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5 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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5 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 [...]

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6 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 [...]

92
7 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
10 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
10 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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Shaq Practices, Is Expected To Play In Game 3

Per Chris Forsberg of ESPNBoston.com with some key practice notes from the afternoon via Doc:

On the team’s health: “Everybody’s good,” said Rivers. “Everybody is feeling pretty good. Shaq went through practice, we didn’t do anything today, we just watched film and walked over some stuff, and then the second unit [not including O'Neal] worked on their stuff. Right now, we expect every single guy, including Shaq, to play [in Game 3].”

On Shaq’s chances of playing: Asked why he’s now more confident that Shaq could play, Rivers said with a laugh , “Because he told me he was going to play,” then added, “[Team trainer] Eddie [Lacerte] thought he would play, so I do expect him to play. If he didn’t, it would be because something went wrong in practice with his body. But right now, I expect him to play.”

Rivers admitted the team isn’t sure what Shaq’s practice workload will look like this week in order to prevent the sort of post-activity soreness he experienced after his first full on-court workout Monday in Miami. That soreness contributed to him not being active for Game 2.

“We’re not going to let him do too much,” said Rivers. “Someone will ask: How much is too much? Hell if I know. I don’t know what too much is. Walking on the floor could be too much. We’ll figure that out.”

On Ray Allen’s bruised chest: “It’s still a little tight,” said Allen. “It wasn’t bad, but I couldn’t do some of the things I wanted to do when I worked out. It feels a lot better from two days ago.”

Full analysis of Shaq’s potential impact on the starting lineup on the way later tonight, but it’s safe to say Saturday night’s main event just got even more intriguing if that’s possible. Does Shaq play an uneventful few minutes with a couple points and three quick fouls? Does he jumpstart Boston’s inept offense at the rim? Somewhere in-between? And will it even matter? Only 48 hours until we find out.

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