Danny Ainge said during a press conference on Thursday that the Boston Celtics are likely to receive a mini mid-level exception, which is the smaller version of the exception afforded to tax-payers, rather than the full mid-level given to teams under the luxury tax.

Obviously, that wouldn’t be good news. The Celtics are already strapped for cash, already over the salary cap, and need to fill between four and seven roster spots during the free agency period. The difference between using a $5 million exception and a $3 million exception could be the difference between Shane Battier and Tracy McGrady, or between Carl Landry and Anthony Parker (yes, I understand they play entirely different positions).

The C’s have a difficult task this offseason, like they’ve had for the past three offseasons — they have to play a balancing act between now and the future, and improve a bench without any real salary cap space. Not having the full mid-level exception only makes that task more difficult.

Danny Ainge said Thursday during a press conference that the Boston Celtics will not take advantage of the league’s amnesty clause.

“”We are not amnestying anybody,” Ainge said, inventing a new word in the process.

An amnesty clause was included in the new collective bargaining agreement, designed to give teams a mulligan (of sorts) on a bad contract. The Celtics, whose money is mostly wrapped up among four All-Stars, all of whom are crucial to the team’s success, had no real candidates on which to use the clause. Jermaine O’Neal seemed like a remote possibility, but even though he made $600,000 per regular season start last season, he’s also the only center on Boston’s roster. Plus, cutting him via the amnnesty clause wouldn’t give the C’s much (if any) additional cap flexibility.

That the Celtics won’t use the amnesty clause is like a rainy day in Seattle, a Jeff Green missed box out, or a ridiculous pull-up jumper by Nate Robinson: nothing unexpected.

I don’t always take trade rumors at face value. But if you take the latest “Danny Ainge wanted to swap Rajon Rondo and Jeff Green for Kendrick Perkins and Russell Westbrook after the 2011 playoffs” rumor as the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God, faith could be shaken and beliefs could be altered. (ESPN)

ESPN’s Chris Broussard dug up yet another interesting Celtics tidbit for us this evening, one that casts last season’s Kendrick Perkins-for-Jeff Green trade in an entirely new light.

After last season’s playoffs, the Celtics offered Rajon Rondo and Green to Oklahoma City for Russell Westbrook and Perkins, sources told Broussard. The Celtics, looking for another scorer who can create his own offense, thought Westbrook might be available after his erratic postseason play. But Oklahoma was not interested in the deal.

Let’s assume this rumor is true and take a look at the timeline:

1) The Celtics are favorites in the East, if not the entire NBA, and destroying everyone on the schedule.

2) Danny Ainge, at the last minute before the trade deadline, swaps Kendrick Perkins and Nate Robinson for Nenad Krstic and Jeff Green. We later hear the trade was made for financial reasons — the C’s did not believe they could afford to re-sign Perkins after the season.

3) The Celtics fall apart after acquiring Green. Green, despite all his obvious natural athleticism, fails to produce in any one aspect of the game. He does not score, rebound, or defend particularly well, and the Celtics collapse during the second half of the season, ultimately bowing to the Miami Heat in five games.

4) Fuck being frugal. Ainge offers to reacquire Perkins (and his new, $9 million per season contract), except this time he also proposes to (slightly) downgrade from Rajon Rondo to Russell Westbrook.

5) Sam Presti hangs up the phone, chuckling to himself.

6) A few months later, the trade offer resurfaces. My period of grieving goes something like this: I spend three hours crying about Perk (“I just miss his scowl, mom”), two hours trying to Google Ainge’s address so I can egg his house, two more hours trying to ponder the question: “wait, Rondo IS better than Westbrook, right?”, and then I return to crying about Perk until I fall asleep.

Unfortunately for Ainge, there is no reset button in real life.

Glen Davis, despite his flaws, remains one of the better free agent big men.

That makes deciding what to do with Davis a difficult dilemma for the Boston Celtics — they need a big man (or three) desperately, but they also want to maintain cap space for 2012 without overspending on an undersized power forward/center known to clash with Doc Rivers and occasionally endure strange, prolonged spells of poor play. To further complicate matters, the new CBA limits how much money the depth-starved Celtics can spend, and re-signing Davis — even if he’s not a perfect option for now or the future — could be their best chance to improve.

Sean Deveney reports the Celtics want to execute a sign-and-trade with Davis, which makes sense. Depending on how wisely the Celtics maneuver, trading Davis could possibly bring Danny Ainge the best of both worlds. The C’s could package Davis for a veteran who preferably A) can contribute off the bench, and B) has one year remaining on his contract, thereby allowing the Celtics to contend (or come reasonably close to contending) in 2011-12 while also maximizing their future flexibility.

Davis is also looking into his own options. (Boston Herald)

Though Davis declined to specify where beyond the Celtics he might be looking, two league sources confirmed that his camp targeted New Jersey, Orlando, Denver, Atlanta, Detroit and possibly New Orleans.

Despite his reported interest in all those teams, Davis still says he would like to return to Boston. But in the same breath, he mentions he would like to start, which wouldn’t happen in Boston at least for one more year.

“Any player with a sense of growth wants to start,” he said. “If the opportunity is there to start for a team, then definitely I would want to do that. But if I have to be a sixth man again, I don’t mind. I’m just excited to see what will happen. The only way I can find out is to wait until Dec. 9.

“I hope I can return to Boston. It will be cool to go back, but if not, then I have to move on.”

The Celtics will be quite busy as soon as Dec. 9 hits. Making decisions on Davis and Jeff Green is a priority, and (at risk of sounding melodramatic) could go a long way toward shaping the Celtics’ present and future.

Now that a missed season is a real possibility, the lockout could end the Boston Celtics’ Big Three era. It could potentially threaten Kevin Garnett’s career. It could mean that Ray Allen is 37 years old when the NBA returns, and Paul Pierce might be 35. And if all that’s not enough, a missed season could result in Danny Ainge scrambling to fill 12 roster spots for 2012-13. I don’t mean to exude pessimism, but these are now realistic possibilities.

“There will ultimately be a new collective bargaining agreement,” NBA Commissioner David Stern said after hearing of the NBPA’s decision. “But the 2011-2012 season is now in jeopardy.”

And for veteran teams that have few bodies under contract right now, like the Celtics, they could very well fall under the category of collateral damage associated with this lockout if it wipes out the entire season.

Beyond 2011-12, the Celtics only have three players under contract – Paul Pierce, Rajon Rondo and Avery Bradley.

So if the season were to be wiped out entirely, the C’s would have as many as 12 roster spots to fill.

The Miami Heat certainly didn’t complain after needing to fill 12 roster spots last summer. But there were extenuating circumstances. Two of the game’s biggest stars (and Chris Bosh) were all free agents at the same time. The trio decided to combine their powers. It was a combination of luck, circumstance and the persuasive powers of Pat Riley (not to mention the persuasive powers of South Beach).

The Celtics wouldn’t be so lucky. Even if the free agency classes of 2011 and 2012 were combined, which is what would happen after a missed season, there’s STILL not the type of star power to rebuild on the fly. Dwight Howard, Chris Paul and Deron Williams are the only superstars on the market. Two of them play Rondo’s position. The other, Howard, will have many other realistic suitors besides the Celtics. If Howard did sign with the Celtics, the Celtics could presumably re-sign Allen and Garnett to smaller contracts and join them with Pierce, Rondo and Howard to form an awesome starting five. But that’s assuming Howard signs. And the Boston Celtics historically don’t land high-profile free agents.

More likely, the Celtics are looking at a lengthy rebuilding process after the (rumored) 2011-12 season. The thought is sobering, but it’s reality. The final year of the Big Three era is in jeopardy, and the future is unknown.

Mostly due to the city’s history of racial inequality, partially due to cold and snowy winters, the Boston Celtics have never signed a truly significant free agent. Bill Russell, Bob Cousy, Larry Bird, Paul Pierce, John Havlicek, Dave Cowens, Kevin McHale — name a Celtics superstar and he was acquired via trade or through the draft.

The most important free agent signing in franchise history was probably Don Nelson; before he became a zany, successful and entirely unpredictable coach, Nelson was a key figure, albeit a role player, on five Celtics championship teams. But even Nelson came to Boston with little fanfare and few other options — the year before joining the Celtics, Nellie averaged 2.4 points per game for the Los Angeles Lakers. And with the Celtics, he never averaged more than 15.4 points, 27.4 minutes, or 7.3 rebounds. The most important free agent acquisition in the history of the NBA’s winningest franchise never made a single All-Star game.

But Boston’s free agent luck might be changing. According to Stephen Jackson, players are beginning to look at Boston differently than ever before.

“When I first got in the league, I would never have thought about Boston. Ever,” Jackson told ESPN the Magazine’s Ric Bucher. “The way they embraced KG was a big part of changing that.”

The Celtics also have a coach, and a black one at that, known for treating his players well. The Boston players begged Doc Rivers to stay every time rumors flew saying he might take a leave of absence, according to Bucher.

“That’s a big piece of it,” one agent told Bucher. “They’d run through a wall for him.”

As the Celtics attempt to transition from the Big Three era to the “Rondo and whoever else” era, becoming major players in the free agent market has never been more important. The Celtics currently have only three players under contract for the 2012-12 season. That means Danny Ainge will have millions of dollars to play with in the summer of 2012, but convincing Dwight Howard or any other marquee free agent to sign in Boston will mean erasing five decades worth of free agent whiffs. And if Ainge does fail to upgrade the team through free agency, the Celtics could begin a long rebuilding process, one that could revive painful memories of Ricky Davis, Gerald Green and Sebastian Telfair. Either that, or Ainge could settle for second-tier free agents and the Celtics could become mired in what I will call “The Antoine Walker Zone,” where the Celtics make the playoffs every year but never have a chance to contend for a championship.

In his piece, Bucher discussed the possibility of a Jeff Green-Paul Pierce-Rajon Rondo core.

“A nucleus of Green, Rondo and Pierce ‘is definitely a playoff team, especially in the East,’ says an Eastern Conference executive who spoke on a condition of anonymity because the league has a $1 million gag order on its employees during the current lockout,” wrote Bucher.

But the playoffs are not supposed to be the end, not for the Boston Celtics, winners of 17 championships, but the means to the end. The Celtics are supposed to fight for championships, not resign themselves to mediocrity. The Antoine Walker era produced many memorable moments — banked three-pointers to win games, a trip to the Eastern Conference Finals, shimmies and shakes galore– but the era that came after it, the Gerald Green era, was more beneficial to winning a title than anything Walker ever accomplished in Boston. With Walker, the Celtics were stuck in quick sand, not going anywhere fast, pretending to make moves that would result in a championship but never really inching any closer. But after gutting the team and rebuilding with young talent (err, if you can call it talent), the Celtics were able to trade assets, contracts and draft picks to acquire the Big Three and bring Boston its 17th title.

In the summer of 2012, when Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen become free agents, Danny Ainge might have a choice to make: sign second-tier free agents and maintain a semblance of competitive mediocrity, or gut the entire roster and attempt to rebuild through draft picks and trades.

Or maybe, if the Celtics get lucky, if Stephen Jackson’s sentiments are shared by the rest of the NBA, or at least by the marquee free agents of 2012, the Celtics could skip the rebuilding process and simply reload.

What say you, Dwight?