All-time three-point king Ray Allen officially announced his retirement from the NBA on Tuesday, but that wasn’t news to his former Boston Celtics teammate Rajon Rondo.
The 41-year-old Allen, who played for 18 seasons in the league, confirmed that he was stepping away from the game in a letter to his younger self in The Players’ Tribune. But considering that Allen hadn’t played since the 2013-14 season, the news was a mere formality for some, including Rondo.
When asked about his reaction to the retirement of his former teammate, Rondo dropped the following line, per Sean Highkin of The Athletic:
Rajon Rondo on Ray Allen's retirement announcement: "I thought he'd been retired."
— Sean Highkin (@highkin) November 1, 2016
Allen and Rondo were teammates for five seasons in Boston, winning the 2008 NBA Championship together. But the two supposedly had an icy relationship and saw their time together end awkwardly when Allen signed with the rival Miami Heat in 2012 and won another title there.
Rondo, who is now a member of the Chicago Bulls, has alluded to the friction between him and Allen in the past. While Rondo may have been giving a bit of a tongue-in-cheek remark on Tuesday, bygones still don’t appear to be bygones now that Allen is officially hanging up his sneakers.
