MIAMI — This is the revenge, the opportunity for Max Strus to settle the score, to prove the Boston Celtics wrong, to make Brad Stevens wish he never issued that pink slip.
Right?
“No,” Strus said to the Sun Sentinel during a private moment outside the Miami Heat locker room at FTX Arena. “This isn’t about me. This is bigger than me. It’s the Eastern Conference finals. There’s no personal vendettas here. We’re just trying to win a series.”
The difference is one team gave up on Strus at the start of his NBA career while the other saw so much potential that it signed Strus a year after a devastating 2019 knee injury.
“I had no idea Max played for the Celtics,” Heat center Bam Adebayo said. “I didn’t.”
That’s because technically Strus didn’t.
Signed by Boston during the 2019 offseason after going undrafted out of DePaul, Strus thrived with the Celtics in summer league and then made it to the final preseason cut. But on the eve of the regular season, Strus was released in favor of Javonte Green, another undrafted prospect.
“I think they went with the more defensive-minded player,” Strus said, with Green spending a season and a half with the Celtics, and now a season and a half with the Chicago Bulls. “But they said it was a tough decision for them to make. And everything happens for a reason.”
The formal notice of his Celtics release came from former Celtics executive Danny Ainge. There also was a parting moment with Stevens, who then was Celtics coach and now oversees Boston’s front office.
“Danny said it was a hard decision to make,” Strus said. “And I met with Brad, too, and he said the same thing. So it happens. It’s part of the business.”
All the while, a Plan B had been put in place, with Strus immediately signing a two-way contract with his hometown Bulls.
“It’s what happens,” Strus said. “It’s part of the business. It was my rookie season. Obviously they didn’t think I was the piece they needed, so they waived me and I signed a two-way with Chicago.
“It was the last minute. We knew that it was down to me or [Green], pretty much. So my agent kind of was working other areas already. So I knew if it happened, I was going home. So it wasn’t the worst thing in the world.”
Then the knee. Then a two-way deal with the Heat. And now a standard deal and starting role in the East finals, including three 3-point daggers in Game 1 in this best-of-seven series that moved on to Thursday night’s Game 2.
All the while playing without animus toward Stevens or his former Celtics preseason teammates.
“I know ‘em all,” he said. “They’re all good guys.”
And if there is a chip, it transcends those roster machinations at the end of Celtics 2019 training camp.
“Of course, always,” Strus said. “I have multiple chips on my shoulder, not just that. I have a lot of things that I could fall back on for motivation and to provide energy for me, so it’s not just that.”
Truth be told, it wasn’t until the eve of 2020 training camp that Heat coach Erik Spoelstra became aware of Strus, after a discussion with Adam Simon, the team’s assistant general manager.
“I remember the first time Adam brought up his name,” Spoelstra said. “I watched a bunch of film. That’s the first time I’d ever seen him play. It was literally a week before we signed him here.”
So, yes, Strus was willing to bleed green.
Even if it’s a chapter largely glossed over.
“I didn’t know who Max was until he got here,” Heat guard Tyler Herro said. “The first day he got here, he didn’t miss a shot. So I knew he wasn’t going anywhere.”
