If there has been one constant of the Big Three era in Boston, it has been a relative absence of crazy. Sure, little things have flared up from time to time, but unlike almost every other NBA locker room, there have been very few non-basketball items on the agenda.

That’s a far cry from Los Angeles, where it’s sometimes hard to tell where the game ends and “Entertainment Tonight” begins. From Kobe and Phil (and Shaq) to Lamar and Khloe and now Ron Artest and whoever, the Lakers aren’t just a basketball team, they’re a 24-7 reality show. (In Odom’s case, literally.)

The Lakers might be an extreme example, but in many ways the NBA exists as a marketing opportunity for various outsized personalities, and the league has profited handsomely from that exchange.

But the Celtics of Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce strode into that world and essentially demanded that it would all be about basketball, all the time. No petty arguments about shots or roles. (At least not publicly.) No pseudo-celebrity girlfriends. No weirdness. Just basketball. Even a character as strange as Stephon Marbury didn’t challenge the Celtics' way of doing things.

Doc Rivers deserves a lot of credit for this approach as well, as he has kept a hermetic seal on whatever distractions have risen internally over the last few seasons. It’s something he learned during his time with the Spurs, who are the other great “boring” team in the NBA.

But now the Celtics have a couple of problems. Of immediate concern is the loss of Glen Davis, the basketball player formerly known as “Big Baby,” who obviously tested the patience of his employers after emerging from a late-night skirmish with a childhood friend with a broken right thumb that will reportedly keep him out for 6-8 weeks.

“It’s no fun to have to deal with this,” Danny Ainge said to reporters in Cleveland before the Celtics took on the Cavaliers in the NBA’s nationally televised season opener.

No fun, indeed. It’s a pretty good rule of thumb for athletes in this town that it’s better to be in the back of the Herald than the front, especially if Laurel J. Sweet’s byline is on the story.

Even before the details began to emerge, Celtics owner Wyc Grousbeck took to the airwaves to express his frustration with Davis and publicly raise the notion that the team was prepared to suspend him, which would essentially cost Davis a few bucks off his new two-year contract.

First, the basketball stuff. Davis is the fourth Celtic to be injured since camp began. Bill Walker and Tony Allen still are recovering from surgeries and Brian Scalabrine tripped over a cameraman in New York and sprained his ankle. That leaves them with just 11 healthy bodies and sets an ominous tone for a veteran team that is trying to stay healthy and rest legs.

Of the four, Davis was the only one with a set spot in the Celtics' nine-man rotation, which means that Shelden Williams now has an enviable opportunity to prove himself as a quality player on a team with championship aspirations.

With four able-bodied big men, the margin for error for the Celtics' front-line depth is gone. Garnett played 33 minutes in the win over the Cavs, which was a few more than Rivers wanted to play him. He’ll probably manage his minutes a little more closely Wednesday night with the second half of the back-to-back against the Bobcats. There will be more situations like this over the next two months until Davis returns. 

Off the court, Davis has been humiliated. He has apologized via a released statement and he is supposed to do so in person to his teammates Wednesday before the Celtics play their home opener with Charlotte. The scene at the Garden will almost certainly be a media circus, whether Davis is there or not.

It would have been anyway, but for basketball reasons, after Rajon Rondo’s agent turned down the Celtics' offer of a contract extension. The two sides are said to be several million dollars apart annually, which is essentially the difference between the top five point guards in the league and the next tier, and also represents two different estimates of Rondo’s value as a basketball player.

Rondo isn’t the first player to operate under those conditions and he won’t be the last. He said all the right things before the game with the Cavs, telling reporters, “It’ll take care of itself. I just have to worry about doing my job tonight. Crazy timing, that’s all.”

Rondo’s agent, Bill Duffy, told Yahoo that Rondo would play out this year and become a restricted free agent. Ainge and Grousbeck indicated they would continue talking up until Saturday’s deadline. So, this story will drag on for a few more days at least.

It’s up to Rondo to make sure there’s no carryover if a deal doesn’t get done, and there probably won’t be since it is entirely in Rondo’s best interests to put together a monster season. But it’s still the first major contract issue that the Celtics have had to deal with during the season.

Throughout the Big Three era, the Celtics have prided themselves on keeping the distractions to a minimum. It’s just easier that way. Like it or not, they have one now with Davis’ actions. How they handle it — both on the court and off — will have a large bearing on how they begin the season.