Ray Allen: If Rajon Rondo Had An Issue With Me, 'That's On Him'
BOSTON (CBS) -- It's no secret that over the course of the past few seasons, a rift grew between aging Celtics star Ray Allen and young rising star Rajon Rondo. Now a member of the Miami Heat, Allen is shedding some light on how it may have developed.
Allen told the Miami Herald that in 2009, Rondo was not getting along with head coach Doc Rivers or general manager Danny Ainge, and so Ainge proposed a trade with the Phoenix Suns which would have sent Rondo and Allen to Phoenix in exchange for Amare Stoudemire, Leandro Barbosa and a draft pick.
"So, I called him and I told him, 'Hey, they're supposedly trading us to Phoenix because you and Danny and Doc don't get along, so, whatever you can do,'" Allen told the Miami Herald. "So, for some reason, I guess he thought that I was … that I had something against him, or there were some issues. And I had no issues with him. I won with him.
"[If Rondo] had issue with me, that's on him."
Allen, 37, also said that he didn't feel the Celtics made a great push to bring him back for next season, even though they offered him more money than Miami.
"I was very loyal to the city and I love the city, but when it came time to keep me in a uniform, [the Celtics] did everything they could to seem like … to not want me to come back," Allen said.
Allen also expressed to the Miami Herald his frustration with his role in the Celtics' offense.
"In Boston," Allen said, "they were telling me they were going to bring me off the bench ... and all I asked was, 'How are you going to use me? Because the last two years you've been using me as decoys. You're running all these plays for me just to pass it to somewhere else and you're not putting me into any scoring opportunities and I'm just standing over in the corner the majority of games.'"
Perhaps, though, Rivers knew what he was doing. Allen averaged roughly two fewer shots last season as he did in his previous four years in Boston, though he did still manage to put up 5.1 3-point attempts per game, and he hit them at his most efficient rate (.453) as a Celtic. The team also went 95-53 in those two years, coming just one game shy of reaching the Finals last June.
