Laughable Report Claims Celtics Were Victims of Tampering With Kyrie Irving and Al Horford

Are the Boston Celtics really complaining about tampering?

On Monday, a report from Mark Murphy of the Boston Herald came out that the Celtics were victims of tampering. This report comes less than a day after both Kyrie Irving and Al Horford leave the Celtics to join the Brooklyn Nets and the Philadelphia 76ers respectively.

In the article, Murphy stated that the timing of the deals was curious, as it seemed as though these deals had been done for a while. However, the same thing could be said about new Celtics point guard Kemba Walker, who had reportedly had a deal with Boston on June 29th.

These three deals weren't the only reported contracts done before free agency, as a plethora of players agreed to deals in principle before 6 p.m. on Sunday night. It's well known that teams don't take the tampering rules seriously, as there really aren't any meaningful repercussions for violating such guidelines. Therefore, is the timing of the deals that led Irving and Horford to leave Boston all that curious? Not at all.

There is absolutely no reason for this to be reported, especially when the Celtics are no stranger to tampering themselves. Everyone tampers in the NBA, you just have to accept it and move on.