of the most symbolic rants in the town’s long history.
“All this negativity that’s in this town sucks. It stinks. It makes the greatest city in the world lousy.”
Antoine Walker, the star on that Celtics team, took Pitino’s comments seriously. Barros had a different reaction.
“It was kind of funny, actually,” he said. “It was pretty funny. But that was just the culmination of a lot of frustration.”
The beacon of hope
The Celtics hired Pitino in May 1997, shortly after the worst season in franchise history. He had deep local ties, having played at the University of Massachusetts, then coaching at Boston University and Providence College before landing his first NBA head coaching job. Pitino spent two seasons coaching the Knicks, beginning in 1987, and went 90-74 there. He then spent the next seven years at the University of Kentucky, where he won the 1996 national title and lost in overtime in the 1997 national championship game. The Celtics went an NBA-worst 15-67 in 1996-97, and the 1997 draft loomed with the potential to change everything. Boston held two lottery picks and the best odds of landing the No. 1 overall selection. With a little luck, the Celtics would be in position to acquire that year’s obvious top prospect, Tim Duncan. They owned a 36.3-percent chance of winning the draft lottery.
Jackie MacMullan, Boston Globe writer: I remember the day they announced (the Pitino hire). It was at the Garden. And it really was like a coronation.
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Antoine Walker, Celtics player 1996-2003: For me, because I was one of the guys left off the team that won 15 games, I was super excited. I thought coach (Pitino) was coming in, he was going to get it right, make us better. So the excitement was there. I was ecstatic to play for my college coach again, who I had so much success for and won a championship with. I do remember that excitement. But even more exciting was the chance that we were probably going to get Tim Duncan.
Peter May, Boston Globe writer: (Pitino) came in and I think people thought he had done pretty well with the Knicks with limited talent. And I think even when he went to Kentucky there was always this assumption that he just kind of would one day coach the Celtics. It just kind of was there that nobody would be surprised if Rick Pitino came back to coach the Celtics. And remember, they sucked back then. (The previous coach) M.L. (Carr) did a great job of A) making them suck and B) getting assets for the new coach to use when he came in. And he didn’t know it was going to be Pitino when he was doing it. So Pitino came in with great fanfare, two lottery picks and plenty of cap room.
The balls of the NBA draft lottery did not bounce the Celtics’ way. They ended up with picks No. 3 and 6 — which they used to select Chauncey Billups and Ron Mercer — and the excitement about the return to glory that Duncan and Pitino could offer the organization was suddenly dimmed.
Michael Holley, Boston Globe writer: I don’t know why he thought in a lottery system that it was just a given that they would get Tim Duncan, but I think that was part of it: “Hey, I’ll take this job. They’ve got two lottery picks. I’ll get Tim Duncan, I’ve already got Antoine there, I’ll get another high draft pick. Maybe I’ll trade that one, bring in a veteran player, we’ll be in good shape.” When they wound up with picks 3 and 6 I think that just blew his mind. And he didn’t know the cap. So it was really a bad start for him.
MacMullan: I think the mistake was he thought they were getting Tim Duncan. And now we know with the numbers – he wasn’t the only one by the way. A lot of people thought the Celtics would end up with Tim Duncan because no matter what they claim now, they were tanking. And they gave M.L., I think, something like $1 million to tank. So right off the bat they didn’t get him. They still got this guy Chauncey Billups, who was pretty good, but they gave up on him. So I think right from the start already, by the time he even coached his first game, he was already disappointed. So that was part of the problem.
When Pitino joined the Celtics and owner Paul Gaston, he was not only the head coach. He also had full control over the roster and assumed the title of team president, which longtime Celtics boss Red Auerbach historically held. Auerbach became vice chairman when Pitino arrived, though he would return to the role of team president after Pitino left.
MacMullan: He convinced the Boston Celtics to demote Red Auerbach. It was the great unwritten part of this whole thing. Red Auerbach was demoted, he lost his title of president. They gave it to Rick Pitino. It was just unconscionable. It really was. It was the thing I objected to most of all.
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Dana Barros, Celtics player 1995-2000: >Preseason, when (Pitino) came, me, Dee (Brown), Rick (Fox), we would talk to each other, we would work out in the summer because we were looking forward to getting to the gym and being a part of it. The excitement was really out of the building with that. We had guys coming in in July working out, coming back in July, working out all summer anticipating it. Everybody was excited, looking forward to it. Except maybe Antoine. He had just left (Pitino).
Walker: (Laughs) I was like, “Oh, man, I just got away from him.” But nah, nah, that wasn’t the case. Honestly, I was excited because I had nothing but success (under him). So for me it was an exciting period for me because I knew we had success together, I knew he would make me the best possible player I could be. And that’s what he did. I made the All-Star team my first year under him. He got me together right away, put me in a situation where I could flourish on the offensive end. So it was great for me.
Barros: Honestly, I had what – 11 coaches in 14 years. So I’ve had a lot of coaches. George Karl was the best coach I’ve ever had, but Rick Pitino and Rick Carlisle, they were really great coaches. Rick Pitino was an innovative genius like George Karl. We would play a 1-3-1 one game and the next half we would play a 1-2-2 full-court. So I enjoyed that aspect of it. I felt he was innovative and almost to the point where we caught people off guard so much in that aspect of it. But I just think from a communication (standpoint) is where it all went to the left. Like, crazy to the left.
Holley: I saw him flip out in an exhibition game. That’s when they had signed Chris Mills to some long contract, a veteran player who was a terrible fit for Pitino’s system. But they signed him, they lost a preseason game, they weren’t playing defense, they lost by 20. He’s throwing stuff in the locker room, he’s cussing. It’s the preseason, Rick. And you’re in the NBA. So he already had lost the veterans in the locker room before the season started. So after that episode, after that tantrum, Mills tried to be the good, young veteran and display some diplomacy. And he’d go to Pitino and say, “You know, coach, maybe we need to dial it back a little bit. Maybe the back-to-backs and then coming back and doing these things in practice and that we do in the games, you’re just going to wear us out.” And Pitino went off on him and traded him.
Mills, who signed a seven-year, $33.6 million contract with Boston on Aug. 22, 1997, was traded to the Knicks two months later. Pitino moved several other veterans, including Rick Fox, Eric Williams and Dee Brown, before the end of his first season. He also dealt Billups just 51 games into his rookie year in a trade for Kenny Anderson.
Walker: That’s the impatience that he had. And also he wore two hats. I think the pressure of coaching the team and then being the GM and making all the moves – I think that’s why you saw the influx in the roster and how the roster jumped up and down the way it did. It’s tough to wear both hats in the league. Chris (Mills) had a problem with the practices, but also Chris had a problem with the style of play. Chris didn’t want to press. That’s why they bumped heads. I think he went out professionally. He tried to sit down and talk to (Pitino), but to no avail. That didn’t work because it got him shipped out the door. But he also left with a big contract though.
Barros: All the guys that we had from pre-camp that he had issues with – or he thought he was going to have issues with – were gone by the time the big camp came. Except for myself and Pervis Ellison. We were hurt. I think he wanted a younger squad. I think he wanted guys he could mold, like a college. Probably the young guys would be able to handle those pressing, back-to-back nights better.
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Tony Battie, Celtics player 1998-2003: It’s funny because the young guys, we just went out there and we were working our asses off. The older guys were like, “Yo, this is not how it goes, man.” We were young and we didn’t know any better. And the vets had a point.
Battie: (Practices) were pretty long. Now (in training camp) they have what, one contact practice, and the other one would be a walkthrough. Well back then we’re talking three or four hours straight, twice a day. No recovery time, run you into the ground, practicing on the press.
Walker: We couldn’t really make no mistakes around him. He wanted everything to be perfect. He demanded a lot. Which is fine with the demand part, but in an 82-game season, you’ve gotta be willing to take the good with the bad sometimes. And he was not willing to take three-, four- or five-game losing streaks. And it led to a lot of calling out and blaming. And then obviously that can affect certain types of relationships.
Pitino directing players during a game in 2000. (David Maxwell/ AFP via Getty Images)Barros: I just think it was the way the communication was processed and it was delivered. We had a lot of veteran guys who just weren’t accustomed to that verbal abuse. And it was difficult. As great of a basketball mind as he had, I just think that was the one downfall that just precipitated every single thing that happened there. He was obviously loud. But it was profanity. It was sometimes personal with certain guys. Not all guys. It was never personal with me. But I think it all kind of came to a head where we had a meeting in the middle of a season and I just kind of blew up and just stood up and went berserk on everyone in the whole room.
Walker: I wouldn’t say he was abusive. I think his basketball knowledge, he was out to get you to play hard every night, he was second to none. It was one of those things that was hard to explain because he was a guy that’s a screamer and yeller, but he also gets the maximum effort and gets the maximum ability out of you to make you the best player that you possibly can be. So that’s the hard part about it and that’s what makes him so special. He was before his time. I think that style of coaching worked at the collegiate level. It wasn’t going to work at the NBA level. Because those guys got paid so much money.
Battie: If you worked hard you didn’t have a problem with Coach P. If you were somewhat lazy then he would definitely ride you just to try to get the best out of you. But I didn’t have a problem with coach. Actually I loved playing for coach. He was demanding. I would say he was hard but fair.
Barros: It was actually funny because we had Ron Mercer, Walter McCarty and Antoine, and they had all just left Kentucky looking for a different space and they walked right back into the same space. So we clowned them all the time. They would get on the bus and be like, “Man, I can’t believe I left college and I’m right back here with the same shit.” So it was actually a pretty good theme that we kept going for a while when those guys were there.
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Walker: Without question. Because we had just left him. You’ve gotta understand: Coach Pitino was hard to play for. He was a very difficult coach. He pushed you to the max. But we respected him so much that it made it really easy for guys to play for him. But hey, when we got away from him, I mean we enjoyed that time. Because we had to work so hard. So Dana Barros is telling the truth. It wasn’t a running joke. It was a real situation.
Kenny Anderson, Celtics player 1997-2002: I thought he brought in a little bit of the college game on the pro level. With young guys you might be able to do that, but as the league got a little bit older, I don’t think you could do it. You know, pressing mainly. I just think with 82 games you’ve gotta do it sporadically. You can’t do it night in and night out. And that’s how he wanted to play – excuse my language, but balls to the wall. (I probably played like that in) college, but college was a little different. There’s 82 games in a season, so you’ve gotta maintain. You’ve gotta take care of the guys, watch your bodies, work out. But you also have to just maintain as a coach. And I don’t think he got it. He was just all out. Now let me tell you this, he was a great coach, understood the game very well.
Pitino’s system — upbeat, lots of 3-pointers, fast-paced — was a forerunner of the style played in today’s NBA
May: Doug Collins told me that (pressing would not work in the NBA). He wasn’t the only one, but I do remember talking to him one night before a game. I think he was coaching the Pistons then. And he was saying, “Peter, this is not going to last. You know that, right?” And I said I think so. And he said, “No, it’s not going to last. NBA players will not do that over the course of a full schedule.” And everybody knew that but Rick.
The Pitino era actually began successfully when the Celtics beat Michael Jordan and the Bulls 92-85 in Boston in Pitino’s first game. But after the opening-night win, the Celtics would lose their next five.
Barros: It was pretty exciting. The crowd was crazy. And I think it probably led to some expectations that probably weren’t achievable. But at that time it was great. I remember just pressing the full game. And at times it really affected them. I thought that they were tired. So I thought at that point it would be great. But (shortly thereafter) we played Milwaukee and we tried to press. And it was a disaster because we were exhausted. I enjoyed (pressing) actually. Once my ankle healed I was in great shape, so it wasn’t really a tired thing. It was more, over the course of a season, man, on a 10-day trip you began putting your hand up to come out because it was just difficult. It was tough night in and night out.
Walker: It was tough. If you go through an 82-game season and you’re not winning games, it makes it really difficult to be around every day. The players were cool. But we didn’t know what Pitino we were going to get on a daily basis. We didn’t know if he was going to be happy, sad, indifferent. Some days it would be long, grueling practice at Brandeis University. If we would win a couple of games things would be a lot better. It just depended.
Battie: He was harsh, but at the same time he would be comical. Like, if Kenny Anderson made a mistake and he corrected Kenny, and then Erick Strickland or Milt Palacio came along three minutes later and did the same thing, he just had a funny way. “What am I doing, talking to myself? Am I talking to myself? I just told Kenny Anderson the same thing and then you come in and do it. Like, what the hell is going on here?” So it was funny but it was his way of correcting and teaching the game. He had his own little overbearing way of getting his point across to get the best out of his players.
Holley: The mood swings were just too dramatic for anybody to deal with on a consistent basis. But his knowledge of the game, it’s exquisite. It’s amazing. We were able to sit right next to (him). I used to have my head in a huddle. I was right next to him so I could hear him and see him designing plays. I remember one time, he’s frustrated so they came to the bench. He paused for three or four seconds, he would cuss them out for eight or nine seconds. And then he would say, “All right, give me the white board.” And just real quick, he’d be like, “OK, do this, run this play for a layup. Go.” And it would happen.
Battie: If you came in, you worked hard, you were always on time, you didn’t have a problem with coach. Man, what has it been, 20 years? I feel like an old fart now, man. It’s been a while. I’ll give you a rant. Coach could be tough on certain things. This was Frank Vogel – Lakers coach Frank Vogel – he was the video coordinator starting off. So he came from Kentucky with coach Pitino. Here he is, we’re talking 20 years ago, I’m not even sure we were up to DVDs yet. We’re talking VCRs.
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So Frank’s working about 10 VCRs stacked on top of each other. He’s got the computer going over here, he’s breaking down films, he’s cooking up things, working his ass off. Frank would be one of those guys if we got off the plane at 2 a.m. and practice was at 10, he’d just go straight to the facility and start breaking down more tape. Especially dependent on how that game worked out that we just played. Of course, if we lost, it was a long, drawn-out, godfather film session where Coach P would just bring out all the quirks and the jokes. Like, “Film doesn’t lie. What the hell are you doing here?” He was rewinding it, going back and forth, back and forth.
But one particular time, Frank Vogel’s computer crashed. So it was going to be one of these ass-chewing team film sessions, but the computer crashed. So he can’t queue up the clips that coach wants to chew us out about. So he goes off on Frank, like, “Frank, what the hell’s going on here? You’ve been breaking down film all night and now the shit’s not working?” And Frank’s over there sweating bullets, like, he’s red in the face, he doesn’t know what to do. And he’s working his butt off, trying to get everything back going. And coach is just killing him with mild jabs and things of that nature. From that point on, you would always see Frank get there before the film session to make sure that the computer was up running and he was not going to be the butt of the jokes that day.
Walker: I think coming in from a situation where he won, I don’t know, 80 percent of his games, he could not take the losing. And it affected him in a way that he couldn’t take it off his mind. The league is an 82-game season. It was more of a marathon. I had to play with, what, 30 or 40 different players with all the trades and releases. He just was so impatient it just was a recipe not to have success. Because we were very young, we needed to rebuild, we needed to take some time. Hell, he traded Chauncey Billups after (half a season). I thought myself, with Chauncey and Ron, we were building something. And I think coach just got impatient. I think he traded for Kenny because Kenny was his favorite player. And coach got impatient with Chauncey and he saw an opportunity to get one of his favorite players in Kenny Anderson.
Anderson: I loved talking to him. Because I’m from New York, so I always wanted to play for him. And I got the chance to play for him with the Celtics, and he was great. Just talking to him about the game, talking to him about life, just everything. He was just great, bringing me to Boston. I played in Portland and he brought me to Boston, closer to New York. It was great for me. I loved it. He was a basketball genius and he knows it. He might have (had an ego). Coming from where we come from, we both come from New York, you’re going to have an ego. And maybe it got to him, not winning in Boston. And Boston’s a great town if you win. And maybe it got to him. Not maybe. It got to him. You could tell it got to him.
Battie: At that time, I’m early in my career. So you’re still trying to find out what this league is all about. Being a young player, you pretty much do what the coach asks you to do. But then you start running into rebellious veterans, like, “Nah, that’s not the way it goes. We shouldn’t be doing this.” And it’s like, “What? You can tell coach that?” You had these two New York guys, Kenny Anderson and coach Pitino, going back and forth about something. I can’t remember exactly what it was about. It could have been something on film.
Coach P says, “Well, Kenny you didn’t do it.” And Kenny says, “I did do it Coach, but dah dah dah dah dah.” And coach fires back, “Rewind it. Now, you’re going to tell me you did it? You didn’t do it. Look right here. You didn’t do it.” And Kenny just couldn’t let it go: “Well, I thought I did it, coach.” And both of them are New York guys, both of them are trying to get the last word in. And Coach P’s like, “Just forget about it. You didn’t do it. Let’s move on from it.” There was a little small pause then Kenny came back in and he said something else.
It was kind of a tit for tat. And Coach P finally said, “Just don’t say anything, Kenny. Just let it be over with.” And Kenny said, “Nah, Coach, I can’t just let it go like that, Coach.” And Coach P said he would fine him if he said something again. And Kenny was like, “I’ll bring my checkbook Coach. Whatever I need to do.”
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I think I’m in my second year, this was Paul Pierce’s rookie year. And I’m thinking, “Wow, he just told coach that he’d get the check.” I didn’t even know what that meant. Oh, that means to hell with you, coach, fine me whatever you want, I’m going to say what I want to say. It was one of those things. That was probably one of my first lessons that this is a players’ league.
Holley: What really killed him is he never quite grasped what he was getting into. And he never adjusted. He never adjusted to the Celtics culture. He never adjusted to NBA culture. Frankly, I’m surprised he lasted as long as he did. He tried to have a curfew. He had a booklet. He handed out this booklet to the players about when they were going to be in their rooms and what they were going to eat. In these major cities, young guys in their 20s with a lot of money, you’re going to tell them to do this and do that? He just had a college mindset. And guys just mocked him for it.
Walker: Guys weren’t going to follow no curfew. Not in the league. And then it was like our style of play. I mean, he wanted to press. And the NBA is not about pressing. So he struggled to get guys to actually press and implement his style. We did it, but a lot of guys did not want to do it. It didn’t fit their style of play.
Barros: (I blew up) before one practice. Someone was saying stuff to the media. We would have a team meeting and the next day, word for word, it would be in the media. Word for word. So we had a meeting.
Battie: I do remember that. I don’t want to exaggerate the story, but I want to say we had a story where it was like some mafia shit. Somebody said, “There’s a snitch in here, he keeps leaking stuff to the media.” It was just hilarious, man. I can’t remember who it was or who brought up the word snitch, but somebody said, “Everything we talked about gets leaked. There’s a snitch in here.”
Barros: It was weird for all of us. It wasn’t just him. It was just weird for all of us to know that someone in the locker room was saying things word for word. And it wasn’t always about him. It was about the way we played, who took the shots, it was a lot of different things going on. That was really, I think, frustrating for him way more than the players.
Battie: I don’t know if coach blamed (Dana), but maybe he insinuated it was coming from him. Because Dana was a local guy, maybe he knew more of the media people than we did because of his ties being the hometown kid. Yeah, DB did snap and go off.
Barros: I just expressed to him I just want to let you know it ain’t me. It’s not me. And I don’t care what goes on once I leave this basketball court – I talked about my kids, I said that was the most important thing to me. And for anyone to think I had time to go home and discuss with reporters, like, I just went berserk. Like, don’t even talk to me about this because this is not a part of my pedigree. I don’t want to be involved in this conversation because I’m here to play basketball. And it was just kind of that conversation. And let’s get things into perspective. And let’s not worry about what people were saying. It just was that. And I thought that he was definitely receptive to that and it was a little better from then on.
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Walker: He didn’t lay out a plan for three or four years. He wanted instant gratification. And the fact that he couldn’t get instant gratification really bothered coach. It was tough.
Barros: Most of the time he was right. It wasn’t that he was saying things that were incorrect. I think his frustration just kept building. I don’t think he was really able to be the coach that he wanted to be. He was always chasing that instant gratification. I don’t think he would have been so intense if he had the patience of a five-year plan.
The damage
The Celtics finished Pitino’s first season at 36-46. They didn’t make the playoffs, but still more than doubled their win total from the previous year. Anderson said he sat out games near the end of the campaign at Pitino’s advice. Anderson was nursing a knee issue and Pitino wanted him to rest up for the following year. Some of the players expected to make a playoff push that following season, especially after the Celtics added Paul Pierce with their first-round pick. But the NBA lockout struck. The Celtics went 19-31 in the shortened regular season and again failed to qualify for the playoffs. Those around the team could see Pitino growing more and more bothered by all the losing.
Walker: In college he was great. He was a father that I never had. He demanded that I work hard and work on my game and he was great at that to get the max effort out of me. Obviously when he came to the Celtics it got a little rocky.
Anderson: Being a coach, it weighed on him. We had the talent but he just didn’t win. You could just tell. You’ve been around a coach for so long, just his demeanor, the way he looked, you could just tell it was wearing on him.
Barros: I asked to be traded. I was home and it was just difficult. I didn’t enjoy it. But again, it was just weird because I thought he was a great coach. I thought he could really coach. Like, he was one of the best coaches I ever had. So it was kind of a conundrum.
Holley: He used to call players, “son.” That’s another thing they didn’t like. “Use the screen, son.” He used to say that all the time. He was disrespectful in games and practices. And he would always go to the media and make comments that were to his benefit and at the expense of the players. So I think the most memorable one is the rant with Larry Bird, Kevin McHale and Robert Parish. But I think there were a lot of tiny mountains around that one.
Battie: When we weren’t winning or playing up to his standards, he took it extremely personal. It did build up. I remember seeing coach’s emotion just on the plane, and how much it would hurt him to lose. And as soon as a game was over, we were on the film, watching breakdowns, trying to prepare for the next game. So he did everything. I loved his passion, I loved his work ethic. But for whatever reason we just couldn’t get over that hump.
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May: He’s obviously an egomaniac, but he’s not the only one with that level of expertise and success. So I can’t fault him for being that. But he just didn’t know how to do it after that wouldn’t work. Because that’s all he did at Kentucky. And he always had great players. I think what he learned pretty quickly in the NBA if he didn’t know it already – and he should have – is that it’s not a coaches’ league, it’s a players’ league. And the players determine what goes on and who wins games. The coach is important but he’s not as important as the players. It’s just the direct opposite of college. You don’t have the control over them that you do in college. You can’t pull a scholarship from Antoine Walker and say, you’re out. And he just made a lot of bad economic decisions too, which handicapped the team going forward. How about trading an unprotected No. 1 for Vitaly Potapenko? Because he was fixated on having a center.
MacMullan: (As the losses piled up) you could just see it in his face. It was just a bad fit. He thought being Rick Pitino was enough. It’s not. The NBA is very unforgiving that way.
The rant
Pitino had great achievements at every other stop. He won two NCAA championships, though one was later vacated, and reached five other Final Fours. He never returned to the NBA. Now a coach in Greece, his team won the Greek League and the Greek Cup in 2019. Only with the Celtics did he endure such sustained losing.
Two decades later, the rant – still standing as the symbol of Pitino’s failures – has outlasted most other memories from that era. Pitino — who declined to speak to The Athletic for this story — even referenced the infamous press conference during his 2013 Hall of Fame speech, adding that he learned patience and humility during his time in Boston. The rant he delivered that March night after his team fell to 23-34 against the Raptors has lived on, just like some of those around Pitino back then had predicted.
MacMullan: It was (in) the old press room. I think I was getting my notebook – because I still used a notebook then – to go to the opposing locker room. But you could hear it happening. And I know I didn’t write about it. But I just sat in on it like, “Wow. This is epic.” It was just epic. (I knew it would live on like it has). Because he was rattling, the spittle, the spit was coming out of his mouth. I mean, he was frustrated.
Rick Pitino (the rant): We played hard the whole year. We’re going to be positive every day. You’re the people being negative, you and some of the fans. Larry Bird is not walking through that door, fans. Kevin McHale is not walking through that door and Robert Parish is not walking through that door. And if you expect them to walk through the door they’re going to be gray and old. What we are is young, exciting, hard-working and going to improve. People don’t realize that. And as soon as they realize that those three guys are not coming through that door, the better this town will be for all of us. Because there’re young guys in that room playing their asses off. I wish we had $90 million under the salary cap. I wish we could buy the world. We can’t. The only thing we can do is work hard. And all this negativity that’s in this town sucks. And I’ve been around when Jim Rice was booed, when (Carl) Yastrzemski was booed and it stinks. It makes the greatest city in the world lousy. The only thing that will turn this around is being upbeat and positive like we are in that locker room. So if you think that we’re not coming to play against the Toronto Raptors, you’re mistaken. Only we’re not coming to play with Bird, McHale and Parish or Cousy and Russell. We’re coming with young guys who want to get better and want to play the game. And we’re going to stay positive. All the way through. And if you think I’m going to succumb to negativity, you’re wrong. You’ve got the wrong guy leading this basketball team.
May: I think when you (see) it at the time, you don’t realize (how big it is). Because Rick was saying so many crazy things back then. And it started when he got there. You know, “Travis Knight (whom Pitino signed to a seven-year, $22 million deal his first summer and who then played just one season in Boston) is going to be a great, great player in this league.” Stuff like that. And, “I’m sorry, but your sources are wrong. We’re not trading for Kenny Anderson.” Stuff like that. He was Trump before Trump. He just said whatever came into his mind. And he didn’t care. His great response to anything was, “I meant it when I said it.” Yeah, but so what? It was still wrong. It was just a bad fit for him. It just didn’t work out. And I think he just didn’t contain his emotions as well as he could have. And he just blew up that night. But it was a sign of things to come. I think he had lost control by then.
Barros: I just think things were at that point where we pretty much knew changes were going to be made. But even after I left, it was still another year. I can imagine what it was at that point.
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Walker: As a player at that time, (the rant) was a reflection of, hey, we’re not good enough to get it done. And even though I think coach was probably doing it because he was protecting us, I think the players looked at it as a situation where he was more negative to us than protecting us. I think coach was probably doing it to protect us because we weren’t living up to our ability in the win and loss category, but guys looked at it as more of a negative thing, like, man, you don’t think we can win. So it was just one of those things. My initial reaction was that I just felt like he had lost total confidence in the team. And he wanted the fans, he wanted everyone to know that those guys weren’t walking through that door. And that we were going to take some time to get good and get to that level. As a player, obviously we knew that we weren’t at that level, but we were believing that we could turn this thing around. Guys took it as a negative. A lot of people took it as a negative, where I think coach thought he was protecting us.
Holley: The Celtics PR staff, they put it out word for word on the transcript. There’s no PR person who could stop that. Once he decided he was going to do it, what are you going to do? Mid-rant, say OK, guys, no more? He was in it. And he had rants. He had several rants during that time and misstatements and lies. And I used to be able to keep up with it. I used to have this little tell and I would make a note of it. Every time Pitino turned his head to the left he was lying.
Anderson: The negativity: You’ve gotta understand that we’re in Boston. Boston was Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, Robert Parish. They won a lot of games. You’ve gotta understand that: You’re coaching for the Celtics. And that’s what it’s about. So I knew if you won in Boston it would be the best thing ever. But if you lose it’s the worst thing ever. And you have to deal with it. It is what it is. All of New England, the Patriots, it’s just the best thing ever when you win.
Holley: I am convinced – and other people will tell you this – that was a premeditated rant. There was nothing organic about it. Because I think the question he was asked, he was asked a question about rebounding, like, a very fair question. I think he was asked about rebounding or transition defense. Something mundane. And he just went off because the pressure had gotten to him. I think he knew long before then that it just wasn’t going to work. I think he knew probably within a couple of months of taking the job, honestly, that this was not going to turn out well for him.
MacMullan: I think when he arrived, again, I call it the coronation. He was conciliatory, he was engaged with the media. And then I think it became – as it does when you’re losing – an us-vs.-them thing. So there was an edge to him. And he was a very competitive guy anyway. I saw that even when he coached BU, he was a guy who hated losing. And he didn’t lose much, by the way, in his career. So I think there was a combativeness to him that was increasing. And I would say that rant was the apex of it.
Moving on
Pitino stepped down from the Celtics in January 2001 after a loss in Miami dropped them to 12-22. He went 102-146 over parts of four seasons in Boston. Assistant coach Jim O’Brien, who also coached under Pitino in Kentucky, took over and guided the Celtics to a 24-24 record over the rest of the regular season. The following year, with Pierce emerging as a star next to Walker and Anderson, the Celtics reached the Eastern Conference Finals. It took many years after that for Walker and Pitino to mend their relationship.
Around 2009, as he recalls, Walker decided he wanted to prepare for a basketball comeback after running into financial hardships, gaining a lot of weight and falling out of the NBA. At his low point, he decided, “You’ve gotta go back to your roots where it all started from.” Walker gave Pitino a call.
Walker: We had spoken several times. But when we really connected and really talked was when I was going through my toughest time. I reached out to him and I told him I needed to get back in the best shape possible. I still want to play basketball. I called him and just explained to him what was going on in my life. And I told him where I was at. And he told me to come down and let’s work. Once he said that it was a no-brainer. I went to play for six months with him in Louisville. And it was the best time. He welcomed me with open arms, worked me out. It helped rebuild our friendship. And it was great for me. That was around 2009, 2010. I actually worked out for a few teams. I worked out for Charlotte. It just wasn’t publicly broadcast. He was going through his own trials and tribulations, but he made time for me to continue to work me out and push me every day. So I’m forever grateful for those moments. (Top photo: Julia Malakie/AP)
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