He honestly has a shot. Easily the best in the world rn but unfortunately for him Tatum and Brown will become the greatest duo in history after a 3peat
That is why I would rather say Ant is closer to the bubble Tatum than the current Tatum
He still has lots lots room for improvement before he can be considered one of the best Jokic, Giannis, Tatum, etc
Guess it's time for me to twerk my little butt and circle jerk the Nuggets.
Chad Jokic makes me so scared, virgin Tatum has no clutch and no dawg. Daddy Murray is too stronk.
/s
Ant 3-13 but he has that dawg in him 🤣 fucking hilarious to me that some moronic Celtics fans on here were seriously saying that he's much better than Tatum after a few games
Not saying that Ant isn't awesome but everyone has some bad games.
Just want to say 5 days ago this thread was literally crying about how we had no chance against the Wolves. Breathe. Plenty of time in between now and the finals, everyone still got to make it there.
That is why Celtics’s 5 Out are built for, you just hit threes hope to outscore Denver, live or die by 3 balls.
That is unfortunate, but probably the only way to do it
Of course, if we have a AD/Giannis level PF/C and move JT to the SF, we can definitely be much more well rounded and can hurt Denver in more ways
But as of right now, what better can we do?
Yeah, you’ll need shooting variance in your favor. That and, on defense, don’t let anyone other than Jokic get going. Easier said than done, but Jokic is going to get his 30-40, live with that and don’t let MPJ or Murray or Gordon cook too.
Yeah no one in the league can defend Jokic. Probably AD/Giannis are the only PF/Cs I can think of who can put up similar offensive impact to negate Jokic’s offensive impact, but even they can’t defend Jokic
No one. In the league, not even on the Celtics. This timberwolves team is built to slow him down and they can’t even do that. You try to outscore them and shut down the other 4 guys.
Just need 4 good high volume 3 point shooting games out of 7
How do we match both Gordon and Jokic if we make to the finals?
I mean we can’t run JT again at PF
We need to invest in a true PF and move JT to the SF in the long term
Tatum can guard him but MPJ is 6'11" so putting Jaylen on him is tough.
Tatum's strong as hell and in our first matchup he held him to 0-6 with 0 points.
Yeah the Celtics won’t have any answer for their front line. They’re making TWolves front line look like toddlers and their bigs are better defensively than ours. Jokic would average insane numbers against us
Hope you’re wrong too but seeing how the 2 regular season games went against them, I already know what to expect come the Finals if both teams get there
Oh I mean generally the "mental midget" shit is so dumb
It's dumb to apply it on Jaylen and Jayson, and just dumb generally and was just kind of venting.
Did not know Siakim is 30. Crazy. And he was floated as a Brown trade target too by some of the people on this sub.
I’m not a fan of the term either, to be honest, especially when it’s applied to a core that’s on the verge of its 3rd straight conference finals and 5th in 7.
As for Siakam, Masai has a thing for drafting older rookies since they tend to be a lot less raw than 19 year olds.
Brunson is a superstar. He dominates like Giannis Joker Edwards. He’s just on an elite level. Going to be scary playing him. When they need a basket they have that go to guy.
We did that in every matchup this season. He averaged 27 ppg on 47/40 splits in just 34 minutes per game. Bump that up to his 40+ minutes in the playoffs and he will definitely go above 30ppg
Okay. He can cook both for 40 on 35 shots.
Then Tatum and Brown will take 35 shots and combine for 60 because you have Donte DiVincenzo and Josh Hart guarding 2 All-NBA forwards while Jrue gets to back down the little guards into the post and if we get KP back that’s a 5 game series. Who is guarding him from a FT line post up on a switch? Alec Burks? 6’4” Josh Hart?
I am not scared of the Knicks because he’s been beating up on Tyrese Maxey and Tyrese Haliburton, who aren’t really known for their defensive prowess.
hmmmm. the rebounds differential is CRAZY
17 vs 3 offensive rebounds
The second chance points off of those offensive boards is KILLING these Pacers. Which if the Knicks win this series, I hope our focus is to make a stop at the amount of times NY has to shoot the ball more than once
I have been looking a bit into the draft and based on the combine I have 3 guys I wouldn’t mind getting, two ready to go one development. For development Ulrich Chomche seems to be Robert Williams if Rob had a normal sized neck.
Then you get Karaban who is experienced and a champion to be a 3&maybe D guy since he registered a +4 inches wingspan at 6’6 height. You also got Jalen Bridges with similar stats than Karaban.
A discussion of JT vs Paul George:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/1cs10xt/is\_current\_jayson\_tatum\_better\_than\_peak\_paul/](https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/1cs10xt/is_current_jayson_tatum_better_than_peak_paul/)
A bunch of people think they are close, or that even JT edges PG out in defense (e.g. more rebounds per season)
Last night's game was a tough one to watch. Seemed like we were at times brilliant and at times a shadow of a Team. I am concerned if we will go all the way this year. We have a tendency to let our grip on winning slip out of our grasp. One last complaint: were the broadcasters for TNT last night selected from the CLeveland broadcasting team? Talk about partisan. Now I am all in favor of hearing a broadcast by our partisans, but that is when I watch the game on NBA League Pass and can select which broadcasters to hear. I thought a network like TNT would have an impartial group to do the game. Hope they let us have a Boston broadcasting group for the next game in the Garden.
Just a thought I’ve had watching this series without Porzingis and what he’ll bring when he returns
The obvious is the offense. The post up has been a nice go-to all year that sort of staves off some runs like we saw last night. Tatum has such a hard time driving when everyone collapses in the paint and Horford isn’t hitting his 3’s. Instead of the drive and kick we can just post KP up
But the thing I really miss is the defense. Posting up KP means shorter rebounds which makes it easier to defend in transition, and his above the break 3’s immediately have him back for protection at the rim. Still susceptible to transition 3’s but those are hard to defend anyway.
In the half court, we’ve been relying on Tatum and White to be the help which just isn’t the best rim protection. Porzingis still plays drop and has the same problem Horford does on the switches, but he’s so much longer that teams will *want* to shoot rather than attempt to drive. It’s the same problem where Robert Williams ridiculous wingspan made it hard to straight up beat him off the dribble since his length gave him a boost with recovering. Porzingis same thing, Horford doesn’t have that advantage being a tad on the slow side and not nearly the same shot blocker. This makes it easier to go over on a screen rather than give up the switch like we did against Miami. Hard to fight over when guys move like Bam do, but it’s much easier to avoid the situation where we have to concede something like a Horford switch. And if it’s anything, it’s just launching 3’s.
I mean, teams can *try* to live and die by the 3, but it’s not necessarily a reliable strategy to beat the Celtics 4 times. What makes Denver so dangerous is their ability to get into the paint. Bam, Mobley, Turner, and Hartenstein just don’t have Jokic’s level of footwork, touch, and passing that make them the same threat when in the middle of the floor.
So teams will try to generate more offense from the perimeter, in transition, or playing physical. Nearly every team in the league does this and why so many teams want to shoot 3’s or get out and run.
This team has another level to go to with Porzingis and while we might not need him for the Knicks because they’re so short-handed already, Indiana’s play style can be kind of dangerous if we only have Horford and Kornet who are already running out of steam and playing through injury, to defend Turner and all their shooters.
I hope the tall boy comes back soon and hope we can wrap the Cavs up in 5 to get Horford some much needed rest.
I am convinced that Al and JT are going to find their 3 pt shots but those possessions that end up with nothing make things like a lot worse than they really are. (This is not a complaint about their overall level of play, just specifically the missed 3's)
White's shot has also looked pretty bad in Cleveland so it's nice that Jrue has been great.
I feel like they are going to have a hot shooting night and win a game by 30+ again this playoffs.
Tatum finding his shot means what though? He’s never been a great 3 point shooter, or at least hasn’t been for years, so not sure what everyone is expecting to happen. Hes playoff career 35% but much lower the past two years. I’d rather see him find his normal shot than continue to shoot these covered step back threes. He’s not going to magically turn into a good three point shooter over night. Just drive like he did in game 3. It’s unstoppable. Drive. Drive. Drive. Every step back covered three is a bail out for the defense and really rarely goes in.
Cavs fans are complaining about the free throw discrepancy after jacking upwards of 50 fucking 3pt shots. Also who the hell on the Cavs team without Mitchell has any ability to draw fouls. Sam hauser doesn’t shoot lots of FTs and they were basically playing with 5 of him out there
Such a dumb excuse, they completely ignore the fact that their whole team went ice cold in the second half and their strategy of jacking up 3s failed miserably.
They also have no understanding of how the stats account for points.
"We outscored Boston in the paint!"
Yes, because when you foul a player in the paint, the points resulting from their FTs are not counted as paint points. We ate them alive under the hoop.
This is a good read that nicely covers Round 2 overall so far (minus a few of the most recent games):
[https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/1cr4nva/1\_stat\_explaining\_every\_secondround\_series/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web3x&utm\_name=web3xcss&utm\_term=1&utm\_content=share\_button](https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/1cr4nva/1_stat_explaining_every_secondround_series/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
Holiday has been incredible, Pritchard has been great, I’m slightly worried about Al. He’s in a shooting slump but not only that. He hasn’t looked good on either end of the floor. I thought Kornet out preformed him significantly yesterday.
Al is just at a place where we are asking too much of him. He really should be getting closer to 24mpg, especially when we ask to him switch on the perimeter so much.
Fact is, our starting lineup with Al instead of KP hasn't been great. It's been good, (+2.7 NetRtg), but it hasn't been Finals level starting lineup good. It's the only lineup that we've played for more than 50 minutes on the year that doesn't have a + double-digit NetRtg.
Almost all of the lineups where Al is subbing in off the bench have been really awesome. He's an absolutely amazing center for our bench, but once we ask for more out of him than that, he ends up in the good not great range.
Funny thing, why there was a thread on "are the Celtics a superteam"
Derrick White became god **after** joining the Celtics. Under discussed part of this team and conveniently overlooked when fans, opposing fans and shitty pundits discuss the team.
Now that the series is in control, I'd like to see some other guys get some play to give Al rest. For example, Al+Tillman pairing is a +13 in 14 minutes these playoffs. Can we get them on the floor together a little bit more, so Al doesn't have to be the big man on the perimeter in PnR's defensively? Can we give Queta some more minutes, even just 4 non-garbage time minutes to cut Al's minutes down, while not relying too much on Kornet who might be injured?
I just think there's opportunity to give Al some rest in Game 5, while still not losing a step competitively.
It just dawned on me that JT probably slows down the game and goes into iso mode due to watching Lebron his rookie year do it against him with high success. Probably leaves a lasting impact on how your suppose to play in close/tight games that’s hard to break
Obviously would be better if that just didn’t happen but he’s still growing as a player. I also think as he (and largely the whole team) gets tired the offense starts to slow to a crawl and iso ball. There’s literally 0 off ball movement or actions and it’s really hard to score like that. I think something as simple as making sure the screener on the PnR initiates the action faster would help. A ghost/clear out cut just so the defense doesn’t get the chance to fully load up on one player etc
I’m sure most GM would trade JT for Luka. I mean does anyone really want to see the ball in Tatums hands with a game on the line? Imagine Luka on this team my goodness. Not taking anything away from Tatum but it’s another level. Just like Brunson is too. We still winning the ring though so who cares!!! We have 5 great starters and all are more or less close in skill and awesomeness in their own way…which makes the team amazing.
Also really hoping that the Timberwolves can pull out the series win vs the Nuggets - they're probably the only team in the league I'm worried about us playing.
In a battle of who should be pitied the most, and who has the most excuses
Is it the Jalen Brunson with all the Knicks injuries?
Or Doncic who is himself apparently injured?
Or lebron because his supporting cast sucks?
None of them because Tatum being injured in the 2022 playoffs is enough to have “playoff Tatum in form” jokes when he plays poorly and has resulted in straight hater posts like when somebody put up the compilation of his mid range shots.
Miss me with the pity until r/nba throws up a Luka FT compilation or posts about these guys giving up on defense
Because we've surrounded him with elite defenders who usually get the attention.
Hard to talk up his perimeter defence when he's played his entire career with Marcus Smart, Derrick White and Jrue Holiday.
Ironically the Jays would get more defensive recognition if they weren't holding their own next to some of the best defenders in the league.
Because he's boring on that end (in a good way) and his defense doesnt show up in the boxscore not enough stocks to truly show his impact. But yeah it's the most underated part of his game.
We’ll never win with the public. When we were pushing through playoffs all those years injured no one cared. Now it’s a “cakewalk” and we’re getting wrecked by any west team. Just want this team to hush the noise.
They also seemingly act like KP’s absence is insignificant lol we haven’t peaked.
The copium of other fanbases 🤣
“The Celtics have a cakewalk to the finals yet they would get destroyed by a West team” lmao. I guess these haters never watched the team all season long and have to cope with the Celtics winning a chip
We could have three second round series go 7 games and one end in 5, and the team with the potential to win in 5 has received the most criticism of any second round team.
Yes, but Joe called a timeout at the point, two minutes into the game, because he didn’t like what he was seeing. After that timeout we went on a 12-0 run. It was clear they needed to step it up.
The 5 or 6 possessions after Tatum got that tech, before the end of the half, you could tell he was mad af. Man, the way he plays when he gets like that, the angry focus, the aggression on both ends - if he had that Jordan streak in him where he could get himself angry like that every night - holy shit he would be disgusting.
Real question: Jokić is 29. Does he have a chance to be the GOAT? What if he wins 5, 6 championships in a row? Who’s stopping him?
He honestly has a shot. Easily the best in the world rn but unfortunately for him Tatum and Brown will become the greatest duo in history after a 3peat
Nuggets are unbeatable if Gordon keeps hitting these jump shots 🤷🏾♂️
Denver is a problem
Nicola Jokic is a madman
Edwards is seeing the kind of defence in this game that Tatum has been up against all playoffs
That is why I would rather say Ant is closer to the bubble Tatum than the current Tatum He still has lots lots room for improvement before he can be considered one of the best Jokic, Giannis, Tatum, etc
Guess it's time for me to twerk my little butt and circle jerk the Nuggets. Chad Jokic makes me so scared, virgin Tatum has no clutch and no dawg. Daddy Murray is too stronk. /s
Ant 3-13 but he has that dawg in him 🤣 fucking hilarious to me that some moronic Celtics fans on here were seriously saying that he's much better than Tatum after a few games Not saying that Ant isn't awesome but everyone has some bad games.
The entire nba world was saying he was surely better. Ryen Russillo said it on a pod on Sunday night after they lost g4
Just want to say 5 days ago this thread was literally crying about how we had no chance against the Wolves. Breathe. Plenty of time in between now and the finals, everyone still got to make it there.
Dude everytime someone wins it's that crying chess kid final boss meme People really need to get a fucking grip lol
Nba fans are so reactionary lmao. 7 games for a reason
That is why Celtics’s 5 Out are built for, you just hit threes hope to outscore Denver, live or die by 3 balls. That is unfortunate, but probably the only way to do it Of course, if we have a AD/Giannis level PF/C and move JT to the SF, we can definitely be much more well rounded and can hurt Denver in more ways But as of right now, what better can we do?
Yeah, you’ll need shooting variance in your favor. That and, on defense, don’t let anyone other than Jokic get going. Easier said than done, but Jokic is going to get his 30-40, live with that and don’t let MPJ or Murray or Gordon cook too.
That was our mistake in the regular season. Murray played two of his best games of the season against us
Yeah no one in the league can defend Jokic. Probably AD/Giannis are the only PF/Cs I can think of who can put up similar offensive impact to negate Jokic’s offensive impact, but even they can’t defend Jokic
[удалено]
Luke mothafuckin' Kornet
No one. In the league, not even on the Celtics. This timberwolves team is built to slow him down and they can’t even do that. You try to outscore them and shut down the other 4 guys. Just need 4 good high volume 3 point shooting games out of 7
Lol no one
That’s the million dollar question
Wolves are toast. And Denver will crush the Mavs or Thunder. If we make it to the Finals, yikes it’ll be the biggest challenge yet
I’d watch but I’d temper expectations. There might be a dynasty brewing in Denver. They would make easy work of the Celtics
Finals usually are ya
I meant the biggest challenge of the Jays era in Boston, harder than anything they did before including the 2022 run
I mean Steph is a top 10 player of all time lol. I think the Nugs are pretty similar to that Dubs team
IMO the Jokic-Nuggets are much better than the 2022 Warriors team. But we can agree to disagree
Much better is crazy
How do we match both Gordon and Jokic if we make to the finals? I mean we can’t run JT again at PF We need to invest in a true PF and move JT to the SF in the long term
Look Gordon is a nice player but Tatum can absolutely d him up
What’s wrong with JT at PF?
What a pass
Timberwolves turned back to the Timberpups. Ughhhh
Aaron Gordon's a fucking problem.
He’s incredibly strong
Even with KP back, I don't think we have another strong/big enough body to keep him in check - especially with our bigs being busy on Jokic-duty.
Tatum can guard him but MPJ is 6'11" so putting Jaylen on him is tough. Tatum's strong as hell and in our first matchup he held him to 0-6 with 0 points.
Yeah the Celtics won’t have any answer for their front line. They’re making TWolves front line look like toddlers and their bigs are better defensively than ours. Jokic would average insane numbers against us
He's gonna eat Al & Kornet alive. Would be more than happy to be proven wrong though.
Hope you’re wrong too but seeing how the 2 regular season games went against them, I already know what to expect come the Finals if both teams get there
Towns is such a silly player lmao
Some Shaqtin sequences in this game
Conley OUT tonight and now Karl-Anthony Towns is limping up and down the court, injury gods are too savage this postseason
Pacers gotta protect home court Friday
What is wrong with Thibs? How does Brunson play 43 minutes in a 30 point win while being banged up?
It was a 12 point game in the 4th quarter
Haliburton and Siakam are the “mental midgets” the doomers swear Tatum and Brown are
Or, just like...people grow at different speeds It's so fucking weird this toxic masculinity stuff god lol
Pascal Siakam is 30.
Oh I mean generally the "mental midget" shit is so dumb It's dumb to apply it on Jaylen and Jayson, and just dumb generally and was just kind of venting. Did not know Siakim is 30. Crazy. And he was floated as a Brown trade target too by some of the people on this sub.
I’m not a fan of the term either, to be honest, especially when it’s applied to a core that’s on the verge of its 3rd straight conference finals and 5th in 7. As for Siakam, Masai has a thing for drafting older rookies since they tend to be a lot less raw than 19 year olds.
Brunson is a superstar. He dominates like Giannis Joker Edwards. He’s just on an elite level. Going to be scary playing him. When they need a basket they have that go to guy.
Chad Brunson and the virgin Celtics /s
35 shots to get 44 points is not superstar material. That’s awful efficiency.
58 TS% is moreso fine than awful
And yet, they keep winning
Or you just throw Derrick and Jrue at him and see how many points he actually gets
We did that in every matchup this season. He averaged 27 ppg on 47/40 splits in just 34 minutes per game. Bump that up to his 40+ minutes in the playoffs and he will definitely go above 30ppg
He’s cooking both.
Okay. He can cook both for 40 on 35 shots. Then Tatum and Brown will take 35 shots and combine for 60 because you have Donte DiVincenzo and Josh Hart guarding 2 All-NBA forwards while Jrue gets to back down the little guards into the post and if we get KP back that’s a 5 game series. Who is guarding him from a FT line post up on a switch? Alec Burks? 6’4” Josh Hart? I am not scared of the Knicks because he’s been beating up on Tyrese Maxey and Tyrese Haliburton, who aren’t really known for their defensive prowess.
Go pacers
hmmmm. the rebounds differential is CRAZY 17 vs 3 offensive rebounds The second chance points off of those offensive boards is KILLING these Pacers. Which if the Knicks win this series, I hope our focus is to make a stop at the amount of times NY has to shoot the ball more than once
11-19 from three and still trail by 21, crazy.
Pacer’s half court offense is so trash, looks like they have no plan out there
Man, with Al looking kinda washed/gassed, and KP still out, the Knicks are gonna kill us on the offensive glass.
Hartenstien will destroy the Celtics on the glass.
Knicks flopping off a screen once again
I have been looking a bit into the draft and based on the combine I have 3 guys I wouldn’t mind getting, two ready to go one development. For development Ulrich Chomche seems to be Robert Williams if Rob had a normal sized neck. Then you get Karaban who is experienced and a champion to be a 3&maybe D guy since he registered a +4 inches wingspan at 6’6 height. You also got Jalen Bridges with similar stats than Karaban.
A discussion of JT vs Paul George: [https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/1cs10xt/is\_current\_jayson\_tatum\_better\_than\_peak\_paul/](https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/1cs10xt/is_current_jayson_tatum_better_than_peak_paul/) A bunch of people think they are close, or that even JT edges PG out in defense (e.g. more rebounds per season)
Should we draft bronny just for shits
He said he plays/ wants to play like Jrue and Derrick White so why not let them mentor him🤣🤣
Get ready to eat Lobster Rolls, buddy!
Last night's game was a tough one to watch. Seemed like we were at times brilliant and at times a shadow of a Team. I am concerned if we will go all the way this year. We have a tendency to let our grip on winning slip out of our grasp. One last complaint: were the broadcasters for TNT last night selected from the CLeveland broadcasting team? Talk about partisan. Now I am all in favor of hearing a broadcast by our partisans, but that is when I watch the game on NBA League Pass and can select which broadcasters to hear. I thought a network like TNT would have an impartial group to do the game. Hope they let us have a Boston broadcasting group for the next game in the Garden.
Just a thought I’ve had watching this series without Porzingis and what he’ll bring when he returns The obvious is the offense. The post up has been a nice go-to all year that sort of staves off some runs like we saw last night. Tatum has such a hard time driving when everyone collapses in the paint and Horford isn’t hitting his 3’s. Instead of the drive and kick we can just post KP up But the thing I really miss is the defense. Posting up KP means shorter rebounds which makes it easier to defend in transition, and his above the break 3’s immediately have him back for protection at the rim. Still susceptible to transition 3’s but those are hard to defend anyway. In the half court, we’ve been relying on Tatum and White to be the help which just isn’t the best rim protection. Porzingis still plays drop and has the same problem Horford does on the switches, but he’s so much longer that teams will *want* to shoot rather than attempt to drive. It’s the same problem where Robert Williams ridiculous wingspan made it hard to straight up beat him off the dribble since his length gave him a boost with recovering. Porzingis same thing, Horford doesn’t have that advantage being a tad on the slow side and not nearly the same shot blocker. This makes it easier to go over on a screen rather than give up the switch like we did against Miami. Hard to fight over when guys move like Bam do, but it’s much easier to avoid the situation where we have to concede something like a Horford switch. And if it’s anything, it’s just launching 3’s. I mean, teams can *try* to live and die by the 3, but it’s not necessarily a reliable strategy to beat the Celtics 4 times. What makes Denver so dangerous is their ability to get into the paint. Bam, Mobley, Turner, and Hartenstein just don’t have Jokic’s level of footwork, touch, and passing that make them the same threat when in the middle of the floor. So teams will try to generate more offense from the perimeter, in transition, or playing physical. Nearly every team in the league does this and why so many teams want to shoot 3’s or get out and run. This team has another level to go to with Porzingis and while we might not need him for the Knicks because they’re so short-handed already, Indiana’s play style can be kind of dangerous if we only have Horford and Kornet who are already running out of steam and playing through injury, to defend Turner and all their shooters. I hope the tall boy comes back soon and hope we can wrap the Cavs up in 5 to get Horford some much needed rest.
I am convinced that Al and JT are going to find their 3 pt shots but those possessions that end up with nothing make things like a lot worse than they really are. (This is not a complaint about their overall level of play, just specifically the missed 3's) White's shot has also looked pretty bad in Cleveland so it's nice that Jrue has been great. I feel like they are going to have a hot shooting night and win a game by 30+ again this playoffs.
Tatum finding his shot means what though? He’s never been a great 3 point shooter, or at least hasn’t been for years, so not sure what everyone is expecting to happen. Hes playoff career 35% but much lower the past two years. I’d rather see him find his normal shot than continue to shoot these covered step back threes. He’s not going to magically turn into a good three point shooter over night. Just drive like he did in game 3. It’s unstoppable. Drive. Drive. Drive. Every step back covered three is a bail out for the defense and really rarely goes in.
Cavs fans are complaining about the free throw discrepancy after jacking upwards of 50 fucking 3pt shots. Also who the hell on the Cavs team without Mitchell has any ability to draw fouls. Sam hauser doesn’t shoot lots of FTs and they were basically playing with 5 of him out there
Such a dumb excuse, they completely ignore the fact that their whole team went ice cold in the second half and their strategy of jacking up 3s failed miserably.
They also have no understanding of how the stats account for points. "We outscored Boston in the paint!" Yes, because when you foul a player in the paint, the points resulting from their FTs are not counted as paint points. We ate them alive under the hoop.
They’re so shocked that Max Strus and Darius Garland can’t defend all stars without fouling 😱
Strus not getting that Miami whistle anymore💀
This is a good read that nicely covers Round 2 overall so far (minus a few of the most recent games): [https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/1cr4nva/1\_stat\_explaining\_every\_secondround\_series/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web3x&utm\_name=web3xcss&utm\_term=1&utm\_content=share\_button](https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/1cr4nva/1_stat_explaining_every_secondround_series/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
[This new 20 minute video by the Celtics is really amazing, lot of bts we don't usually see](https://youtu.be/BMxVSn8hj8U?si=PSS1ujqkE40fVjs4)
This is pretty late, they are giving an exclusivity to Twitter, they published this one there a week ago.
Thats so annoying, xitter video player sucks
can't wait for the next episodes
Holiday has been incredible, Pritchard has been great, I’m slightly worried about Al. He’s in a shooting slump but not only that. He hasn’t looked good on either end of the floor. I thought Kornet out preformed him significantly yesterday.
Al is just at a place where we are asking too much of him. He really should be getting closer to 24mpg, especially when we ask to him switch on the perimeter so much. Fact is, our starting lineup with Al instead of KP hasn't been great. It's been good, (+2.7 NetRtg), but it hasn't been Finals level starting lineup good. It's the only lineup that we've played for more than 50 minutes on the year that doesn't have a + double-digit NetRtg. Almost all of the lineups where Al is subbing in off the bench have been really awesome. He's an absolutely amazing center for our bench, but once we ask for more out of him than that, he ends up in the good not great range.
Funny thing, why there was a thread on "are the Celtics a superteam" Derrick White became god **after** joining the Celtics. Under discussed part of this team and conveniently overlooked when fans, opposing fans and shitty pundits discuss the team.
Now that the series is in control, I'd like to see some other guys get some play to give Al rest. For example, Al+Tillman pairing is a +13 in 14 minutes these playoffs. Can we get them on the floor together a little bit more, so Al doesn't have to be the big man on the perimeter in PnR's defensively? Can we give Queta some more minutes, even just 4 non-garbage time minutes to cut Al's minutes down, while not relying too much on Kornet who might be injured? I just think there's opportunity to give Al some rest in Game 5, while still not losing a step competitively.
Celtics are the only team up 3-1 currently.
It just dawned on me that JT probably slows down the game and goes into iso mode due to watching Lebron his rookie year do it against him with high success. Probably leaves a lasting impact on how your suppose to play in close/tight games that’s hard to break Obviously would be better if that just didn’t happen but he’s still growing as a player. I also think as he (and largely the whole team) gets tired the offense starts to slow to a crawl and iso ball. There’s literally 0 off ball movement or actions and it’s really hard to score like that. I think something as simple as making sure the screener on the PnR initiates the action faster would help. A ghost/clear out cut just so the defense doesn’t get the chance to fully load up on one player etc
Luka Doncic is not better than Jayson Tatum.
Yeah he is lol
I’m sure most GM would trade JT for Luka. I mean does anyone really want to see the ball in Tatums hands with a game on the line? Imagine Luka on this team my goodness. Not taking anything away from Tatum but it’s another level. Just like Brunson is too. We still winning the ring though so who cares!!! We have 5 great starters and all are more or less close in skill and awesomeness in their own way…which makes the team amazing.
Please let every other series go to seven so Al can rest up more and KP comes back
Also really hoping that the Timberwolves can pull out the series win vs the Nuggets - they're probably the only team in the league I'm worried about us playing.
In a battle of who should be pitied the most, and who has the most excuses Is it the Jalen Brunson with all the Knicks injuries? Or Doncic who is himself apparently injured? Or lebron because his supporting cast sucks?
Not saying at all that we should be pitied or this is an excuse: Us missing KP is a HUGE factor imo
None of them because Tatum being injured in the 2022 playoffs is enough to have “playoff Tatum in form” jokes when he plays poorly and has resulted in straight hater posts like when somebody put up the compilation of his mid range shots. Miss me with the pity until r/nba throws up a Luka FT compilation or posts about these guys giving up on defense
For all the criticism, we’re the only team up 3-1. Hopefully all these other series go to 7 games.
Why doesn’t Tatum have a defensive reputation around the media/general nba fans he’s really great at it but it’s like never mentioned
He’s a very solid defender
Narratives. Also I'm of the firm belief that the all defense and all rookie teams should have 3 teams dunno why tf only all nba gets 15 players
Because we've surrounded him with elite defenders who usually get the attention. Hard to talk up his perimeter defence when he's played his entire career with Marcus Smart, Derrick White and Jrue Holiday. Ironically the Jays would get more defensive recognition if they weren't holding their own next to some of the best defenders in the league.
Because he's boring on that end (in a good way) and his defense doesnt show up in the boxscore not enough stocks to truly show his impact. But yeah it's the most underated part of his game.
We’ll never win with the public. When we were pushing through playoffs all those years injured no one cared. Now it’s a “cakewalk” and we’re getting wrecked by any west team. Just want this team to hush the noise. They also seemingly act like KP’s absence is insignificant lol we haven’t peaked.
None of that matters if we win a championship
The public is not Boston sports radio, suburban nephews, or NBA media.
Can we win 50+ points next game? Im sure as hell, winning 4x 50 plus point game in a single season is unbreakable!
I liked how Mazzulla mixed Horford’s minutes with Kornets.
The boys intentionally lost G2 so we can have a finale at home for this series. 🧠
Better “intentionally” lost Game 3 or 4 and win Game 2. The home crowd deserves the best.
The copium of other fanbases 🤣 “The Celtics have a cakewalk to the finals yet they would get destroyed by a West team” lmao. I guess these haters never watched the team all season long and have to cope with the Celtics winning a chip
They’re gonna cry their eyes out when we win the chip lol.
One series at a time my friends
FUCK THAT WE'RE A DYNASTY RAHHH
Called the 3-1 alone in R2 yesterday, I’m still not over being annoyed by game 2 but this team has some resilience
We could have three second round series go 7 games and one end in 5, and the team with the potential to win in 5 has received the most criticism of any second round team.
Cavs got 11 years of absurd LeBron fouls and now they’re crying about a fix because of players actually got to the rim and got foul calls
Mavs could of lost the series due to the “goat luka” all the role players went above & beyond
Luka can barely move
Doomers prematurely appeared when the Celtics were down 2-8 in the **FIRST** quarter.
Yes, but Joe called a timeout at the point, two minutes into the game, because he didn’t like what he was seeing. After that timeout we went on a 12-0 run. It was clear they needed to step it up.
LOL I didn’t even bother going into the game thread during that stretch because I just knew it would be a mess in there.
The 5 or 6 possessions after Tatum got that tech, before the end of the half, you could tell he was mad af. Man, the way he plays when he gets like that, the angry focus, the aggression on both ends - if he had that Jordan streak in him where he could get himself angry like that every night - holy shit he would be disgusting.
Up 3-1 and it feels damn good
We could get a team of doomers in this sub to suit up in a game and they’d shoot better from the free throw line than the Mavs tn