Avery Bradley: Boston Celtics teammate Marcus Smart will become one of the NBA's best guards

Avery Bradley: Boston Celtics teammate Marcus Smart will become one of the NBA's best guards





Avery Bradley: Marcus Smart will become one of NBA's best guards

Jay King | mjking@masslive.com By Jay King | mjking@masslive.com

on October 26, 2015 at 6:05 PM



WALTHAM -- Avery Bradley believes Boston Celtics teammate Marcus Smart will rise up the charts over the coming years.

"I know that Marcus is going to continue to get better," Bradley said after practice Monday. "And he's going to be one of the best guards in the NBA."

Largely because of Smart's defensive impact, some analytical models already consider him Boston's top player. If he continues to develop point guard skills and shooting accuracy, becoming a bona fide star isn't out of the question.

ESPN's Kevin Pelton and Jeremias Engelmann recently debated the topic:

"So much of the conversation about the Celtics centers on how they can get a 'star,'" Pelton said in a chat that can be found in full here. "Given how inefficient he was offensively as a rookie, Smart is unlikely to fit the conventional definition of that kind of player any time soon.
"But he was so good defensively that he still rated just outside the top 10 point guards in the league by RPM last season, and we'd expect rapid development as a scorer in year two. Can Smart be their star?"

"I don't think he can be a traditional superstar point guard like Stephen Curry, Russell Westbrook or Chris Paul, but I like to compare him to Kyle Lowry and Eric Bledsoe, who posted similar numbers at similar ages, including the not-so-great shooting percentages (like Smart's in his rookie season)," Engelmann replied. "These are guys you hate to play against because of their pesky defense, they are solid contributors to their team's offense and they post good plus-minus numbers year after year.

"Will Smart be a star in coming years? He'll most likely not be part of the elite, but he'll be right there in tier two."

Everyone seems to agree Smart puts in the work, a positive sign as he attempts to push his offensive game to new heights. If he ever takes a leap, that would do more to change the Celtics' arc than any other possible internal development. Smart still has a long way to go there, but his progress as a playmaker has been evident this preseason.

"Slowing down. Being able to pick his spots," Bradley explained. "Marcus used to be one speed. Terry (Rozier is) learning and he's usually always going one speed. But Marcus has definitely changed speed. It's funny because someone told me that he wanted to work on that this summer. I didn't know that but I definitely see it in his game. He's picking his spots and changing speeds and making it hard for defenders to guard him."



bob
MY NOTE: Changing speeds is a major developmental milestone for any player. It's a milestone some players, like Marcus Banks, never reach and their careers fizzle. It doesn't matter what it is, if you keep doing the same thing again and again, eventually, you'll be scouted and they'll take that away from you, and that includes speed. The defense will trap you, glue themselves to you in the back court so you can't get the ball quickly and get a long run going, put their knees into your thighs to ding you up. You have to give them new looks. Marcus Smart's offense left much to be desired last year. This was especially concerning given he was billed as a "point guard" but his defense was that of a human wrecking ball. If he can continue with that, and if you watched the first quarter of the Sixer game you saw him and Bradley blowing everything up on almost every Sixer possession, and up his offense, well then, we might have something.

Speaking of Bradley, though, I read somewhere he claims he throws up 300 shots everyday in practice. That's how you go from a defender who was afraid to shoot to a solid offensive player.


.