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7 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 [...]

19
8 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 [...]

12
9 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 [...]

93
9 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
12 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
13 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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Jason Collins Agrees to One-Year Deal With Celtics

With Greg Stiemsma skipping town, the Celtics wasted no time in locking up a true center to replace the big man, locking up the notorious Dwight Howard stopper and former Hawk Jason Collins to a one-year deal for the veteran’s minimum, according to Chris Forsberg of ESPN Boston.

THE GOOD NEWS ABOUT THE SIGNING

Collins is an incredibly good post defender and actually plays the pick and roll very well for a big man. I’ll let the numbers do the talking here (via Forsberg)

Collins allowed a mere 0.748 points per play last season, ranking in the 88th percentile among all NBA players, according to Synergy Sports data. He’s stout in the post and can defend the pick-and-roll. Able to match up with players of all shapes and sizes, Collins has the potential to thrive in Boston the way Stiemsma did when he settled into the team’s defensive system

THE BAD NEWS ABOUT THE SIGNING

Collins does not rebound, block shots or score well at all. It’s bargain basement shopping right now for the C’s and they got themselves a veteran one-trick pony. Collins has anemic rebounding rates on both ends of the floor for a center (although they are a little better than Ryan Hollins) and last year he averaged 4.6 points per 36 minutes! So despite those tremendous highlights you see in the video above, you’ll be getting that kind of scoring probably once or twice a season. Given the strength of the C’s bench now, Doc Rivers won’t be asking him to score at all so this shouldn’t be an issue.

The rebounding however is still a concern with this team and the addition of Collins does nothing to address that. Instead, it just makes the problem a little worse.

FINAL VERDICT
If Collins can play some D though, enough to let Garnett sit for 5-10 more minutes a game with Collins serving as an anchor on the defensive end of the floor, the C’s will take that in a second. I just hope Jared Sullinger and Chris Wilcox can dominate the boards as advertised…Boston’s second unit will need it.

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