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The Ticker
6 days ago

Painful Reminders (Part I): The Celtics Drafted JaJuan Johnson Instead of Jimmy Butler

On June 23rd, 2011, Brian Robb and I stood around a high top bar table in Tommy Doyle’s in Kendall Square.  Before us lay one of the biggest mounds of buffalo chicken wings I had ever endeavor to make disappear.  These 25 cent flappers- one of the few indulgences afforded to the participants of our [...]

19
7 days ago

Chris Wilcox: 2012-13 Final Grade

There are a number of contextually-appropriate ways to craft this post. One would be to forgo words entirely, and represent Chris Wilcox’s entire season with a series of videos. That would involve one part of this: For every eight parts of this: Note the headline on that second clip. Someone was so amused/enraged by Wilcox’s [...]

12
8 days ago

Rajon Rondo’s 2012-13 Final Grade

Here’s a sweeping general statement involving super specific statistics that may or may not mean anything: In the 1423 minutes Rajon Rondo played this season, the Boston Celtics were outscored by 1.3 points per 100 possessions. When he sat (including all contests after he tore his ACL), Boston was better than their opponents by 1.8 [...]

93
8 days ago

Avery Bradley Elected to NBA All-Defense Second Team

Avery Bradley has been a standout defender for the past couple seasons…in the regular season anyway. Now he has a trophy to prove it. The NBA announced this afternoon that the third-year guard has been elected by coaches around the league to the second-team all-NBA defensive team for the first time in his career. Bradley [...]

13
12 days ago

Paul Pierce’s Contract: Dispelling The Myths and Stating The Facts

The first domino to fall this offseason is Paul Pierce’s contract. Until Danny Ainge figures out what he’s doing there, little else matters. As we wait for this decision, we also must face the rest of the offseason, which means it is also rumor season. With that time of year, comes plenty of information floating [...]

42
12 days ago

Final Grade: Avery Bradley (C+)

In his third year in the league, in which promising players often make brash leaps from benchwarmer to starter, from starter to star, Avery Bradley took a big step back. But his regression might be deceptive. When he returned to the Celtics’ lineup on January the 2nd after two in-season months recovering from offseason shoulder [...]

9
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Pierce Out “Indefinitely”/”Day-to-Day”

Is there  a more misleading word in sports reporting right now than “indefinitely”? When you read the headline that says “Boston’s Paul Pierce Out Indefinitely With Thumb Injury,” your first thought is, “What? Did he break it or something?”

Indefinitely, after all, means that the team has no idea when he will come back. And that’s technically accurate, since the Celtics don’t know exactly when Pierce will be back, according to ESPNBoston.com:

Boston Celtics guard Paul Pierce is out indefinitely with a right thumb injury and did not even come to the TD Garden Tuesday night for a game against the New York Knicks as he also has the flu, according to Celtics coach Doc Rivers.

Of course, he’s still listed as “day-to-day,” because the injury is not serious. All “indefinitely” means in this context is that the C’s will give Pierce as many games off as he needs, according to Doc Rivers:

“Oh yeah, I’m comfortable with any of our guys being out, I’ve gotten used to it,” joked Rivers. “It’s not what you want, but, listen, we went 3-1 [on a recent four-game road trip] without Paul giving us much of anything because of his health. We can win without him…”

I move to eliminate the use of “indefinitely” in the context of a day-to-day injury that keep a player out a day or a week. The word should be used when someone breaks their leg, needs to tend to his family (i.e. Allen Iverson right now) or has some sort of non-athletic medical problem to deal with. 

So: Pierce is day-to-day. Move along.

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