Picks 'n Pops: Al Horford making sense, soul-crushing reporting, and bargain shopping

Every week I gather some thoughts about the Celtics, the NBA, and beyond and dump them here. Because there's much less chance I'll lose a finger today if I'm just typing.

- It’s amazing to see Jonas Valanciunas turning down NBA money in a great situation in Denver to go finish his career in Europe. Then again, getting three years and $36 million to play in Greece isn’t a bad gig. 

I know everyone is saying Al Horford to Golden State is basically done, but this opens up an option for him in Denver. I think the Nuggets would be the better choice. 

- Horford leaving makes perfect sense if you look at it through the eyes of him teaching his son a lesson. If Ean Horford is going to become an NBA player, he has to see the business side at work, understand what it is to value yourself and your services, and be ready for business decisions to be made. He also has to see what other locker rooms can be. 

Al is making whatever decision he makes for himself, but there's more to it than that. 

- I’m fine with Damian Lillard in Boston if he is willing to sign here for the minimum. What better way to mess with Milwaukee than to have them pay Lillard’s salary when he’s playing for the Celtics?

- The Bucks willingly keeping $22 million in dead money on their books for five years in this economy is one of the most absurd things I’ve heard. It’s honestly the last thing I expected from any team, much less one flirting with aprons.

And to do it for Myles Turner? Yeesh.

- Phoenix is about to do the same damn thing. That's called desperation. 

- Work out with Payton Pritchard at your own risk.

- It’s very easy to have your optimism for a season sapped when you see a team sifting through Minnesota’s hand-me-downs for cheap options to fill a roster.

- I say it all the time: situation matters. Maybe Luka Garza and Josh Minott just need a chance to prove what they can do. If there's a player out there that has made anyone in the organization purse their lips, stroke their chin and think ‘hey … maybe …” then there's a chance Brad Stevens will grab him and give him an opportunity to prove himself.

- Here’s your Celtics summer league schedule, for your overreacting to rookie performances purposes.: 

• July 11: Celtics vs. Grizzlies, 4 p.m. ET
• July 13: Celtics vs. Knicks, 5:30 p.m. ET (airs after Connecticut Sun game on NBCS Boston)
• July 14: Celtics vs. Heat, 8 p.m. ET
• July 17: Celtics vs. Lakers, 9 p.m. ET
• Game 5 TBD: Celtics vs. TBD

You can call me the Ice Bucket Challenge because I’m gonna be here dumping cold water on everything we see in Vegas. 

- It’s pronounced “Oogo” Gonzalez. He told us himself. Don’t use the “H” around him. 

- Happy Birthday to Joe Mazzulla and Derrick White. 

- Wyc Grousbeck basically said Kendrick Perkins talked too much crap to be invited to last year’s parade. 

Honestly, I don’t care if he was there or not, but I do enjoy some level of consequence for someone who will literally say anything to get paid. 

- The announcement of the DeAndre Ayton signing is why I never went down the “newsbreaker” lane of modern sports media. 

Look at these tweets.

“The Lakers find their starting center in Ayton, the 2018 No. 1 overall pick who is the only player in NBA history to average 15+ points and 60%+ shooting in the postseason.”

Sure, he did it four years ago, and was so effective after that, his team dumped him to Portland. 

“The Lakers have the No. 1 pick and the No. 3 pick in the 2018 NBA Draft. Significant building blocks for now and the future.”

Hold on, I need to sit down. The spin on that tweet just gave me vertigo. The guy the BLAZERS just bought out is a significant building block?

Are you freakin’ kidding me? Do these folks have no shame at all? 

The boot-licking necessary to get scoops nowadays is the worst. I can’t subject myself to it. I’ll live in my lane of game analysis for however long it lasts. I’d rather go open a bar or a restaurant or something than play some stupid game of kissing every agent’s ass to be first with a tidbit of information. 

Congrats guys. You broke the news. I’ll make sense of it and be happy living with myself.

- Congrats Mike Brown on being New York‘s 8th choice. 

Seriously, Brown is a really good coach and New York will be fine with him. Also, you don’t fire Tom Thibodeau just to hire Mike Brown. You don’t fire Thibodeau without a more rock-solid plan than trying to poach all the other good coaches in the league. 

- You know injuries have gone too far when Red Panda breaks her wrist on the court. 

- The LeBron James situation in Los Angeles is super interesting. He’s up to his old tricks with statements challenging the team after opting in to his $52 million this week. 

"We understand the difficulty in winning now while preparing for the future. We do want to evaluate what's best for LeBron at this stage in his life and career," his agent Rich Paul told ESPN. 

But this isn’t his team anymore. They're going to prioritize Luka Doncic over LeBron at this point. James is obviously still effective but he’s on his last legs. The Lakers shouldn’t be bending over backwards for him anymore. 

They should just tell him to play this year and then be on his way. I don’t know who can trade for LeBron at this point. I’d argue that no one should because there's no way to get equal value after you total up every player you’d have to give up. 

Every king’s reign comes to an end somehow. The system is going to end this one. 

- I’m always a proponent of players getting their share of the pie. It’s just going to take a while for me to get used to guys getting $70-plus million per year. Jaylen Brown’s “richest contract ever” status looks like peanuts by comparison … Fancy peanuts. Like the honey roasted, premium kind with just the right amount of salt. But still peanuts. 

- I don’t think Ayton is going to fit in L.A. 

- I can see Joe Mazzulla making his critics happy, but his proponents angry, this year by winning more games than expected. 

- Kenneth Lofton Jr. was just named MVP of his league in China. He’s going to be on Boston’s summer league team for a look to see if he might get a camp invite. Just in case you were wondering about the difference between the two leagues. 

- The NBA splits its basketball-related income (“revenue”) 51% for the players and 49% for the owners. They don’t actually know how much money will exactly come into the league to start the season, so 10% of the money going to players is withheld until the end of every season so the league can go through its official accounting. 

So a player making $10 million will have a million set aside and put in escrow, in addition to all the taxes, agent fees, etc. that come out. 

At the end of the year, the league figures out if the players made too much or too little, and the escrow is distributed accordingly. Some years, the owners get too much, and the money gets returned to the players. This year, 91% of that escrow money is going back to the owners to ensure the 51/49 split. 

So that $10 million player who had a million withheld is only getting $90,000 of that back. The other $910,000 goes to the owners. 

Just another weird little financial thing to throw in the heaping tire fire of weird NBA business. 

- I like this idea for disincentivizing random, one-year tank jobs. 

- Congratulations to Jeff Twiss for getting the honor of throwing out the first pitch at Fenway. 

From what I've seen from Red Sox pitchers, I still think he can be a middle reliever this season. 

- This week's AI-generated image, Brad Stevens going bargain hunting to fill out his roster. 

- Luke Kornet went from $14 million in career earnings to a four-year, $41 million contract in San Antonio. It's sad to see him go, but I can't be anything but happy for a guy having the Best Week Ever!

- Here's my latest podcast, if you're bored.