Acquiring any player, whether it’s via trade, free agency, or the draft, comes with an air of uncertainty. The NBA has no guaranteed covenant and all sales are final, no matter how talented, proven, or productive the player may have been in year’s past. But these memories—especially recent ones—often clouds the judgment of a [...]
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 [...]
The Celtics won their first game last night since the trade that sent Kendrick Perkins to Oklahoma City. Still, there is not a whole lot of substantial information with which to walk away. The Celtics ultimately wore down a pretty bad, yet exciting, team and came away with the win.
Sure, Jeff Green and Nenad Krstic made their debuts which was pretty exciting. Green gave an underwhelming performance by going 2-for-5 from the field and finishing with seven points. Overall, the Celtics were a -10 with Green on the court and he had two turnovers. Oh, and as mentioned in my previous post, he got dunked on hard by Randy Foye. Check it out:
Yowzas!
Krstic, on the other hand, exceeded everyone’s expectations by not only being active on defense but also on the offensive glass (all six of his rebounds came on the Celtics’ side of the court). It was great to see a guy who is not known for is aggressive play or his toughness get his nose dirty. Most Celtics’ fans are worried about how fast these guys can assimilate to the Celtic way and it looks like Krstic is on board. If you’re the sentimental type that will wonder someday what Krstic’s first basket as a Celtic looked like, never fear. Now that you saw a seven-footer get stuffed by the rim you can wish you were left wondering.
Green will get better too. He looked out of sorts last night and most of his offense came on one-on-one moves. Unless you’re name is Carmelo Anthony or Kobe Bryant, you probably shouldn’t file away these moves as “go-tos”. These types of moves, however, are to be expected from offensive-minded players who haven’t had enough time to feel-out their teammates. Green’s mobility and size give me enough cause to be excited regardless of his blah performance. I really expected Green to attempt a few threes, a skill he has been working on since he found out he really couldn’t hack is it as an NBA power forward. Luckily for Cs fans, he didn’t. Watching new guys jack up three pointers is the fastest way to a fan’s dog house.
Odds and Ends
Despite this game really being about the newbies and how they would do, other things happened too. Most notably, this:
It scares me that this is humanly possible. This has to equate only to ninjas running up walls or contortionists doing things that give me intense heebie-jeebies. How Blake Griffin can do this at full speed (and not in a dunk contest) is beyond me. Really, I can’t even do this on a trampoline, on my most flexible day, and in an anti-gravity chamber. Trust me, I’ve tried. LeVar Burton took me to Space Camp in 1990.
Delonte West had his best game since his wrist has healed enough to allow him to play. He was incredibly active, deflecting passes and harassing Clipper guards. He also really showed us what to expect from him off the bench and ultimately what made Nate Robinson so expendable. He finished the game with 7 points and 5 assists. Do you think the Lakers would like this type of production from Steve Blake? Yes, yes they would.
Kevin Garnett filled up the box score with his second straight double-double. He finished the game with 16 points and 11 rebounds. He’s probably channeling all of his anger over losing Perkins into playing basketball, which makes me think the Celtics should purposely piss KG off before every playoff game. Thoughts?
Rajon Rondo had 11 assists but curiously only 2 points on 1-of-2 shooting. I tried to think back at how that could have happened and have made a conjecture: when the Celtics have a center who is an offensive threat, Rondo does not have to be so assertive with his offense. Should be interesting to find out whether that’s proven right or wrong.
Randy Foye scored 32 points on a series of really fast dribble pull up threes and strong moves to the basket. He looked like a faster Dwyane Wade last night and it may be safe to say he’ll never look like that again.
I know DeAndre Jordan is super tall and really athletic, but Chris Kaman is the best center on that team.
The most underrated part of this trade is that the Celtics all call Nenad Krstic “curly”. I can only guess that the nickname is derived from his name beginning with a “K” and that terrible Donald Trump comb-over/dead animal he sports on his dome-skull.That’s it for now. Much more later tonight and tomorrow so stay tuned.
The Ticker