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 [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
Offensive Efficiency: 134.1 points/100 possessions (2nd highest of any NBA game this season)
Defensive Efficiency: 97.6 points allowed/100 possessions (near league best)
(Earlier I had this game as the highest offensive efficiency of any game this season. This was wrong. It’s 2nd highest. Very stupid 3:00 AM mistake. Thanks for your patience).
Be measured with your pats on the back for this game. Yes, the C’s shot their highest percentage in almost two years. Yes, nobody played more than 30 minutes and the starters were out by the fourth quarter. But they did all these things against a defense of almost supernatural ineptitude. The Wizards made their own team name sound sarcastic tonight.
The Celtic lead was only five after the first quarter tonight, but the ending was Shutter Island obvious. The C’s shot 68% and gave up 43% at that point, with the Wiz numbers coming on a lot more shots because A) they pulled down 10 offensive boards and B) the C’s gave up four steals on bad passes in the first four minutes. The Wizards were also being rewarded for terrible shot selection: guys like Gilbert Arenas, Al Thornton, and Nick Young would take a few obligatory dribbles and then, six seconds into the possession, pull up with a long two that they would somehow drain. The Celtics want you to think you can hit those shots for an entire game. By all means, keep taking those.
The lead closed to 3 early in the quarter thanks to a Gilbert trey, some fudged possessions by Nate, and a gangly slam from JaVale McGee. Then the starters came back in and everything was fine. They found each other all over the floor, Shaq continued to abuse the 7-foot, 150 McGee in the lane, and the C’s went on a 16-4 run from which the Wizards would never recover. They absolutely rolled over in the second half. The whole evening ultimately felt like a Shutter Island waste of time.
If you watched this game, you saw at least one high-percentage scoring opportunity on virtually every single trip down the floor for the Celtics. This Wizards team does not know the first thing about defensive rotations, nor any of the other things.
Many, many times tonight a C’s ballhandler took a couple of steps into the paint and no less than three Wizards converged on him, leaving two Celtics on the wing or under the basket trying to figure out how they were suddenly so open. Every Celtic screen seemed to leave two Wiz defenders on either the screener or the ballhandler. For a team that moves the ball as well as the Celtics, this is how you end up with more assists (32) than your opponent has field goals (31). Flip Saunders looked like he never thought a team could make him hate basketball this much.
Here’s a quick representative photo essay and then we’re done with this. First, Rondo approaches Kirk Hinrich at the arc. Like any respectable doorman would, Hinrich creates an unobstructed path for Rondo.
"Evening, Mr. Rondo! Lovely weather we're having."
As Rondo slips Hinrich a two-dollar bill on his way into the lobby, Trevor Booker steps in with a proposition to race Rondo to the hoop backwards.
Rondo cheats and attacks the rim forwards. But all is not lost for this Wiz defensive possession, as Hilton Armstrong, behind Booker, has plenty of time here to contest Rondo’s shot at the rim, or at least administer a smart foul to a poor free throw shooter. In this shot it actually looks like maybe that’s what he has in mind.
Instead, Armstrong gets about three feet, then stops and watches Rondo roll in the two.
Also, how funny is Nick Young (in the corner on Delonte) in these shots? Look at him briefly consider helping out and then go back to just standing around. Anyway, the Wizards ran this anti-play multiple times on both Rondo and Delonte. Blecch. Let’s just hope the C’s didn’t have their conception of opposing defense irreparably shifted before the Thunder game Friday.
Quick Notes:
Glen notched another charge tonight on Andray Blatche. I’ve heard varying reports that say it was either his 16th or his 17th. I honestly don’t care how many it is as long as he continues to make that “the nerve” face as somebody picks him up off the ground.
Man, is JaVale McGee a crazy player. He’s Tony Allen plus eight inches and a huge hit of meth. Watch this clip, which contains, in 26 seconds:
-a spectacular rebound over the C’s 3, 4, and 5
-perhaps the worst shot I’ve ever seen in a basketball game
-a perfectly timed steal on the entry pass
-a heads-up monster jam off a Hinrich miss
What a terrible/awesome guy to have on your team. Every single part of that sequence was hugely entertaining.
Hey, here’s a trivia question: name another active player who, like JaVale McGee, has a capitalized-decapitalized-capitalized letter sequence in both his first and last name. Then name a trivia question better than that one, if that’s even possible.
Brendan begged Celtics fans in his precap not to make Luke Harangody the next Scalabrine with patronizing crowd overreactions as they did at times this evening. I vehemently support Brendan’s initiative: Scalabrine shouldn’t even have been the old Scalabrine. But I have zero faith that this won’t happen again with Luke. I mean, he’s white, Irish, probably not that great at basketball, and his name has an “oo” sound in it. We’re just going to have to adapt to this reality.
Here’s a great Tommy joke you may have heard:
(Al Thornton dribbles over halfcourt and throws up yet another contested pull-up 20-footer)
Mike: Al Thornton comes up firing!
(12 seconds pass on the game clock as Tommy formulates his response)
Tommy: They didn’t hear about the defense budget deal.
So good. The Wizards, even though they reside in our nation’s capital, obviously hadn’t heard about proposed reductions in national defense spending because they were firing. I love it. Tommy also said tonight that you should only get in the lane with Shaq “if you’re into self-abuse.” Huge night for Tommy all around.
Hey Lester Hudson! I did not know you were on this team. Still, great to see you and good luck in all your endeavors.
The Ticker
