At the end of Jackie MacMullan’s excellent piece on the end of The Big Three, she quotes Pacers president Larry Bird regarding Danny Ainge’s asking price for Ray Allen.

“Here’s the thing,” Bird said. “When Danny and I talked about trading for Ray, he wanted Tyler Hansbrough and a first-round pick. If that’s the value he’s putting on Ray Allen, he ain’t getting it. That tells me he’s in no hurry to trade him.”

That jives with other talk around the league that Ainge’s price is high for one of his four All-Stars. On The Big Show on Thursday, Ainge said that he wouldn’t deal future assets to fix his bench’s problems now. He’s not desperate to make a trade, in other words.

The deadline is March 15 so there’s no rush to cave, especially when deals around the league are hung up on the Dwight Howard sweepstakes.