Jrue Holiday was one of two players the Bucks traded for Damian Lillard.
In the 2023 offseason, the Milwaukee Bucks orchestrated a three-team trade and traded Jrue Holiday, Grayson Allen, a 2029 first-round pick, and two pick swaps in exchange for Damian Lillard. Lillard and Giannis Antetokounmpo stand out as one of the best duos in the league today.
Holiday lambasts Bucks for how they handled trading him
Holiday, who won an NBA title with the Bucks back in 2021, revealed that Milwaukee didn’t give him a heads-up that he would be traded for Lillard until the last minute.
“I’m taking a nap. I see a call from the GM, and I’m like, ‘I’ll call him back.’ Like I’m deep in this nap, too. It’s a good one. Two seconds later, my agent called me. So I pick up his call, he’s like, ‘You talk to him?’ I’m like, ‘Nah, bro. I’m sleeping.’ He’s like, ‘Well, you just got traded, so you should probably call him back.’ And then I end up looking at my phone. He ended up texting me everything that was happening and like, ‘Yeah, we traded you here, here.’ And then I ended up calling him, and he ended up saying like, ‘Yeah, we traded you for Damian Lillard.’ So, I also had no clue. I think for me it was just a shock because at least let me know 24 hours in advance, not five minutes in advance,” Holiday said.
Jrue is thriving in Boston
Shortly after getting dealt to the Portland Trail Blazers, Portland traded Holiday to the Boston Celtics. So far in his first season in Boston, Holiday has significantly impacted a Celtics team that boasts the best record in the NBA by a considerable margin right now at 57-15.
Holiday is scoring significantly fewer points per game this season than he did in his last season in Milwaukee (12.8 compared to 19.3), but he is averaging a career-high 5.4 rebounds per contest to go along with 4.9 assists, 0.9 steals, and 0.8 blocks per game.
Moreover, the 33-year-old has managed to avoid the injury bug for the most part since joining the Celtics, as despite sitting out the last five games with a shoulder injury, he has appeared in 61 of Boston’s 72 regular-season contests to this point.
