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9 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 [...]

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9 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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9 days ago

Danny Ainge Expects Doc Rivers & Kevin Garnett To Return, Unsure About Paul Pierce

A long, challenging offseason awaits Danny Ainge this summer. Before he dives in head first, he joined Salk and Holley on WEEI-FM 93.7 to discuss the multitude of decisions facing him this offseason, as well as the progress of Rajon Rondo in his rehab from ACL surgery. A few of the notable highlights from the interview. Ainge [...]

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9 days ago

Suns Hire Away Celtics’ Assistant GM Ryan McDonough

In one way or another, there will be change this offseason in Boston. That process started in the past couple days, with the first piece moving out coming as a name most C’s fans might not be familiar with. Yet, it was Celtics’ assistant general manager Ryan McDonough, one of Danny Ainge’s top lieutenants, who [...]

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11 days ago

Doc Rivers Finishes 13th in Coach of the Year Voting

It was a tough season for the Boston Celtics, and that includes for head coach Doc Rivers. The long-time coach battled to find the right fit for a lot of new pieces that were both underperforming and/or failed to pick up his schemes on both ends of the floor. Naturally, an unfortunate plethora of injuries [...]

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12 days ago

Overconfident Answers To Offseason Questions (Part 1)

It seems like every offseason since 2010 we’ve been through this: a myriad of questions and concerns about the Celtics’ roster that usually involve the possibility of the core of the team being dismantled. As we head into the summer of 2013, we’ve got a whole batch of questions, many of which will be familiar.  [...]

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Five Questions About Heat-Celtics

For the past month, ESPN.com has been running a terrific feature, pulling together a panel of five writers to pick up apart the finer points of the NBA Playoff picture. Today, Celtics-Heat is the topic of the hour and our own Hayes Davenport represented CelticsHub in the Q and A, along with Chris Forsberg and three members of the Heat Index. Here’s a sample of Hayes’ responses. You can check out the full piece by clicking here.

1. What do you take from the four Celtics-Heat regular-season games?

Hayes Davenport, Celtics Hub: My homerism glands are forcing me to chalk up the fourth game to the Celtics’ late-season apathy, but the takeaway from the first three is probably that the Heat are not looking forward to this matchup. The Celtics have an unnatural ability to force below-average performances out of the Heat stars, and that’s obviously the key to beating Miami.

2. Which player will you be watching most closely in the series?

Hayes Davenport, Celtics Hub: Rondo is the puppeteer of the Celtics’ offense, but this series will be decided on the other end, so I’ll be watching Kevin Garnett on defense. He’s going to try to be everywhere at once, and he actually can do that. But the motivated Heat are probably his greatest defensive challenge yet.

3. What’s the potential fatal flaw for each team?

Hayes Davenport, Celtics Hub: Miami’s fatal flaw is the belief among its star players that they’re really awesome at shooting from distance. Boston wants them to think this and plans to make them prove it.

Boston’s flaw, meanwhile, is its bench. With either James or Wade on the court at any time, the Heat have a chance to make runs against the Boston reserves.

4. What’s the potential fatal strength for each team?

Hayes Davenport, Celtics Hub: Boston’s strength against everyone they face, but especially Miami, is team defense. The Heat have several players who require multiple defenders to stop them, but sending a second defender to help is central to the Celtics’ defensive scheme.

Miami’s strength, of course, is that the best player in the league is on its side, and his best teammate isn’t Mo Williams anymore.

5. Celtics-Heat: Who wins?

Hayes Davenport, Celtics Hub: Boston in seven.

I think Miami is a better team than Boston. If the Heat get through this round, they have a better shot at beating the Chicago Bulls and the Western Conference champ than Boston does. But I also think the Celtics are the one team that can stop the Heat.

Stay glued to CelticsHub later today and tomorrow for a full series breakdown and predictions from the entire CelticsHub crew.

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