BOSTON -- Danny Ainge, who found in a short baseball career he couldn't hit the breaking pitch, will soon get his chance to find out if he can hit the outside shot and lead a fastbreak in the National Basketball Association.
Ainge, who led Brigham Young University to the NCAA playoffs last spring while a third baseman for the Toronto Blue Jays, Friday jumped to the champion Boston Celtics of the NBA.
Ainge signed a multi-year contract with the Celtics, three days before a deadline given the team by the Blue Jays, who earlier won a court battle to keep Boston away.
'I'm excited to get started playing basketball. It's going to take me a couple of weeks, I'm sure (to get ready),' the 22-year-old Ainge told a packed news conference in Celtics President Red Auerbach's Boston Garden office.
'I've always been optimistic that everything would work out with the Celtics,' said Ainge who played pro baseball with the Blue Jays the last three years.
This season his batting average fell below .200 while the Blue Jays tried to keep him and the Celtics tried to sign him, after surprising the NBA by drafting him during the baseball season in June.
The agreement was reached following a day-long meeting in Boston involving his father Don, his agent Bob Quinney, Auerbach and Celtics owner Harry Mangurian.
No terms were announced, however the Celtics were expected to compensate the Blue Jays, who held Ainge under a contract that prohibited him from playing professional basketball until 1983.
'If all goes well, Ainge could be in uniform (No. 44) by Dec. 9,' when Boston hosts the New Jersey Nets following a road trip, Celtics coach Bill Fitch said.
'Danny is a good player. We know that,' Fitch explained, 'But he's four weeks behind every rookie. If he's as good as we think, it will only take him a couple of weeks.'
Also present were two Blue Jays representatives, including Vice President Pat Gillick. 'We are satisfied. We came out minus a third baseman, but you have to face up to it that he wanted to be a basketball player,' Gillick said.
Ainge, in another of Auerbach's drafting coups, was chosen in the second round of the June NBA draft after other teams had bypassed him because of his baseball career.
He repeatedly offered through the summer and fall to repay a $300,000 bonus to Toronto. Gillick said Ainge was allowed to keep all the money he'd been paid by the Blue Jays.
'All our dealings on compensation were with the Boston Celtics,' Gillick said. He said no one in Toronto received any calls from another NBA team concerning Ainge.
Mangurian and Auerbach have said they will ask the NBA to investigate charges of tampering against the Los Angeles Lakers and the Philadelphia 76ers. It has been reported representives of both teams told Toronto they would meet the Blue Jays' asking price of $1 million to release Ainge when the Celtics held the BYU All America's rights until the 1982 draft.
Auerbach on Friday reiterated that there 'definitely will be a full-scale investigation of the charges.' Ainge said he had no contact from other NBA teams.
Ainge, a 6-foot-5, 190-pounder, averaged 20.9 points per game in four years at BYU. His best season was his senior year last season when he averaged 24.2 points per game. In his BYU career he totalled 2,467 points with a career field goal percentage of .526. He shot at least 50 percent from the floor in all four seasons with the Cougars.
