Boston sent Bob McAdoo to Detroit on September 6, 1979 and received two 1980 first-round picks as compensation connected to the Celtics' earlier signing of M.L. Carr. McAdoo still produced 58 games at 21.1 points per game for Detroit in 1979-80, then appeared in only six Pistons games the next season before being waived. Boston kept both first-rounders together and on June 9, 1980 traded them to Golden State for Robert Parish and the No. 3 pick used on Kevin McHale. Parish played 1,106 Celtics games and McHale 971, with both becoming Hall of Fame pillars of three championship teams. Few downstream branches are more direct or more decisive.
Basketball-Reference records the September 6, 1979 transaction as Boston sending Bob McAdoo to Detroit for two 1980 first-round picks. The exchange was arranged as compensation for Boston's July signing of veteran free agent M.L. Carr. This review treats Carr as transaction context rather than an incoming trade asset. The assets scored here are McAdoo on Detroit's side and the two first-round picks on Boston's side.
McAdoo played 58 games for the Pistons in 1979-80 and averaged 21.1 points, 8.1 rebounds and 3.4 assists in 36.2 minutes. He was still a high-level scorer even though Detroit finished with one of the league's weakest records. The return did not last. McAdoo appeared in only six Detroit games in 1980-81 before the relationship ended. NBA.com's historical profile describes an injury-plagued Pistons stint and notes that Detroit eventually waived him after a grievance dispute. That leaves Detroit with 64 regular-season games from a star-level scorer, but no long-term asset chain from the transaction itself.
The decisive part of this trade came nine months later. On June 9, 1980, Boston sent exactly those two incoming first-round picks to Golden State. One was the No. 1 pick later used on Joe Barry Carroll. The other was the No. 13 pick later used on Rickey Brown. In return, Boston received Robert Parish and Golden State's No. 3 pick. The Celtics then used No. 3 on Kevin McHale. Because both Detroit picks from this exact transaction moved together in the Parish-McHale deal, this review can credit that downstream return directly rather than treating it as a diluted multi-branch outcome.
Parish played 1,106 regular-season games for Boston over 14 seasons. Basketball-Reference's franchise leaderboard places him second in Celtics history in games played. McHale played all 971 of his NBA regular-season games for Boston. He became a seven-time All-Star, a Hall of Famer and a three-time NBA champion. Parish and McHale joined Larry Bird as the frontcourt core of Boston's 1981, 1984 and 1986 championship teams. This is not a speculative value chain: the two picks received for McAdoo were the exact outgoing assets used to obtain Parish and the pick used on McHale.
Detroit did receive legitimate value. McAdoo remained a 21-point scorer in his first Pistons season, so the return was not empty. But 64 games of McAdoo cannot approach 2,077 combined Boston regular-season games from Parish and McHale, three championships with both players on the roster and two Hall of Fame careers.
Celtics Win, A+/C. Boston receives an A+ because the two first-round picks were directly converted into Robert Parish and the No. 3 pick used on Kevin McHale. Detroit receives a C because McAdoo still supplied one productive scoring season, but the stint lasted only 64 games and the opportunity cost became one of the most valuable downstream returns in NBA trade history.