Celtics/Knicks 10/9

http://www.csnne.com/boston-celtics/cs-comeback-falls-short-preseason-loss-knicks?p=ya5nbcs&ocid=yahoo

Was tied up and didn't see this but supposedly Phil Pressey was terrific. Spurred the comeback from 23 down in the fourth quarter with 13 points and 7 assists which saw the Celts briefly take a lead late until they lost in the final seconds. Made a strong statement to be on the team as backup point guard.

My take

As I won't get to actually watch too many games need to watch the ones I can. After viewing this and then reviewing the Knicks game, I'll say this...

Going to be a tough decision on who fills out the end of the bench. Couple players last evening certainly raised eyebrows, that said the main players appear to be pretty well set.

Presey is the new PP. Looked small in college.........looks tiny in the NBA but he can run this team as a backup and perhaps a starter till RR returns. 7 dimes 0 TO's.

Victor at the center could be our real diamond in the rough. As Sam mentioned his feet got tied up a bit at times but still he made some shots and hit the boards pretty good.

Entire team rebounded pretty well esp on the D boards Knicks only got 5 offensive boards. If we can do well here we will be in many games.

Offense was a little stagnet at times.

KO looked pretty good too and Sully looks ready to roll. Not sure about if Green is just waiting for the season to start but aside from a trey and a couple other moves he basicly watched the game like I was. And I was several 100 miles away.....

Only 14 Foul shots attempted..... need to get to the line more cause we are not going to win many games with that number. At least when we did get there we made 12 of them

Stevens did OK trying things and he will most likey continue this thru the entire pre season and perhaps a bit beyond.

I saw somewhere Vegas had us  Over/under for 27.5 wins for the season.  If I had some spare cash.......(unfortunately Marucs seems to suck that up faster than a Hoover Vacume) I'd lay it on the over.

beat

Anyone... exactly how many players are under contract for this year? I checked a couple sites and got conflicting info.
beat

beat wrote:Anyone... exactly how many players are under contract for this year? I checked a couple sites and got conflicting info.
beat

beat,

Boston has 14 under players with fully guaranteed contracts.
Humphries, Rondo, Wallace, Green, Bass, Lee, Bogans, Bradley, Crawford, Faverani, Olynyk, Sullinger, Brooks, Pressey.

The other 4 in camp (Babb, Bell-Holter, Sims, Taylor) have no salary guarantees.

Hi,
I guess the second game was sort of back to planet Earth after euphoria of the first game's dissipated.
Sully and KO were OK. They had hard time against Chandler and Bargnani.
PP was OK, too. Especially at the end of the game. Speaking of which, it was fun: Celtics 3d stringers vs NYK 3d stringers. Ours happened to be head and shoulders better.
Also about PP. I think he, after getting experience and being RR's understudy, is going to be much better PG than any other candidates for this position - AB and JC.
I like Beat's description of JG. I'm not sure what's going on. It looks like he's either not interested or stays on the background (mostly) by design, his and/or Brad's. I'm talking about offense. On defense he was Ok especially against 'Melo.
I have to mention Vitor. After the 1st game I rated him x2 better than Fab. After the last night's game that factor skyrocketed: it turns out he can hit 3 and catch the ball while running.
All in all, it's going to be a long, long, long season for the Celtics. And BrSt is going to be overwhelmed.

AK

It turns out my favorite sushi restaurant has NBA tv and wifi.  Sushi, sake and Celtics; my personal Holy Trinity.  I ended up standing at the sushi bar most of the time, bending over to grab something to eat  or to refill my sake cup.  Not many people can turn a nice, quiet Japanese restaurant into a sports bar.  That's real talent I have, real talent.

This is the first professional basketball I've seen since I left for New Zealand on 4/8.  That's 6 months.  No crack whore in Hell's Kitchen has ever been jonesin' for a fix more than me.

After all the off season bloviating, including my own, I finally got to see what we really got from Brooklyn.

1.  Hump works hard, playing out of position most of the time.  He ran the floor and chased down errant rebounds.  A pleasant surprise.  Is he worth $12m?  No, but that's not his fault, I'd have said yes to the money too.  I'm less than a fortnight from my 60th and I'd still say yes and suit up for that kind of money. I'd like to see how he does against PFs.

2.  Gerald Wallace is the best player on the roster now.  Ridiculous contract, doesn't check in during the summer, shows up for camp but not early like everyone else and didn't even know when the first pre-season game was and he's still the most season-ready.  Constantly moving on offense and defense.  That contract?   He is looking like better value than Jeff Green right now and Green's making less.

3.  The player that was supposedly "the keeper" in that trade was Marshon Brooks.  So much for bloviating.  He's a KoMe wannabe but completely overlooks all the other things Bryant does.  His offense is one-on-one schoolyard.  His defense?  It's spelled D-E-F-E-N-S-E, Marshon.  Write it down, you might need it sometime.  Repeatedly caught playing matador defense.  I've silently wondered about his basketball IQ.  Now, I'm no longer silent.  Is the 4" muscle between his ears strong enough to play in the NBA?  Is he the new Gerald Green?

4.  I was going to say, on the game on thread, that Kelly was the team's best pg not named Rondo, but that was just me getting frustrated with Bradley.  Then, along came Pressey.  What a great debut by the undrafted rookie.   A team high 13 points and a pre-season high 7 assists in a team high 28 minutes.  What I like about Pressey as a point guard is that he's a pass-first pg.  What I like about Pressey as a point guard is that he was always probing for a seam in the defense and, when he found it, his instinct was to attack the paint and the rim.  What I like about Pressey as a point guard is that he's not Avery Bradley.  Pressey fueled the comeback.  He's ready for his close-up now, Mr. De Mille.

5.  Sully looked good on the boards, hit 2 shots from the top of the key in the 1st half and then launched a few 3s.  Stop that!

6.  KO is struggling, but he'll settle down.

7.  Jeff Green is starting to worry me.  Last year he started the season saying that he needs to focus on his rebounding more.  His rebounds were the exact same as the previous one,  5.1/36mpg.  This year he says he needs to take over and, as KG told him, "be an asshole".  After his lackluster game in Toronto on Monday he was asked about that and he said "it's coming, it's coming".  By what, Jeff, slow boat from China?  He intellectually knows what he has to do differently, he just doesn't drive himself to distraction to achieve it, and THAT'S what's worrying me.  He has SO much talent, but he has basketball ADD.

8.  Sims and Babb came in and did well, Babb in particular.  Smooth stroke, plays defense.  Just 6 minutes for Sims and 8 minutes for Babb but a nice first look.  Babb, for one, looked like a more complete player than Brooks.

9.  Besides Chandler, is there anybody on the Knicks who can't shoot 3s?  Shumpert hit 3 of them from the same spot in succession.  We did not do a good job of closing their perimeter shooters out.  TAFKARA had a great game.  First he schooled Olynyk, who is 5"taller, and then he turned Brandon Bassackwards.  Melo and TAFKARA, that's a good set of 3s.

10.  Lastly, ya gotta love Vitor.  11 points on 5-9, 1-2 from 3 (calm down Vitor, you're a lock to make the team) 6 boards (2 offensive) and he runs.  VITOR WANTS MINUTES!  I still haven't seen him set a real, solid, sustained pick yet but...As a team we need Vitor to be, at the minimum,  a legit rotation player.  So far so good.  Stevens needs to play him more in pre season to see what combos work best with him.  Go Vitor!

Win or lose, and we lost, that was a beautifull comeback.



bob


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Still WAY too soon to draw conclusions...however...

Despite different players getting looks and minutes vs game 1, I'm on board with the best forward lineup being Sully, Wallace and Olynyk.

Still need to see more of the guards but Pressey can sure distribute that thing.

Babb apparently is channeling his inner Larry Bird. Doubt he sticks but fun to watch.

Brooks, Lee, you're both looking highly expendable right about now...

Heck, I'd take Babb over Brooks.

KJ

In the early going, I hesitate to feel definitively about any player. But, of those who have played so far, I'd say the only one who looks like a mummy out there is Bogans. Brooks is on my probation list, but at least he shows some life. I, too, would like to see more of Babb. I've been touting Pressey for some time, and the thing that made me happiest about him last night (of many possibilities) was the way his confidence curve shot way up from a few initially tentative possessions to a real take-charge attitude near the end.

It seems to me that, despite his wondrous passing and transition skills, Kelly Olynyk is being rushed on most of his outside shots. I believe he has to make quicker decisions out there.

Kudos to Brad for leaving the kids out there when they started making inroads. Regardless of the quality of the competition, coming back like that seemed to infuse all of them with much needed confidence—especially Phil, Babb and Sims..

Sam

Sam,
What's your take on JG? Based on your description of Bogans being a mummy, I'd described JG as a mummy's ghost.

AK

Sinus,

My take is that Jeff is not a good creator of his own shots. He needs to be fed, whether it's for a transition slam or an inside-out three. Pressey showed a little aptitude for the inside-out game, although I'm not sure whether or not that was an aberration. Otherwise, it may take the return of Rondo to get Jeff throughly untracked.

Sam

Sinus,

I looked up Jeff's 2012-13 stats, and 56% of his field goals were assisted. The league average was 55%, and the figure for Paul Pierce (whom I associate with creating a lot of his own shots) was 56%. So the theory I mentioned above doesn't seem to hold much water. When he made the slam on that fast break last night, he looked like the "old" Jeff.

The fact that he didn't start last night could mean that he's been given the green light to pace himself. He's obviously not taking it to the hoop as he did last season. Last year, only 23% of his field goal attempts were three-point shots. So far in the obviously early part of the preseason, 59% of his field goal attempts have been three-point shots. And he has a lousy shooting average of 20% from behind the arc in the preseason.

Although he doesn't display it with a lot of theatrics, what seemed to fuel him last season was a lot of emotion—perhaps fueled at least largely by a desire to put the surgery behind him. His game reflected that emotion, featuring a barrage of threes and emphatic slams.

So far this preseason, I don't sense a lot of emotion in his play. For one reason or another, he seems to be taking it a little easy and letting the kids take the emotional lead in fighting for jobs. I'll be very surprised if he doesn't assert himself more vigorously when the season starts.

However, since he represents a crucial part of what passes for a "core" on this team, I personally wish he'd pick it up NOW because it would make it easier for the kids to get a more realistic baptism of fire within what I call the "womb" of experience surrounding them.

Sam

THE TEAM WILL BE LIKE A YO YO THIS YEAR.........UP AND DOWN......UP AND DOWN.

Will it be tough to watch especially against Miami, Chicago and New York......ya........but this day was coming since we first put together an older team in 2008 and had a limited window.

Patients will pay off.

112288

I can't get a handle on what Green is doing... Part of me thinks his lack of aggressive play is by design.


KJ

k_j_88 wrote:I can't get a handle on what Green is doing... Part of me thinks his lack of aggressive play is by design.


KJ

Kj,

Lack of aggression by design? Interesting concept. It'd be great in a chemically-neutered sex offender, not so well here.


bob



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Bob,

It's only a theory, though. And not one I'm putting too much stock into.

This theory stems from the thought that maybe it's on the agenda to have the new guys contribute more since JG is the starter anyway. However, in order to simulate an actual regular season game, JG would have to take a more dominant role on the offense.


KJ

As I said earlier, I believe Jeff may have been given the green light to pace himself. Rather than playing at peak intensity and risking injury to create opportunities, parcel out the intensity when clear opportunities present themselves (e.g., the transition slam in the N.Y. game).

Sam

Sam,

True. No sense in him getting hurt in otherwise meaningless preseason games. They'll need him for the real action. That's why I've been rather hesitant to make too much of a determination about his recent play.


KJ

KJ,

Not only that, but I also believe we tend to measure Jeff's effort against the performances of teammates who (at least in some cases) are fighting either for their professional lives or for a slot in the rotation or to acclimate themselves to the NBA. It makes sense to my semi-warped mind that those guys would be busting their butts a lot more than Jeff would.

Sam