Celtics’ Vincent Poirier no stranger to fighting for attention

https://www.bostonherald.com/2019/10/13/celtics-vincent-poirier-no-stranger-to-fighting-for-attention/




Celtics’ Vincent Poirier no stranger to fighting for attention



By MARK MURPHY | markr.murphy@bostonherald.com | Boston Herald


PUBLISHED: October 13, 2019 at 7:09 pm | UPDATED: October 13, 2019 at 7:30 pm




Vincent Poirier is a 25-year-old rookie who, among other things, led the EuroLeague in rebounding for Baskonia (Spain) last season.

But he’s not too proud to understand that as the least used big man in Brad Stevens’ complex big man rotation in the preseason, his chance to get some public attention has not yet revealed itself.


“I’ve been in this position a lot of times – the new guy who arrived on a big team that wants to win. So I know how to handle it,” Poirier said after the Celtics’ 118-72 exhibition win over Cleveland yesterday. “I don’t make too much noise, I just know my place, walk in every day, and I know one day I will have my chance. Then I will be ready. That’s why I’m cool, I’m relaxed, I know what to do. And then one day it will be my turn, and I will be ready for that day.

“I don’t expect nobody to tell me you’re going to play more, you’re going to play less,” he said. “Nobody has to tell me to be ready when the coach calls my name. I’m just focused on what I can do once they call my name.”


Daniel Theis, who has made the strongest claim on the starting center role despite his modest 6-foot-8 size, started his second straight preseason game, and against a stripped down Cleveland team, the smallish Celtics lineup moved with overwhelming quickness.

It may not be like this when the real games start, and as Brad Stevens admits, Theis may not be the ideal starting five man when the Celtics match up against those aircraft carrier lineups, like what awaits them on opening night in Philadelphia.

But between Theis, Enes Kanter, Rob Williams, Poirier and even that fledgling sensation, Tacko Fall, Stevens has a lot to sort through with his new big men. Right now Theis, the most indoctrinated in Stevens’ culture, moves with the most efficiency.

“If you watch closely, that’s a tied together group on that end of the court,” Stevens said after the Celtics’ 118-72 blowout win over the Cavs. “Obviously we didn’t start (Marcus) Smart, who is our best perimeter defender, and is coming off the bench.

“So it’s really important that group that starts understands when to kick guys out, when to be up, when to be back, when to react to a threat, and they are really good at it together,” he said. “That’s been the case throughout the preseason, and Daniel’s gotten better at that over time. I think that’s largely a result of being here the longest. We’ve had really good defenders in (Aron) Baynes and (Al) Horford that he’s played behind, but he was working on all that stuff, too.”


Alas, Theis won’t be the answer against Joel Embiid, or Anthony Davs, or Karl-Anthony Townes, which is why Stevens said of that starting center slot, “That could be a rotation position.

“We almost started in zone today. So, like, I’d say we are still going to be mixing and matching. And each team might be different, depending on what the strengths of their interior is like.”


Poirier, a 25-year-old NBA rookie, has played the least of the above group, with one basket and three rebounds spread over three exhibition games. He played six minutes last night, though Stevens intimated that he may actually start Poirier in the exhibition finale Tuesday night in Cleveland.

“It’s going to be interesting. It could be one of those things where he doesn’t play one night, and then starts the next, because something doesn’t go right and you want to try something different,” said Stevens. “But those bigs are all a little bit different, a little bit unique. Theis, Williams and Poirier can all create a real threat on their rolls to the rim, way above the rim, and that is a uniqueness. You saw even in Vincent’s six minutes, he flew into screens and he flew out of screens, and that’s a skill. That’s something he’s practiced. He’s the least probably up-to-speed of the guys in terms of what we’re trying to do, and he’s trying really hard to catch up and he’ll play a lot more on Tuesday. But evaluating all five of those guys is hard. We’re going to play one of them, usually. We might play two of them at times, against certain teams, but usually just one.

Whatever the rotation, Poirier understands that it’s his job to earn his way into it.

“It was pretty clear on the first game of the season, Theis, Kanter and Rob on the rotation and I have to try to find my place, and same for Tacko,” he said. “I feel like we have four or five guys who have a different style and everybody can bring something different. That’s our strength. We just have to learn what is best for the team.

“It’s the beginning. I tried to learn fast to do my best to fit into the team,” said Poirier. “It’s not like the guys who were there last season and know everything. I’m learning every day to be ready as fast as I can. But I’m confident. I’m working on my game. I try to set screens, get down the floor fast, rebound, and let it come to me.”



bob



.

Polite answer by Poirier, but in my opinion he has been humiliated by Stevens.The team ahead in the game by almost 50 points and he was still sat on the bench, even Tacko who is not on the roster is playing more than him.A good coach give confidence to new players not the contrary, that is one of the differences between Pop and Brad .He is so in love with the damn small ball that he was using Semi at the center position.

International,

Brad still has a lot to learn about utilizing personnel. He might not ever reach Pop's level if his primary focus continues to be analytics and an obsession with the 3 ball.


KJ

VP will get an opportunity to play and I expect he will get a start at center tomorrow.

It is still preseason and VP came in behind 3 other centers, 2 of which were on the team last year. Guys like Kanter and Fall have been with the team all summer.

VP will get his chance but I would be surprised to see any significant minutes early in the season.  It is going to take him time to find chemistry with his teammates and for them to do the same.

Danny obviously believed he could help otherwise he would not have signed him.

kj 88,
agree 100% with you.

dboss wrote:VP will get an opportunity to play and I expect he will get a start at center tomorrow.

It is still preseason and VP came in behind 3 other centers, 2 of which were on the team last year. Guys like Kanter and Fall have been with the team all summer.

VP will get his chance but I would be surprised to see any significant minutes early in the season.  It is going to take him time to find chemistry with his teammates and for them to do the same.

Danny obviously believed he could help otherwise he would not have signed him.

d boss have you seen how is Alvin Gentry using Nicolo Melli? The 6''10 Italian is in the same situation as Poirier, new in the league, language barriers. new sistems and even coming from a knee injury that kept him out of the world championship, but he is playing lots of minutes and is doing great.

I did not see a lot of small ball yesterday. 37 minutes out of 48 was manned by a center not named Theis.

I never saw Semi play center yesterday. If he did play 5 it must have been minimal.

international wrote:

dboss wrote:VP will get an opportunity to play and I expect he will get a start at center tomorrow.

It is still preseason and VP came in behind 3 other centers, 2 of which were on the team last year. Guys like Kanter and Fall have been with the team all summer.

VP will get his chance but I would be surprised to see any significant minutes early in the season.  It is going to take him time to find chemistry with his teammates and for them to do the same.

Danny obviously believed he could help otherwise he would not have signed him.

d boss have you seen how is Alvin Gentry using Nicolo Melli? The 6''10 Italian is in the same situation as Poirier, new in the league, language barriers. new sistems and even coming from a knee injury that kept him out of the world championship, but he is playing lots of minutes and is doing great.

I would not over react at this point. I would be skeptical to see how other coaches use other players. Every team is different.

VP WILL play and if he plays well he will play more. Brad will need to play him enough and with the starters and not just the end of the bench guys.

It’s a long season, guys will go down, he will get his chance, if he plays well, he will play a lot more.

Too soon to say much, hard to draw conclusions, but I would think Stevens sees Poirier in practice sessions and takes it from there.

What very little we've seen of him so far he doesn't look good at all. Slow to react, behind the pace of play, bad hands. Only in for 5 minutes at a time and he looks lost.

Again, extremely small sample size. Hopefully he shows something. Like Cowens says, if he plays well, he'll get more time. We'll see what happens.

I have to agree with NYCELT in his evaluation of Poirier so far.

To add, it is not good when Theis looks so much better at center while he is very much even a kind of small power forward.

On the team or not, I think that he needs to smooth out a lot in his own game before he gets meaningful minutes. Fall is a really raw rookie, but he may look as good as Poirier right now.

Poirier has not had any meaningful minutes.  Theis has played in a small ball lineup around the same minutes as last year.  Of course he looks good playing with guys he has played with before and in a system he is familiar with.

No one should criticize a player who has not had a chance to play.  

VP is a legit 7 foot center and he has an understanding of how to play the game.  Let's give him a chance.  If he is not able to make the transition from Euro ball to NBA ball we will find that out soon enough.

I believe the only thing we can say for certain is that playing 6 MPG is too small of a sample size to drawn any conclusions.

dboss,

Small sample, yes. But he literally doesn't even look like he knows which way to turn. Go back and watch his few minutes in each game, especially Orlando. Could be why the minutes are small to begin with. Stevens has seen more than highlight clips on YouTube, which is all we have. I would think he would have given Poirier more run if he thought the guy was ready. I'm hopeful it's just nerves or something, we could use a big his size. Especially competing with Philly and Milwaukee. I'd have to say he can't possibly be as bad as he's looked, or he wouldn't have come this far. Maybe we'll see something vastly better tonight.

Regards

His defense has been fairly good as advertised, like to see more. On offense he looks tentative, a new league, new system, it will take time....

I also believe VP should get more of a chance to prove he can contribute. Even from his limited minutes some of his good basketball insticts on defense were evident like his ability to block lanes and put a body on anybody as pointed by bob in some/all of the game threads.

I actually think the reason he looks a bit lost sometimes especially on offense and has gotten so few minutes might be related to a comment from Brad (or someone else on coaching staff?) that Poirier has had to deal with a language barrier. It is not easy to fit into a new system in a new much faster league when you also need some time to get familiar with the language. I hope he gets some more minutes in the last preseason game.

And as lost as he has looked in his limited minutes if I had to choose between him and R. Williams for a big body to put in our defense after the first 3 preseason games I would pick Poirier as I have yet to see R. Williams prove he can consistently play defense. He is by far our best athlete at the 4/5, but he has looked really raw and uncertain on defense too often while Poirier has at least shown good positioning and blocking out so far.

In the end it is still early for conclussions, we will probably have a better feel for our bigs only after the first couple of weeks of the season are behind us.

I actually liked the look on defense when Poirier and R Will were playing together. R Will has the attributes to play the 4 for some stretches IMHO, both will have to go thru growing pains, but that is the process going forward. In the long run, I think this years bigs can be better than last years on defense....