Nov 5, 2016

  • Chris ForsbergESPN Staff Writer

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    • Covered Celtics since 2007
    • Emmy laurels-winning videographer
    • Joined ESPNBoston.com in 2009

WALTHAM, Mass. -- For the better part of the past calendar week, Boston Celtics guard Isaiah Thomas has been seeing tweets from fans who have encountered the "Pick Me Last Again" signage that Nike has pasted all over Boston'southward transit stations as part of the company'south "Come Out of Nowhere" entrada.

Thomas, the 60th pick in the 2011 typhoon who has elevated to All-Star status in Boston, is ane of 10 players spotlighted in Nike'south NBA promotion. Told at that place were some signs at Due north Station, the railway that sits below TD Garden, Thomas had his wife, Kayla, snap some pictures during Wednesday'south dwelling house game against the Chicago Bulls.

Only his followers repeatedly implored him to get to South Station, the city's largest railroad station and bus last. So after a late dinner with Kayla and a friend, Thomas ventured over to South Station in the early on hours of Saturday morning. The edifice was locked, merely Thomas managed to sneak in when one of the doors opened from within. Thomas encountered workers still constructing a sprawling black-and-white brandish that includes multiple hanging banners and gigantic window coverings above the main entrance.

"That was similar a dream. I tin't even explicate it," Thomas said. "The workers said they've been doing information technology for the last four or five days and they've nonetheless got way more to do. I was taking pictures and [security] was telling me that it was against the rules to accept pictures in the train station, but I kept telling them, 'I know you got to practice your task, but I'm taking these pictures and these videos. I'm sorry.'"

Even as Thomas' glory status explodes in Boston, these are still compression-me moments for the 5-foot-9 guard who has propelled Boston back to contender condition since his arrival at the 2022 merchandise deadline. Thomas has improbably elevated to get the face of the one of the nearly storied franchises in NBA history, but seeing his paradigm all over Boston's near trafficked commuter stations left him in awe.

"I tried to FaceTime my mom and dad," Thomas said. "It was tardily, but I tried. They didn't reply. The people who were putting upward the signs, they wanted to take pictures. They said, 'Nosotros never get to take pictures of the people we put upwards.' It was a great moment. God has blessed me in ways that I never thought would happen."

Thomas knew Nike was putting together a commercial spot featuring himself, Golden Land Warriors big man Draymond Dark-green and Indiana Pacers forward Paul George, simply he didn't know the telescopic of Nike's transit campaign.

"Nike said they had something special for me, only I didn't know it was going to be that," Thomas said. "When people sent me pictures on social media, it was of like North Station, and so my wife had taken a flick of it last game. Just the next day someone said South Station had bigger ones. I'yard similar, 'I gotta go by this.' Then that was my get-go time ever even at Southward Station. The posters are similar everywhere. It's unbelievable.

"When I went last nighttime, me and my married woman, nosotros had a moment."

This is only the start of Thomas' image taking over the city. Over the summer he filmed some commercial spots for Mountain Dew, and that campaign is expected to put him on billboards and buses effectually the city.

"It'due south crazy," Thomas said. "I only grinning because I don't fifty-fifty know how to draw it."

For the "Come up out of Nowhere" entrada, Nike released a actor-edition shoe for Thomas, customizing its HyperLive to include a dark-green-and-black Celtics colorway. Thomas tin't assist but dream bigger now.

"Maybe that'll exist the next thing -- I get my own shoe," Thomas said. "Who knows? Information technology would be great to have my own shoe, just it's a approving just to exist in this position."