Post-Game Thread - vs Raptors, Home

[bobheckler]

Unfortunately, we cannot play the Philadelphia Sixers 82 times. And all summer I was looking forward to shutting out the entire league...

The Celtics played in their "alternate" jerseys last night. "Alternate" to what? Classy? Traditional? The jerseys of winners? I cannot stand them. The league is doing this to generate more clothing sales. I hope the plan backfires because nobody buys them. Probably a lost cause wishing for that, there are way too many sheep out there in the world...



They played with poise, especially after regrouping in the 2nd half. I can understand losing on talent but they were beating us to every 50/50 ball, they beat us with hustle. That I cannot swallow. We looked stunned, disoriented, a step slow. If I didn't know better I'd say we were at the end of a long road trip. We made a number of dumb plays all night, the kind you make when you're fatigued and the brain is not quite sharp. The Raptors, on the other hand, played the passing lanes, used their hands effectively and just blew us up. We just made it easier by getting into trouble and then attempting the obvious bail out pass.

So much for our offensive upgrade, we shot 38%. What's more, thanks to 17 TOs, we only got to take 85 fgas. Hard to win like that.

1. Speaking of our "offensive upgrade" David Lee had another bad shooting night. He had 6 points on 2-6, so he neither shot well nor often. In fairness, one of those fgas was a 59' heave at the buzzer, so he shouldn't be run down for taking that and missing. If your last name isn't Curry, you will miss that shot. That makes him 2-5 for 40% and, sadly, 40% is better than what the team shot. Also, all his fgas came in the first quarter. One of those brain-dead plays I was referring to in the beginning was at 7:24 left in the 1st quarter when Lee rushed at Lowry when he was just going over halfcourt to call a timeout and body slammed him. You have to either go for the ball OR wait until after he calls time out before you pop him, David. Just stupid and clumsy play. He had one possession where he was running a nice two-man game with What's making me wonder is that it seems, for the last however number of games we have played from the opening of camp on, that he is consistently short-arming his shots. It seems like they are consistently not getting over the front of the rim. Is it possible that his legs really are starting to go, that he lost an inch off his leap and so the ball isn't leaving his hands as high as it used to and he hasn't adjusted to that yet? I'm at a bit of a loss here. Other than that heave, the rest of his shots were inside the lane. Those should be bunnies for him. He did have 6 rebounds in his 17 minutes, which is a nice /36mpg rate but we need more from him. If his goal is to elevate himself from a bench starter in GSW to a legit NBA starter again he's getting off to a slow start.

2. A kinda weird game by Sully. Nothing to write home about as far as boxscores go (6 points on 3-3 and 3 boards in 14 minutes) but he had definite highs and lows. With 6:18 left in the 2nd quarter, Bennett came down with a defensive board underneath and Sully just RIPPED it out of his hands and laid it in with a foul. Pure muscle hustle by Sully. This was unusual because the refs were calling the game very tight in the first half, blowing whistles on everything and Sully picked up 3 fouls by halftime. They were not letting him use his strength, which is his strength. He ended up fouling out, after 14 minutes of play, with :13 left, but it was hard for him to find a rhythm the refs could live with. The refs were two refs with over 10 years experience each and a sophomore. I'll say one thing for Sully, he worked his fat ass off last night. He got no love from the refs, but he put in the effort. After a truly crappy pre-season he is turning it on now.

3. They got 24 ftas in the first half. Some of that was the refs blowing everything and some of it was us just playing poorly. We bailed them out again and again and again. We got 19 ftas, so there wasn't that much of a disparity, the difference was that they hit theirs (21-24 for 87.5%) and we didn't (13-19 for 68%). DeRozan, who was having a miserable shooting night, shooting just 2-8 in the first half and 5-15 for the game, was 7-8 from the line in the first half and 12-14 for the game. It was so bad there were a couple of technicals called because players, like Sully, expressed their displeasure with the refs in terms their virgin ears were unused to. In the second half the whistles started to even out. By the end of the game we had 41ftas while they had only 35. They hit theirs for a very nice percentage (30-35 for 85%) while we inched our way up to our mean (32-41 for 78%). Our saving grace at the line was Thomas, who was 11-12 and single-handedly offsetting DeRozan.

4. Thomas was also 7-16 from the field, for 25 points in 29 minutes. Forget about starting, Isaiah, you're doing way too well coming off the bench. As a starter you'll be undersized and maybe somewhere in the middle of the pack. Maybe. As a sixth man you are on target after two games to pick up a trophy at the end of the year. That will be a more lasting memory than hearing your name being called. He also had 7 assists and 3 TOs. His TOs were of the kind I mentioned earlier, he'd get into trouble (e.g. dribbling into a double team in the paint) and then making the obvious spin-around bail out pass to the perimeter that gets picked off because they see he's in the air and has to pass. Nevertheless, our sixth man scored more points than starters Zeller and Bradley combined. The man is fearless. He attacks the rim with two Raptors, obviously both much bigger than him, and he doesn't care. Sometimes that gets him in trouble but more times than not he ends up at the line. No wonder Brad is leery of starting him. There wouldn't be much more than chopped meat left of him by the end of the season if he did, the way he goes at bigs.

5. I had the Toronto feed last night. Raptor color man, Leo Rautins, had a lot of love for Marcus Smart. He talked up his physicality on defense, how disruptive he is on defense, how he has veteran anticipation and able to pick up offensive charges on defense. Didn't talk much about Smart's offense because, well, Smart was an abysmal 2-11. 3 rebounds, 3 assists and a steal made last night thoroughly forgettable for Marcus Smart. His man, DeMar DeRozan, lived at the line. 3 of his 6 points were on this wild, off-balance as he is falling out of bounds corner 3 that will show up on Sportscenter but NOT in the Celtics film sessions. Pure Hail Mary.

6. Crowder had his usual hard working night too, but the refs were having none of his physicality. Weird how they shut down Sully and Crowder but let sophomore Smart rough people up. A generally forgettable night for Jae too. One of the match ups I was really looking forward to watching was the one between Jae Crowder and DeMarre Carroll. Carroll killed Jae. I've heard Crowder described as "a poor man's DeMarre Carroll". Well, last night he was a "poor man's DeMarre Carroll" like the way a Ford is a poor man's Mercedes.

7. Speaking of hard working, it is just a matter of a few more games before Celtic fans worldwide fall in love with Amir. 11 points on 3-3, 8 rebounds in 19 minutes and just generally being in the right place at the right time doing all the right little things. Better start hitting your shots, Lee.

8. Kelly was pretty aggressive too. Only 4-10 (which is actually better than the 38% the team shot) but he attacked. He shot. He was only 1-5 from 3 but that's ok, I just want him to shoot. He can hit those shots, comfortably, he just needs to gain confidence. Four Celtics were in double digits last night: Thomas with 25; Avery Bradley, who played 30 minutes, with 13 on 4-11; Zeller with 10 and Kelly with 11. Just be aggressive, Kelly, just attack and it will be alright. Needless to say, the Toronto announcers oohed and ahhed over everything Kelly did.

9. Bismack BIYOMMMBOOOOO!!! Just had to say it. Crappy night by the #7 pick, and marginal NBA player, in the annual crap shoot. Still has the best name in basketball. He'll probably always have that going for him.

10. In fact, it's looking like Toronto is where high draft picks go to die. The well-traveled #1 pick, Anthony Bennett, is there too. He is not only on his 3rd team in 3 years, he only played 3 minutes last night and went to sleep last night with his whole team knowing he was brutalized by a man who, just last year, was so fat he practically had his own gravitational field. Why wouldn't you tank when you have a chance at the getting the #1 pick and drafting Anthony Bennett?

11. Terrence Ross wasn't very effective in the first half, only 8 points, but he went nuts in the 2nd. 21 points on 7-11.

12. Welcome back, Evan Turnover, we were wondering where you've been. 2-11 from the field, 1 assist and 4 TOs. With a choppy offense, needing leadership, he went into full-blown ME-ball mode. Time running down, we need 3s, and he takes a 2pt shot (which missed). He was the exact opposite of what we needed last night.

13. This was, in my opinion, the worst game I've seen Brad coach in a long time. He left Turner in when he was chucking up bad shots instead of running an offense. We had tied at halftime and, when they came out and started to discombobulate us, he didn't call time outs. He should have stopped the hemorrhaging and drawn up a play. We repeatedly got caught watching the ball and then get backdoored, like what Bradley is known for doing to others, and he didn't call a time out and straighten that shit out. He let the game get away from us. I realize players play, not coaches, but he's the general. We stopped moving in our half court offense, going instead with individual penetrations and kick outs, which were getting intercepted, and he didn't change the game plan.

14. Stat round up: 38% fg% sucks. 85 fgas doesn't completely s-u-c-k, it's just s-u. Getting 38 rebounds while they get 53 s-u-c-k-s-b-i-g-t-i-m-e. 27% from 3 sucks. 14 steals is very nice. Jae with 3, Amir, Thomas and Kelly with 2 each, 5 other Celtics with 1 each. That's 9 Celtics with at least 1 steal. In fact, of the 11 Celtics who played the only ones without steals are Zeller, who played 16 minutes, and Jerebko who played only 8. 22 fast break points is VERY good. Gives you an idea just how bad the rest of our shooting was when we had 22 high percentage fast break points and still shot only 38% for the game.


We looked poor last night, especially in the 3rd quarter. They were shooting 32.5% as a team through 2, 37% through 3 (they shot 11-25, 44% in the 3rd. We shot 6-19, only 31.5% in the 3rd) and, in the 4th quarter, they shot 12-17, 71%. 71%, for a quarter. We shot 12-22, 54.5%, and that would usually be good enough, but not when nobody is slowing down Terrence Ross.

We play a matinee at home against the Spurs. If there's some good news to be found in this debacle it's that they squashed the Nets by 27 points last night to help the Nets get off to an 0-2 start to the season. Jarrett Jack played against Spurs, but he has a slight hammie. Joe Johnson has an injured hand and is questionable against Memphis tonight. Sam Hinkie finally has a legitimate challenger. And so it begins, the slow descent into darkness for the Brooklyn Nets. An appropriate sentiment on Halloween.


bob


.

[cowens/oldschool]

bob I think we need a bigger boat, did you see how many boards Z and KO had combined? Surprised you didn't notice that, what were the announcers saying, too easy? Lee is adequate defensively next to an intimadator like Bogut, next to Zeller he gets exposed, thats pretty soft, then it gets softer when KO comes in. We got killed on the boards by a team that starts Luis Scola....NOT GOOD.

[bobheckler]

bob I think we need a bigger boat, did you see how many boards Z and KO had combined? Surprised you didn't notice that, what were the announcers saying, too easy? Lee is adequate defensively next to an intimadator like Bogut, next to Zeller he gets exposed, thats pretty soft, then it gets softer when KO comes in. We got killed on the boards by a team that starts Luis Scola....NOT GOOD.

cow,

Smile when you talk about my Argentinean hombre, Luis Scola.  He's a very good rebounder and crafty as all hell on offense.  He's just 35.  If he was 8-10 years younger I'd love to have him in green (or even that disgusting gray we wore last night).

We looked bad last night.  Everybody did.  Crowder, who is usually a defensive stalwart, looked bad last night.  The team I watched last night was not the same team I've been watching the past month.  Understandable perhaps, this is the real deal, not pre-season, and the Raptors aren't the Sixers or the Nets or the Knicks or Olimpio Milano, but we fell apart in the 3rd and Terrence Ross caught fire in the 4th.

We missed a lot of bunnies.  Turner missed a dunk.  Lee missed a couple of 4' flip shots.  Lee has never been described as an "above average defender".  His forte is, and has always been, rebounding and putting up points.  Last night he had 6 boards in 17 minutes.  That's not bad rebounding at all (12.7rebs/36mpg).  Rudy Gobert averages 12.9rebs/36mpg career, DeAndre Jordan averages 12.5rebs/36mpg career and Dwight Howard is averaging 12.9rebs/36mpg career.  His offense has been missing in action.  If/when he gets his scoring touch back, then we'll see.

They shot 44% on the game.  That's not bad defense.  Not great, but not bad neither.  They made their fritos, us not so much.  They made their 3s, we didn't.  That made for a huge discrepancy.  They took 26 3s and shot 42%.  When they're shooting almost as well as from 3 as from 2, you have a problem.  The problem, for us, was our perimeter defense and rotations.  We didn't close out the shooters, so they had wide open 3s, which they hit.  We shot 27% from 3 and 42% from 2.  So, we shot about as well as they did from 2.  If our defense was bad that means theirs was too, but they hit their 3s and we didn't.  As I said, we didn't close them out, but that's the guards' job.  They had 34 points in the paint, we had 38. Whose interior defense was worse? We had 14 steals.  Steals are a pure defensive stat.  Kelly had 2.  They had 21 TOs.  Sometimes TOs are unforced and sometimes they are not.  It's hard to know how many of theirs were forced but if even half of them were due to our pressure that's not bad.  Defense isn't just shot blocking.

I'm surprised, quite frankly, that Brad didn't put Hunter in.  I'm sure bobc agrees.  We needed to firm up our 3pt shooting.  I didn't like Brad's game last night neither.


bob


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[bobc33]

Bobc does agree of course.

Perhaps he was still feeling the effects of whatever sickness he was getting over, though if he was still sick I'd guess Young would have dressed instead of him.

It really did seem like the perfect spot to put in a guy who can get white hot from deep and possibly get you back in he game.

[bobheckler]

Bobc does agree of course.  

Perhaps he was still feeling the effects of whatever sickness he was getting over, though if he was still sick I'd guess Young would have dressed instead of him.

It really did seem like the perfect spot to put in a guy who can get white hot from deep and possibly get you back in he game.  

Bob,

RJ is saying he had food poisoning.

bob


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[dboss]

This was a tale of 2 halves.

Fully recoverd from the Sixers win.  That was actually the last pre season game.

One of the big dogs in the Atlantic came in and saw that Boston was not mentally tough enough to gut out the 3rd and 4th QTRs.

The Celtics played hard in the first half matching the energy and intensity of the Raptors.  What the hell happened in the second half.

I think that is the real story...

For reason unknown the Celtics stopped defending the 3 point perimeter and the result was a feeding frenzy as those Northerners drained snowflakes down in the entire 2nd half.  At one point I'm like "Time to call a time out"   but Brad just let the team stink up the place.   When your guys continually fail to rotate out to the perimeter there is a big problem.

I am still waiting to see a measure of progress with the Lee/Zeller combo.

I think the biggest problem is that the two of them are both wanting to play in the post  and neither has the 'stretch  the defense skill' so there is really no way they can effectively execute the pace and space offense.  I like Brad but his decision to begin the season with them may reflect a 'We got the right Fit mentality'  after showing who won the war in Europe. But the worst of it is not on the offense with them. Collectively they are playing horrible on defense.

Balance in THIS offence dictates that either your 4 or 5 must be a perimeter shooting threat.  Zeller actually looks like he is in regression and I think it may be the pairing of him and Lee.

Hear is the point.   Amir Johnson must be the starting PF...period.

Sully still has a very important role on this team.  I thought he had another strong game last night.  He must be in the rotation on the big minutes side.

Thomas is pretty amazing and again he does have some of those Tiny Archibald skills.  

Our starting 5 needs to put up more points.  I'm not suggesting that IT move into the starting lineup.  Smart did not play well last night but that is to e expected.  He's is still working on consistency at the beginning of year 2.

At one point in the game. Evan Turner turned into Paul Pierce.  Playing with the damn ball and the offense sputtered.  I am not sure if ET can be en effective bench player.  Now that Smart is really running the point they do not need ET in the starting line up.   ET must learn how to be effective off the ball.  He needs to get with the program.

Crowder is a good player but truth be told, we need a high end SF.  It is not just a rim protector.  We need an upgrade at the 3 as well.

The Celtics want to be the Golden States Warrior for some reason.  Problem is the Celtics are a very poor 3 point shooting team.  I thought that AB was gonna spend more time in the corner.  Instead all of his shots are going from the top.  Just an observation.

KO has some skills.  He has developed and is getting better.  I do not have any idea of what his ceiling is but I know he has not hit it yet.  He made some nice plays last night at both ends.

Since The Patriots have Sunday off after another amazing performance against the Fish, I will be more than happy to watch the Celts and Spurs tomorrow.  Tom Bradley is playing at a level that I have never seen before.  His pre snap reads where he already knows who the third option is puts him in a class all by himself.  It is about mental toughness.

In the end that is what was missing from Boston last night.  They lacked the mental toughness needed to fight through their poor shooting.  That is the reason why they stopped playing defense.  

This is going to be one exciting season of Celtics Basketball!

dboss

[rambone]

bob I think we need a bigger boat, did you see how many boards Z and KO had combined? Surprised you didn't notice that, what were the announcers saying, too easy? Lee is adequate defensively next to an intimadator like Bogut, next to Zeller he gets exposed, thats pretty soft, then it gets softer when KO comes in. We got killed on the boards by a team that starts Luis Scola....NOT GOOD.

Raptors shot 85.7% from the FT line, and 42% from 3. Shooting lights out like that was a bigger factor than the rebounding difference. Another bigger factor than the rebounds was the Celtics shooting so poorly. Smart and Turner combined for 4-22, or 18%. And those two were 50% from the ft line.

Raptors only had two more offensive rebounds than the Celtics, 9 to 7.

Basically offensive rebounding was a non-factor, as neither team was getting them.

If the Raptors had been missing their shots, we would have been getting more rebounds. And since we were missing so many shots, they were getting so many rebounds.

The rebounds were the effect, not the cause.

[cowens/oldschool]

bob I think we need a bigger boat, did you see how many boards Z and KO had combined? Surprised you didn't notice that, what were the announcers saying, too easy? Lee is adequate defensively next to an intimadator like Bogut, next to Zeller he gets exposed, thats pretty soft, then it gets softer when KO comes in. We got killed on the boards by a team that starts Luis Scola....NOT GOOD.

Raptors shot 85.7% from the FT line, and 42% from 3. Shooting lights out like that was a bigger factor than the rebounding difference. Another bigger factor than the rebounds was the Celtics shooting so poorly. Smart and Turner combined for 4-22, or 18%. And those two were 50% from the ft line.

Raptors only had two more offensive rebounds than the Celtics, 9 to 7.

Basically offensive rebounding was a non-factor, as neither team was getting them.

If the Raptors had been missing their shots, we would have been getting more rebounds. And since we were missing so many shots, they were getting so many rebounds.

The rebounds were the effect, not the cause.

Lee, Zeller and KO don't scare anybody in that paint, teams know they can feast on those guys, we need to play Amir and Sully more minutes and since were a few years from contending, I wouldn't mind developing Mickey now.....could the perimeter been left open because the little guys had to help the bigs inside? If you saw Okafor, a rookie abusing Zeller you know he is not the answer, far from it, Sully is our best post defender, Lee is on his downside and every team has a back up center that is much better defensively and at rebounding than Zeller, who should be a 3rd center, the back up to the back up. I would go centerless or play Amir and Sully at the 5 and start developing Mickey at PF, we could use some rim protection.

[kdp59]

seemed to me we had no offence other than Thomas this game.

Lee needs to step UP and understand that on this team when he is in the game he needs to be the low post offense.

If he is too old to handle it then Sully should be getting his minutes. I would go as far as saying after two games that Sully should probably be starting over Lee.

Bradley also needs to start being vocal about wanting the ball (and of course making the shots). He was our best shooter in the pre-season and is now an after thought in the offense. have your best shooters SHOOT.

I still think that Turner will end back starting at SF , with Crowder coming of the bench. Minutes may not change overall, but the matchups work better.

Zeller, Crowder and Smart are not no go-to scorers in the starting lineup. so Lee and Bradley MUST be those guys. or we need to find someone who is.

[rambone]

Olynyk had the second best +/- in the TOR game behind Isaiah, as usual. Amir was third.

Amir and KO are our two best bigs, but Stevens makes them come off the bench along with our best player Isaiah just because they compliment Isaiah's game so well.

The Celtics played TOR to a draw in the first half, when KO was the first big off the bench. But then Brad got cute in the second half and gave KO's minutes to Jerebko. That's when the game was lost, in the 3rd quarter.

Lee has looked like garbage since Eurotrip '15.

KO is a much better overall defender than Sully, being a lot more agile, being longer, and being quicker off the ground, and a lot quicker back on defense.

Sully is definitely a better man defender against 280+ lb guys like Okafor, but there's only 2-3 guys at that weight who are great scorers in the paint like Okafor.

Valanciunus only played 20-21 minutes and the Raptors were like - 6 or something while he was in the game.

I have no idea why Brad only played KO and Amir 16-18 minutes each, since they were a big part of why the C's went into halftime with a tie score.

Team passing/ball movement/offensive efficiency fell apart in the third quarter, and last year those things were all at elite levels whenever KO was on the court.

I look forward to the day when both Amir and KO get 25+ minutes a game, preferably as starters but any way they can get those minutes.

[rambone]

seemed to me we had no offence other than Thomas this game.

Lee needs to step UP and understand that on this team when he is in the game he needs to be the low post offense.

If he is too old to handle it then Sully should be getting his minutes. I would go as far as saying after two games that Sully should probably be starting over Lee.

Bradley also needs to start being vocal about wanting the ball (and of course  making the shots). He was our best shooter in the pre-season and is now an after thought in the offense. have your best shooters SHOOT.

I still think that Turner will end back starting at SF , with Crowder coming of the bench. Minutes may not change overall, but the matchups work better.

Zeller, Crowder and Smart are not no go-to scorers   in the starting lineup. so Lee and Bradley MUST be those guys. or we need to find someone who is.

Bradley is still streaky, and still can't create much offense off the dribble. He also dropped a couple passes out of bounds, while turning the ball over another two times. Ross and DeRozen were also shooting and scoring right over him. These are all some of the reasons Bradley finished with a team low -11 +/-, though there were certainly other factors unrelated to him.

If Brad and Danny want to insist on bringing IT4 off the bench, I really wish Rozier would get a chance to start in place of Bradley. I think that would solve a lot of the starting unit's problems generating offense. Crowder is solid as a starter, much better than Turner in my opinion, but we need a speedy guard on the floor with him who can handle the ball and get into the paint at will. That's not Bradley. Smart is a great secondary ball handler/combo guard, but our offense would be much more dynamic with Rozier rather than Bradley. And defensively I suspect Rozier isn't far behind Bradley either. Better instincts in the passing lanes, and physically stronger than Bradley. Rozier is also a much better rebounder than Bradley, though Bradley did have 5 last night.

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