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13 hours ago

Rondo Replacing Johnson on All-Star Team

The Herald got it right from Rondo’s agent. According to his agent, Bill Duffy, the Celtics point guard has been named to the Eastern Conference All-star roster, presumably to replace Joe Johnson, the injured Atlanta Hawks guard. This would be Rondo’s third all-star appearance. Nice birthday present for RR, who probably should have been selected [...]

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3 days ago

Comments Deleting?

We apologize if your comments are being deleted (provided that they are not offensive). We are looking into why this is happening. We also want to apologize for the lack of a game thread for last night’s game.  We had a premonition that the Celtics would play that poorly and thought if we pretended the [...]

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7 days ago

5 Questions With Greg Monroe

I talked with Detroit star forward Greg Monroe prior to the Celtics-Pistons game on Wednesday night.  Here is what the 2nd year big man out of Georgetown, who is averaging 16.4 points, 9.7 rebounds, 2.5 assists per game had to say. 1. Just your 2nd year in the league, but playing so well, were you disappointed [...]

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8 days ago

Call for Responses: 5-on-5

Readers! Last week’s responses to the 5-on-5 questions were really, really great. We had way more qualified answers than we were able to use. So we’re going to keep doing it! FOREVER. Here are this week’s questions: 1. Are you concerned about Rondo’s media boycott this week? 2. The trade deadline is less than a [...]

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11 days ago

5 Questions With Ronnie Brewer

I talked with Chicago starting guard Ronnie Brewer prior to the Celtics-Bulls game on Sunday.  Here is what the 6th year man out of Arkansas who is averaging 7.6 points, 3.1 rebounds, and 2.1 assists had to say. 1. You guys have a lot of the same players back from last year’s team which was [...]

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13 days ago

5 Questions With Josh McRoberts

I talked to Los Angeles back up big man Josh McRoberts prior to the Celtics-Lakers game Thursday night at the Garden.  Here is what the former Duke Blue Devil, who is averaging 2.9 points and 3.8 rebounds in his first year in LA, had to say. 1. How have you guys been able to deal [...]

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The Turkeys Are Back: Players, Owners Resume Discussions

After meeting Tuesday and Wednesday, NBA owners and representatives from the former NBA Players Association will meet again Friday. The two sides will attempt to negotiate an out-of-court settlement to the antitrust lawsuit filed by the players earlier this week (which would effectively be an agreement on a new CBA).

Save for this being the last gasp at staging the lucrative Christmas games, this probably reminds you of all the previous times the two sides have gotten together over the last two months, only to see negotiations collapse into the kind of acrimony that makes you wonder if this entire lockout is really just a grand piece of satire.

What’s different this time:

–A plan is in place for a 66-game regular season starting December 25.
As Ken Berger of CBS suggested earlier this week, Jim Quinn, former outside counsel to the players union and a key agent in resolving the 1988-99 lockout has become involved and may (per the NYT) have usurped Jeffrey Kessler as lead negotiator. Earlier in the lockout, you may remember David Stern characterizing Kessler’s conduct as “routinely despicable”. It stands to reason he thinks more highly of Quinn.
–There has been no more talk of the hard-line reset proposal the owners threatened. Negotiations have apparently picked up where they left off, with a presumptive 50-50 split on BRI, assuming progress can be made on system issues.
–Indications are the owners may now be willing to compromise on those system issues. ESPN’s Marc Stein notes that the owners have discussed allowing more latitude on the use of the full mid-level exception amongst tax-paying teams, a major issue for the players.

So, that’s where we stand.

So I ask you, on a scale of 1 to 10 with 1 being Kedrick Brown and 10 being Paul Pierce, how optimistic are you we’ll see a deal done in the next few days?

I’ve been consistently wrong on this stuff, but I’ll go with Bill Walton (a solid 7.5).

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

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