Lessons learned from my first experience as a credentialed reporter

Brad Stevens was part of a panel of coaches speaking at a fundraising breakfast this morning (at Fenway Park's EMC Club) for the Positive Coaching Alliance, and CelticsLife sent me there to cover it.  The media was given a few minutes of time with Coach Stevens beforehand.  Here are three things I discovered:

1. You have to be really aggressive.  I had a great spot standing right next to Stevens with my phone out and ready to record, but then a very small women somehow snuck in underneath me and boxed me out.  Luckily I'm tall and my phone is awesome, so I got good stuff anyways.

2. Make sure to have a follow up question to your question.  I asked Stevens if based on the top players likely to be left when the Celtics draft at #6 (Julius Randle, Aaron Gordon and Noah Vonleh, all most suited to be power forwards when Boston is already well stocked at power forward) if the C's would take the best guy available, or choose based on what position they need.  Here's his response:

"I would first of all, ask Danny [Ainge] that.  But my impression from all of our discussions is that with both picks, six and seventeen, we take the best available player."

Then he looked at me to see what was next, and all I had was "Thank you."

3. Think about what the answer is going to be ahead of time.  It felt like a good question when I came up with it.  But as soon as he said that I realized there was no way his answer could have been anything else.  The Celtics are playing a chess game right now, and there's zero chance Stevens would come out and say in a press conference what they intend to do with their lottery pick.

I'll have many more quotes from Stevens and a video clip or two in my article for CelticsLife tomorrow.

6/14 UPDATE - Here it is: Brad Stevens talks about preparing for next year, drafting best available player regardless of position



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