Title-winning 2008 Celtics won't invite Ray Allen to reunion
Ray Allen is not welcome at the Boston Celtics' 10-year anniversary to celebrate the team's 2008 championship, according to Rajon Rondo.
The 2008 Boston Celtics team plan to reunite and celebrate the championship they won together, but will do so without a key piece of the team: Ray Allen.
Allen - now retired - has not been forgiven for leaving the Celtics to join NBA the Miami Heat in 2012, after Boston lost to their rivals in the Eastern Conference finals that year.
While the Celtics gave 10-time All-Star Allen a solid offer to stay, the veteran player later revealed he did not see eye-to-eye with the players there, specifically Rajon Rondo.
Rondo is setting up a vacation with the title-winning roster to celebrate their 10-year anniversary. But in the process of reaching out to guys, he learned not many people want Allen there.
"I asked a couple of the guys. I got a no, a no head shake," Chicago Bulls guard Rondo told The Undefeated.
"It will be a long story about that, but it is what it is. I don't know a good analogy to put this in. It just wasn't the greatest separation. It wasn't the greatest thing that could've happened to us as a team, a bond. We were at war with those guys [Miami]. To go with the enemy, that's unheard-of in sports. Well, it's not so unheard of. It's damn near common now.
"The mindset we had. The guys on our team. You wouldn't do anything like that. It makes you question that series in the Finals … Who were you for? You didn't bleed green. People think we had a messed-up relationship. It's not the greatest. But it's not just me.
"I called and reached out to a couple of other vets and asked them what they wanted to do with the situation. They told me to stick with what we got [without Allen]."