What If?

Have you ever wondered how things could have been?  Looking back on your life there must be several life altering moments where having made a different decision or getting a lucky break could have drastically changed the direction of your life.  If you had the chance to go back in time to change one thing from your past, would you do it? Even if you knew the decision could completely change the path your life had taken, for better or for worse?

This leads us to playing the "What If" game.  Essentially, it's taking a hypothetical look back on what would have happened had a particular event played out differently.  You can fantasize about this while applying it to your own life (please, I don't need the details), but we can also see many examples of this in sports.  Boston teams have had their fair share of these moments where fans can only wonder what could have been.  We'll never know if it would have worked out for the best or not, but it's still fun to debate about them, hypothetically re-writing sports history.

What if the Celtics landed a top 2 pick in the 2007 NBA draft?
The Celtics ended the 2006-2007 season with the second worst record in the league, behind only Memphis.  They felt confident that tanking at the end of the season would be rewarded with one of the top two picks in a top heavy draft that would save their once storied franchise.  As we now know, the Karma Gods struck back at us and the Celtics fell to the #5 pick in the lottery, meaning they would miss out on having a chance to draft either Greg Oden or Kevin Durant.

If the Celtics had gotten a top 2 pick, as the odds predicted they should, it could have played out in one of two scenarios.

A) The Celtics get the #1 pick and draft Greg Oden.  Despite what we know now, every GM in the league would have taken Oden with the top pick.  Of course now he is in danger of becoming a bust due to a string of injuries that cost him his entire rookie season and parts of the next two seasons.  Oden had some injury issues in college as well, so this should have been a red flag, but any team would have been prepared to take him with that pick, including the Celtics.  A rule of thumb in the NBA is that you always take a dominant big man over a dominant Guard or Forward, and Greg Oden looked like a can't miss big man coming into the league.  Or at least that's what Portland still tries to convince themselves of ever since they drafted Sam Bowie over Michael Jordan.  Poor Portland...

Had this scenario occurred it would have been a disaster for the Celtics.  There's no way to know if Oden would have suffered the same season ending injury in Boston before ever playing a game, but it's fair to assume he would have gotten injured at some point because, well, that's what he does.  That would have left Boston with essentially the same team they had the previous miserable season, only with a healthy Paul Pierce and an improving Rajon Rondo they would no longer finish in the basement, but more likely with a late lottery pick.  Still useful, but still no franchise savior, so we're left waiting to see if Oden ever gets healthy enough to contribute.  It hasn't happened yet.  However, given that he looked like a 40 year old man coming out of college, I'm fairly convinced that he is the real life version of Benjamin Button, who ages in reverse.  So it's possible that 10 years from now he will be a young, spry, dominant force in the league once he gets younger, instead of the old man with the bad wheel that we've seen so far.

B) The Celtics get the #2 pick and draft Kevin Durant.  Now things are looking a little more intriguing, as Durant has blossomed into one of the league's elite players.  He has carried a young Thunder team on his shoulders and made them into a team that should contend for many years.  He's a good bet to rack up several scoring titles and MVP awards over the next decade. 

If the Celtics drafted Durant they would have had a core of Rondo, Pierce, Durant, Al Jefferson and Kendrick Perkins.  Fill in some quality bench guys, some of which they already had (Delonte West, Ryan Gomes, Tony Allen) and others that GM Danny Ainge has proved capable of finding, and that's a very solid team.  It may even be better than the Thunder team that Durant is on now, given that it includes a veteran leader in Pierce that can handle some of the scoring load instead of requiring Durant to handle too much too soon.  After a couple years the torch would be passed to make Durant the main option with Pierce playing a solid second option.  The other young starters would all develop together around Durant, making them contenders for a long time.  Durant had a solid rookie year, which would help the Celtics improve, but not much.  He struggled on defense and took too many bad shots.  He's since improved in just about every aspect of the game, but that rookie season would have been another lottery pick for the Celtics in 2008, meaning they likely would have added someone in the mid-late lottery (Anthony Randolph, Eric Gordon, or Brook Lopez?).

Of course if this does happen then the Celtics no longer have the #5 pick to trade to Seattle for Ray Allen, which means Kevin Garnett doesn't agree to come to Boston for the Al Jefferson pu pu platter.  The Big Three is never formed and the Celtics don't win the title in 2008.  When this group was assembled they knew they had a limited window due to the decline of their aging veterans, but so far in that window they have 2 NBA Finals appearances, 1 Championship and another deep playoff run that could very well have resulted in another title if KG wasn't injured.  This Celtics team wins primarily by playing suffocating defense, which stems from the intensity that KG brings every night.  Replacing KG and Allen with Durant and Jefferson would make for pretty bad defensive team.  Maybe Pierce doesn't end up buying into the defensive approach without KG around.  Maybe Rondo and Perkins don't develop as quickly without that veteran leadership around and the playoff experience that tested them early in their careers.

Having Durant with that young core of players would give us an exciting contender for years to come, but would you give up the run this team has had the past three years, including their championship, for the chance that you might win multiple titles with a team led by Durant? I say no.

What if the Red Sox traded Nomar and Manny for A-Rod and Ordonez?
This is an actual trade that nearly happened in the offseason before the 2004 season.  The Red Sox would have traded Nomar Garciaparra to Chicago for Magglio Ordonez, then shipped Manny Ramirez to Texas for Alex Rodriguez.  Technically that's two separate trades, but the Nomar trade was contingent on the Sox being able to trade for A-Rod as his replacement at SS.

On paper this looked like a great deal for the Red Sox.  Nomar was beginning his decline into clubhouse malcontent and had a history of injuries which prompted the Sox to want to move him while his value was still high.  They had a chance to acquire A-Rod, who was considered the best player in the game at the time while ridding themselves of having to deal with "Manny being Manny."  As good as Nomar had been in a Red Sox uniform over the years, A-Rod was a clear upgrade at the position.  Meanwhile, Ordonez was coming off a season where he hit .317, had 29 HRs and drove in just shy of 100 RBIs.  His previous season was even better (.320, 38, 135), so he was a proven stud capable of replacing at least most of the production that Manny provided, without the off-field baggage and defensive liabilities that they dealt with having Manny around.  Red Sox Nation held their collective breaths all off-season waiting to see if these deals would get done.

As it turned out, the Sox and Rangers could not come to an agreement regarding the large amount of money being transferred with the game's two biggest contracts.  The Sox scoffed at the demand that they pay a portion of Ramirez's salary in addition to taking on A-Rod's contract.  That deal fell through and A-Rod was instead traded to the rival Yankees for Alfonso Soriano, stabbing the Red Sox in the heart.  It was a devastating defeat, to not only lose out on that deal, but to have the Yankees pounce at the opportune time to take advantage.  The Nomar/Magglio trade was no longer needed, so the Sox were stuck with two players that were not happy about being dangled as trade bait.

Believe it or not, it may have been the best thing that ever happened to this team.  Nomar became a problem in the clubhouse and dragged the team down with his poor attitude, but they eventually did trade him at the trading deadline for spark plug Orlando Cabrera, who helped energize the team.  The Sox make an impressive run to secure a playoff spot with the Wild Card and shock the world by coming back from an 0-3 game deficit to beat the Yankees in the ALCS.  They then go on to sweep the Cardinals to win the team's first World Series Championship since 1918. 

Manny was the MVP of that World Series, so maybe keeping him around was a good idea.  He hit .308 with 43 HRs and 130 RBIs in 2004, combining with David Ortiz to form the leagues most feared duo in the middle of the lineup.  The man that would have replaced him, Magglio Ordonez, only played in 52 games that season due to injury, with a .292, 9 HR, 37 RBI stat line.  He followed that up with another disappointing injury plagued season with similar results.  He finally had a bounce back year with Detroit in 2006 and has put up pretty good numbers since, but he wasn't the same MVP quality player that he was pre-2004.

Meanwhile, A-Rod had an impressive year for himself in New York, but it was the Red Sox that ended up beating his team in the playoffs.  A-Rod took much of the criticism for that loss, as he failed to produce in the playoffs.  There were whispers that he was the type of player that put up impressive numbers during the regular season, but couldn't come through in the clutch when it mattered in the playoffs.  He was a "me first" type of player that cared more about his own stats than he did about winning, which was not the Yankee way.  Former teammates named him "The Cooler" because no matter how good he was, having him on the team made the team worse.  Evidence of this can be pointed to how the Seattle Mariners immediately got better after he left to sign a record size contract with Texas, while the Rangers ended up finishing in last place after acquiring A-Rod.  This doesn't sound like the type of guy we'd have wanted in Boston.  His prima-donna personality would not have meshed well with the "bunch of idiots" the Sox had at the time, such as Johnny Damon and Kevin Millar.  Can you imagine watching A-Rod stare back with glazed eyes while Millar told him to Cowboy Up?  He was not a good fit for that team, which won in part because of the relaxed, happy-go-lucky attitude they all had.  They were having fun and loved being a team together.  A-Rod would have made himself an outsider to all that and poisoned the team in the process.  His lack of post-season production, especially compared to Manny's, would cost us as well.  Suffice it to say, we would not have won a championship in 2004 had that trade went through.

After that championship season, much of that 2004 team disbanded.  If they don't win that title would players like Damon and Pedro feel as entitled to a huge pay raise?  Would they still have left town for big time contracts, tarnishing their reputation in the eyes of Boston fans?  Do they re-sign Ordonez after watching him waste away on the Disabled List for most of the season?  Does Curt Schilling retire early to focus more of his time on blogging about how much he hated being teammates with A-Rod?

But it doesn't end there.  The A-Rod effect would impact more than just one title.  Assuming the Sox kept him around, A-Rod would likely have impacted the 2007 World Series as well.  He was considered to be too big and lacked the necessary range to remain at SS for long, so his switch to 3B would have occurred eventually even if he hadn't gone to the Yankees.  He would have been pushed aside for promising young prospect Hanley Ramirez.  With A-Rod manning 3B they would have had no reason to trade Han-Ram for a deal that included Mike Lowell (2007 World Series MVP), and Josh Beckett, who as the ace of the pitching staff, helped lead the team to another title. 

If the Red Sox had successfully completed those trades in the winter of 2004 then the Red Sox may not have won either of those World Series titles.  We'd still be suffering from the Curse of the Bambino, still be taunted by the "1918" chants and worst of all, we'd be forced to cheer for A-Rod.

What if Drew Bledsoe didn't get injured in 2001
Drew Beledsoe had been the Patriots franchise Quarterback since being selected first overall in 1993.  He made 4 Pro-Bowls and led the team to a Super Bowl in '96, which they lost to the Green Bay Packers.  In 2001 the Patriots were not considered an elite team, but they were expected to contend for the division crown and a playoff spot.  Those expectations seemingly went down the drain in Week 2 of the season when Bledsoe was badly injured by a hard hit from Jets linebacker Mo Lewis.

Fans all around New England were crushed by news of the injury, which was expected to keep Bledsoe out for several weeks.  They now were forced to turn their playoff hopes over to an unknown backup that was drafted in the 6th round.  That man... was Tom Brady.

So we know how that turned out.  Brady came in to finish that game against the Jets, which resulted in a loss and put the team in an 0-2 hole.  But Brady managed to rally the team around him, leading them to victories in 11 of their remaining 14 games, including wins in their final 6 regular season games, to finish with an 11-5 regular season record to win the AFC East Division title.  Brady made his first Pro-Bowl that season while continuing that roll into the postseason, where their improbable run resulted in a huge upset victory over the heavily favored Rams in Super Bowl XXXVI. 

Since then Brady has gone on to win two more Super Bowl rings, 2 Super Bowl MVPs, a regular season MVP and set league records, including his 50 TD season in 2007.  He led arguably the best offense the league has ever seen during an undefeated 16-0 regular season that nearly resulted in another Super Bowl victory (another What If story for another time).  He's not only amongst the best QB's in the league now, but he's mentioned in the debate for best QBs of all time.  He's a surefire Hall of Famer and the best thing that ever happened to this once miserable franchise.

Not to knock Drew, who was great at times during his years in New England, but would he ever have accomplished any of that?  Can you picture him winning an MVP award or any of those Super Bowls?  After he lost his job in New England he bounced around the league looking for work as a starting QB in places like Buffalo and Dallas, but never was the same as in his peak years.

If Bledsoe never gets injured then Brady never gets his chance to shine.  The Patriots don't dominate the last decade with a record setting dynasty team, Tom Brady doesn't become one of the most recognizable sports celebrities in the world, Giselle might still be single and we'd have other things to dislike about our Quarterback besides a goofy haircut.  What kind of world would that be?

Unless someone ever invents a working time machine (which, if they did, wouldn't someone from the future already have gone back in time to tell us about it?) then we'll never know for sure how things would have turned out if these scenarios had played out differently.  We'll forever be forced to wonder... What if?