Saturday Playoff Notebook: Predictions, Anti-Rondo D, Sheed’s Declaration and Calls for That Old-Time Celtics D

Posted by Zach Lowe on Apr 17, 2010 75384 commentshttp%3A%2F%2Fcelticshub.com%2F2010%2F04%2F17%2Fsaturday-playoff-notebook-predictions-anti-rondo-d-sheeds-declaration-and-calls-for-that-old-time-celtics-d%2FSaturday+Playoff+Notebook%3A+Predictions%2C+Anti-Rondo+D%2C+Sheed%27s+Declaration+and+Calls+for+That+Old-Time+Celtics+D2010-04-17+19%3A07%3A36Zach+Lowehttp%3A%2F%2Fcelticshub.com%2F%3Fp%3D7538

Let’s start with a round-up of playoff predictions we didn’t get to on Friday:

• SI’s Ian Thomsen puts the C’s in the category of “outsiders”—high-level teams a step behind the true contenders: 

They may be healthy – Kevin Garnett and Paul Piercelooked lively around the basket in their regular-season finale at Chicago — but the former champs know that health alone isn’t the solution to what ails them. The timing, the shared understanding and the faith in one another has diminished. They’ve lost their identity as a contender that attacks and defends the paint; instead they’ve become a perimeter team around Rajon Rondo and the three-point shooting of Pierce and Ray Allen.

This notion of a fractured locker room has appeared in so many places over the last month that it’s either true or has become a lazy journalistic short-hand to explain the C’s struggles—the sort of thing that is just accepted as true without much digging. Here’s a similar excerpt from Jackie MacMullan’s piece on KG that I highlighted earlier today:

There has been a shift in the Celtics locker room. Rajon Rondo and Kendrick Perkins yearn for more control, more shots, more cachet. Garnett, Paul Pierce, and Ray Allen understand they must sacrifice some of their numbers to stimulate that growth.

Do we know the first part of this sentence is true—that Rondo and Perk are itching to take control of the team? I mean, Rondo already has control of the team. Rajon spoke earlier in the season of guys playing with individual “agendas,” and the topic came up again in Gary Washburn’s Globe piece on tax day:

The Celtics’ locker room is fractured. There are the old schoolers (Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, and Michael Finley), the Sheed crew (Wallace, Robinson, and Daniels), and the future stars (Rajon Rondo and Kendrick Perkins), while the rest bounce from group to group.

Washburn tells us the locker room is fractured. Are we to take that statement at face value, without proof beyond the fact that different guys hang out in different cliques? Every team is like that, to varying degrees. Does the existence of cliques necessarily mean there is internal dissension? 

Washburn adds this about Sheed:

His stubbornness has stunned some of his teammates, and it has become apparent why the Pistons allowed him to leave.

Which teammates? When did his stubbornness stun them?

Washburn adds:

And a veteran team has at times refused to adhere to Rivers’s game plan or adjustments and freelanced in crucial moments. 

This is indisputably true. If you watch games, you see this team break plays now and then, and the athleticism of the team’s key players has declined to the point that the offense is not as effective anymore when the players break from the team’s (generally really good) offensive sets. 

• NBA Fanhouse uses a Bill James method to predict the Miami-Boston series, and that math says the C’s have a 64 percent chance of winning the series, with the most likely outcome being a C’s win in 7 (about 22 percent chance) or a C’s win in 5 (about 19 percent). Excerpt:

It’s totally unclear, still, if Rondo can step in and become the franchise once these other dudes expire. But his most impressive work to date came in last year’s playoffs, and he’s a premier defender out on the perimeter. He moves like he’s on his roller-skates all the time, throws assists with a strange combination of precision and carelessness, and seems to have taken a lot of method acting classes from Garnett.

• Bill Simmons, in a column all of you have undoubtedly already read, picks the C’s to lose in the first round:

I thought the Celtics played their fans this season. Don’t rope us in with “ubuntu” for two years then turn your back on it like it was a kabbalah fad or something. Don’t tell us to embrace “The New Big Three,” then shop Ray Allen for eight months like he was a used car. Don’t tell us our best forward’s knee is fine when we see him limping. Don’t blame the effort of your players after a loss when you played all 12 of them like they were Little Leaguers, or when you keep playing the one guy who exhibits no effort whatsoever without calling him out once. Don’t sign a second center for big bucks, then act surprised when the incumbent center bristles about his playing time.

Simmons is obviously angry and disgusted, and in a general sense I agree with his pessimism about this team. Of the three guys who write this site, I’m the one who picked Boston to lose to Cleveland 4-1 in the 2nd round, and I’m the one who is still sort of surprised that people think this team has a chance to win the title.

But there is more nuance to some of these things. I mean, should the Celtics not have shopped Ray Allen? Or if they were shopping him—and they were—were they obligated to, I dunno, stop selling his jerseys or pull him off programs or yank him from ads? 

And did the C’s really tell us KG’s knee was fine? I mean, sort of. They said it was structurally fine. But the team—and KG—have acknowledged, on occasions this season, that KG’s leg hurts, that he can’t be the player he once was, that his mobility is limited. People have said those things. KG has said those things. 

The deceit, to the degree there ever was any, happened last season, when the C’s kept the bone spur/tendon strain quiet and did not disclose the extent of KG’s injury until the off-season. But that situation is enormously complicated, and I’m still not sure the team owed its fans full disclosure if officials believed there was a chance KG might return for the playoffs. 

• Chris Forsberg picks the C’s in 5—the same pick I made—and has a nice, comprehensive preview of the series up at ESPNBoston.com. 

Among the key tidbits:

Doc: 

“I think this is the best Kevin [Garnett has] been since early in the season. I think Paul [Pierce] is feeling fantastic right now. So this is the healthiest, this is the best we can be right now. And that’s the good part.”

That’s great. So why did the team finish 3-7? 

Oh, because the defense fell off a cliff down the stretch. And as Forsberg notes, opposing stars often torched the C’s even though Boston geared entire defensive strategies toward stopping guys like Manu Ginobili. Here’s Doc on the D:

“Defense is what we hang our hat on and we haven’t done a good job with two things: high field goal percentages — teams are making [3-pointers] — and high point totals,” Rivers said. “Then the last thing is the fact that the best players are beating us. That, to me, stands out over all of them. Every night, the best player on the other team is having a big game against us. That’s something, hopefully, we can fix.”

Hopefully. 

• Rondo tells Forsberg he thinks the team should run against Miami, and I completely agree. The C’s can and should win the transition battle:

“We should be able to push the ball,” Rondo said. “If they miss shots, we’ll get in transition and go.”

• Jay King at Celtics Town wonders if Dwyane Wade will spend some time guarding Rondo. I’ll go further: I’ll be shocked if Dwyane Wade doesn’t spend a few possessions each game guarding Rajon. 

• Sheed tells the Globe he’s ready to start playing hard now that the playoffs have started. Well, he doesn’t say that, exactly. But he does say these games count the most, and that these are the games he came here to play. He also wants you to know that he doesn’t care whether you like him:

“I’m going to be me,’’ Wallace said. “Half of the people like me, half of the people don’t. I’m not out here to please the fans or whatever, I’m here to win the title. Some of the fans are mad with me. Some of the fans cheer for me. I can’t worry about that. I can’t play my game off that. So I’m going to go out there and do what I’ve got to do.’’

Sheed: If you think half the people like you, you’re over-estimating. 

He also isn’t worried about his horrid three-point shooting:

“It was nothing to write home about, but I’m not worried about it,’’ Wallace said. “It’s a down season coming into a new offense or whatever. I’m not worried about it. I’m not making no excuses on how I shot the ball or nothing. I know I had a bad year shooting, but it’s part of it.’’

Umm….OK. 

It goes without saying, but the Celtics need to do whatever they can to deal Sheed in the off-season. Sheed may have played so poorly that Larry Brown doesn’t even want him anymore, though. 

• John Schuhmann at NBA.com lists the 10 best five-man units (minimum: 100 minutes together) among playoff teams in terms of overall scoring margin, offensive efficiency and defensive efficiency. One Celtic unit appears among the 30 line-ups, and it’s on the defensive list. Put it this way: Line-ups with TA and Rajon together have been killer on defense. 

• The Detroit Free Press (hat tip: Red’s Army) reports the C’s might be interested in acquiring Richard Hamilton. 

Hamilton is 32 and scheduled to make $12.5 million per season (with only $9 million in the last season guaranteed initially) through 2013. The notion of Boston acquiring him makes absolutely zero sense.