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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 [...]

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6 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
7 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
11 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
11 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 [...]

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Starting With A Tough Slate

The C’s knew they would be challenged this season with Delonte West, one of their best performers in the second unit this preseason would be out of action for the first ten games. The bad news though? The schedule makers did not do the C’s any favors with the lineup they had the C’s facing. Julian Benbow of The Boston Globe covers just how challenging the lineup will be:

“When you read the list of teams we’re playing our first 10 games, it’s a brutal list,’’ Rivers said.

The lineup? It features matchups with Chicago, Milwaukee, a return date with Miami and road jaunts to Dallas, Oklahoma City and Memphis. The C’s will need to push themselves if they want to match their hot starts from their earlier seasons which has been their trademark:

“A 27-2 start the 08-09 season made it seem as though the Celtics were destined to defend their title. They ripped off 19 straight wins starting Nov. 14 and were 44-11 at the All-Star break. Then Kevin Garnett strained his knee in Utah in the first game after the break and the Celtics went 18-9 the rest of the way.

Last season, they shot out of the gates 23-5, and even though there were some warning signs (e.g. fourth-quarter collapses), the hot start let them get away with playing .500 ball the rest of the year as they navigated through a minefield of injuries on their way to the fourth seed in the East.

“We can’t dwell on what we’ve done in the past, getting off to good starts,’’ said Paul Pierce. “This is a new year, we’ve got new members on this team, and we have to help them understand that this is important for us down the road to get off to a good start, develop some confidence.’’

The good news about the schedule this year? If the C’s can get through this opening stretch they should be okay. There are no more long road trips (4 games tops it out) and the C’s have some quirky scheduling given them favorable home stretches (10 of 11 games at home in January) that teams like the Lakers had benefited from in past years.

So what can we expect out of this opening stretch? 7-3? 6-4? 8-2? The C’s have their work cut out for them no matter what it is.

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