The State of the Celtics After First Eight Games

After first eight games that the Celtics played in the 09/10 season, the fans have all the reasons to be happy: the score is 7-1, and with Phoenix it tops the league. Only the Lakers and the Heat come close with 6-1 records. Yet, I have many reasons to be pessimistic. And I will make a bold prediction: the Celts will not win the championship this season, even if they manage to top the league in wins, even if they top the Bulls record of 72 wins.

Why am I so pessimistic?

1. I am not a Rondo believer. Not that he is a bad point guard. He is really not. But I don’t believe in players who turn their game on or off by following some unpredictable urge which neither the fans nor, what’s worse, his coach and teammates can understand. He’s been like this since he got into the league and he will not change despite the 55mil contract. During the Celts’ last game, against the Nets, Rondo sat most of the fourth quarter. Eddie House led the Celts to the win. If Rondo played, the Celts may not have gotten the win. Despite the stat sheet, Rondo is the weakest link in the Celtics line-up, the link that other teams more and more often decide not to guard. I am very convinced that even 5 mediocre NBA players can guard 4 of the Celtics aging stars. The Nets proved that.
2. The Celts don’t get to the foul line nearly as often as they should. With exception of Paul Pierce, they simply don’t attach the hoop. Perkins is the only big player with a resemblance of an inside game, but Perk is only solid offensively, his real strength is defense. Ray Allen will go inside when the threes don’t fall in. I expected Daniels to attack more, but he’s been reserved so far, maybe still trying to learn his role.
3. The Celts have three seven-footers and are getting out-rebounded. This is the most frustrating component of the Celtics game. They have enough size to outrebound every opponent, yet they don’t do it every night. They’ve been sloppy with their box-outs, or maybe with age they lost a bit of that lateral movement and agility required for consistent box-outs. This is another result of a lot of the players preferring the outside game, lurking from behind the three-point line.
4. The Celts are struggling mightily when playing back-to-back games. Is this age? Is this lack of conditioning? It’s been particularly noticeable with Allen and Garnett. It is true that they’ve had a loaded schedule so far and that it came too soon, but the whole point of deepening the bench was to avoid the tiredness in the middle of the loaded schedule. Maybe the bench is not paying off the way the management and the coaching staff expected.
5. I don’t think that Doc Rivers is a great coach. I say this with conflicting feelings because he seems to be a great guy (never met him). Also, he’s had success, he won the championship two years ago. But even during that championship year I had a feeling that something was lacking. It is not very tangible, that what’s lacking. It’s just that his rotations don’t give me the confidence. In my view he gets stuck with certain rotations. For example, I watched Hudson in few minutes he played this season. It is clear that Doc will trust him only when the lead is big, but during the time he played he didn’t make a single mistake. He shows maturity on the court. Maybe try him at the point before the game becomes decided and finally relieve Eddie from running the game as he is not very effective at that.
6. Garnett is not 100% and maybe he never will be again. Let’s face the truth, he can barely dunk. Now, I wasn’t thrilled about Rondo/Garnett dunking plays last year as I suspected it might lead to Garnett’s injury, but this year his elevation is just not there. Forget about dunking, just look at his 18-foot jumper. Garnett never shot 1 of 9 until this season. I hope he recovers and does it quickly because Garnett is a true force in today’s game and his passion can be matched by no other player.

It would be a terrific Celtic-Lakers series in the Finals. I hope both teams make it there after some exhausting, exhilarating 7-game series in the Playoffs. If they do, and if players on both teams are healthy, I don’t think that the Celtics can match what the Lakers can throw at them. I am writing these words and hoping that I am so wrong.