Celtics vs Heat - The Matchups

I am looking forward to our Round 3 ECF against the Miami Heat.  There is some bad blood at the top between Riley and Ainge but the players have no such animosity towards each other.  At least not yet.

The Miami Heat saved us from having to play the Bucks and for that I am thankful.  Our pathway through the playoffs could not have been better.  Our team will finally get a few extra days off to rest their bodies and begin to focus on the next challenge.

The Matchups

I am going to key in on positional matchups at guard, wing and bigs just like the previous series and will try to dig out a few tidbits of information on individual players.

The Guards

Toronto starts Dragic at point and rookie Tyler Herro at SG.  Dragic is a slithering Pg that does a great job snaking his way through the defense and around screen and he has been a dangerous 3 point shooter in the playoffs hitting at a rate of 38% on 7 attempts.  Surprisingly he is their primary offensive weapon and leads their team in FGA at 17.2.  It is hard to believe but Jimmy Butler is 2nd on the team in shot attempts at only 12.3 per game.  Pat Riley beat Danny to the punch in drafting Tyler Herro.  Danny wanted him as reports came out before the draft that the Celtics were very impressed with his shooting (40% from deep in the playoffs)  Off the bench spot up shooter and fellow rookie Duncan Robinson is clearly on the radar as he is shooting 39.3% from deep.  The third rookie Nunn is a quick pace guy with a decent handle but he has been a minor rotation guy.  This team clearly lacks depth at the point as Dragic is the only guard who can run the offense.  Many plays will run through Butler.

Advantage Celtics

Assuming Kemba Walker comes out of his funk he would pretty much match whatever Dragic can do.  I am going to assume that Marcus continues to start at the 2 and he should give Herro fits because he is a great defender.  Robinson is a catch and shoot guy and Wanamaker is the better defender.  Our versatility at wing means we have guys who can stay with and challenge Robinson provided we take him seriously.  They will also use Iggy off the bench as a SG and he brings an experience factor to the game but is a shadow of a shadow of his former self.

The Wings

Reports are circulating around that GH may stay in the bubble.  

"Hayward is still expected to leave the bubble again for the birth of his son, which reportedly is expected to occur near the end of September. A recent ESPN article suggested Hayward might remain in the bubble based on an Instagram post by Hayward’s wife Robyn in which she said the next time she saw Hayward, he would no longer be the only boy in the family. That, however, has not been confirmed by Hayward or the team."

This mystery is impactfull.  If wife Robyn has opened the door for him to stay with his team our chance to win just went up.

It is always amusing when we see former Celtics players impacting other teams.  The Miami wings are old college buddies, Jimmy Butler and Jae Crowder.  Butler is an all around player and leads them in scoring at 21.8 PPG.  He is not a great 3 point shooter although he is shooting 50%  but that is only for 2 attempts per game.  He is a drive and kick guy with a very physical profile but not the quickest off the bounce.  His 4.7 assists per game in the playoffs is barely better than his 3.3 turnovers.  We know Jae and he is the same guy that developed under the Celtics.  He is a catch and shoot wing, 40% from deep, a very physical defender but a step slow defending on the perimeter, a solid rebounder with physical play in the post.  My guess is that the 6' 7" Duncan Robinson will swing between SG and SF.
 
Advantage Celtics

Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown are better than Jimmy Butler and Jae Crowder.  If GH is ready and able to play as expected our wings are clearly superior.

Bigs

Bam Adebayo proves once again that the 14th pick in a draft can turn into a very good player.  He is a PF/C that is quick off of his feet.  He is averaging 11.7 rebounds and makes his presence felt on the offensive glass.  He is a good passer and screener and his quickness lets him play on the ball against smaller players.  Cowens' best friend, Kelly Olynyk, comes off the bench as a stretch 4/5.  Meyers Leonard who is a legit size center has been hurt and has played a total of 9 minutes during the playoff.

Advantage Celtics

We have a combination of Theis/Williams and Kanter.  We have more depth and Theis has been really playing well.  Young Robert Williams has finally gotten more opportunities and looks ready to contribute.  And if we need a big physical body to score and rebound in the post, we can always use Kanter.  I expect to see GW also get some minutes at the 5 in small ball circumstances.

Coaching

Erik Spoelstra has championship pedigree as a coach and his 17 years of NBA coaching experience gives him the edge over Brad Stevens.  Any coach who can figure out how to stop the Buck including shutting down the freak is a great coach.  There is no way I expected the Heat to reach the ECF.  

Intangibles

Injuries, fatigue, head to head results and unknows. How fast can Gordon Hayward get up to speed?  Will he stay in the bubble?  Will he move to a reserve roll off the bench while Marcus continues to start.  Can the Heat keep shooting at a high rate with a hand in their face.  Which one of our rotation guys will contribute beyond their regular season numbers.  How will the ease with which the heat beat the Pacers and Bucks impact their confidence level.  Head to head we are 2-1 with the loss coming from the bubble.  I am going to watch that game again.

X-Factor = Marcus Smart

Final Conclusion The Celtics win 4-2

Correction:

Herro does not start for them. He comes off the bench but is playing starter level minutes (32.3 MPG)

Duncan Robinson has been the starter at SG

Both rookies have been playing solid basketball for the Heat. The Lineup correction has no significant change in positional match-ups.

Just finished watching the bubble game between Boston and Miami.  There was no Butler and Smart fouled out.  I watched their 3-2 zone.

Like the young John Connor said in Terminated 2 after he robbed the ATM machine for some arcade cash   "Easy Money"

I am changing my unpredictable prediction to 5 games won by Boston and a trip to the finals which will be a bus ride from the Hotel to the Gym.

Watching film is great. Another option for the Heat at the wing is Derrick Jones, Jr. but he has not played much during the first two series averaging only 8 MPG.

Positional differences are blurred as a position-less style has taken hold. Jaylen could be a guard, a wing or a big. Several on the roster can and will play multiple positions. I did not include that but I am sure you guys are acutely aware.

Olynck, Hero and Robinson are all very weak defenders, Crowder is a little above average, nothing special defensively, but works hard. Jimmy Butler is a past all defensive force, clearly their best wing defender, but theres only one of him and Iggy has clearly lost a step, so the more you play him, the more you take away from their offense. I’d say we have a big advantage and should attack their weakest defenders, just go right at them. We can go thru, over and around their weak defenders. Play up on their shooters, they can shoot given space and make them drive and our defense should be able to cause a lot of havoc. All our top guys have shot blocking ability in Theis, finally RWill and 2 J’s and Smart and GH, obviously they can cover a lot of ground and get steals and blocks. We have like 3 guys with as much or more defensive ability than their best defender in 2 J’s and Smart. I think we match up pretty well with them, stay on top of their shooters and attack their weak links on offense, wear them out by attacking them.

position-less basketball  match up, based on playoff minutes per game

Tatum- Butler

Brown- Bam

Kemba- Dragic

Smart- Herro

Theis- Crowder

Wanamaker- Robinson

Time Lord- Iguodala

Grant W.- Kelly O.

Semi- Nunn

Langford- Jones


since there really are no positions now or any real match ups with switching defenses anymore.

Miami offers as much of a battle as Toronto the way they have been playing now, IMO.

but we may just see a Celtics/Lakers finals after all this year.

dboss,

Excellent analysis as always and very helpful for those of us who love the game and don't know why!

I don't understand why we would "waste" MS on Herro. I know Herro can get open and be dangerous from 3, but he's a rookie and eventually the big stage playoff pressure is going to get to him and Bricksville/I Can't throw it in the ocean will be his battle cry. Shouldn't Marcus be shading/guarding on Jimmy Buckets? Can't Kemba take care of Herro?

I'd love to one day watch game film with you. You'd have to start pretty much from scratch but it would be a blessing. (Maybe I should start with Kobe -Detail?) I might be able to do it with my son who is in 15U AAU in Texas when I see him next. He's getting to the finals pretty regularly.

I'm starting to sour as well on Doc and the boys overcoming LAL myself, assuming all goes well today. Offense vs. Defense. Tim Legler seems to be suggesting BOS might be the fave of the 4 to be left to beat LAL. He was talking about our "string" defense. How fluid, confluent and continuous it is and the Lakers not having seen anything like that in the first two rounds nor will they see that vs. Clips/Nuggets. Plus the fact that they suck from 3-ville.

I'm not expecting too much out of Hayward in this series. Just as a reliever and moderate scorer off the bench. Anything more like going for 30 is gravy. We kinda need to know whether he's going to be there the whole time. (It's a tough choice, I understand. But totally his call. You can tell he is torn otherwise he would have made up his mind to stay or go, but when he tells his son years from now that he was at his birth but no trophy, his son's going to be po'ed!! If he faced-times the birth and stays in the bubble and shows him the ring on his finger from the championship won, his son will be over the moon proud and happy. I know, I've left out his wife but she has all the medical help she will need for a normal birth. Gordon isn't adding anything except support to the equation there. However, if things go awry then no question he has to go)

I hope Brad does not throw him back into starting line up and blow the mo and synergy from the first two rounds. He's more for relief this round and if we move on we will definitely need him for the Finals.

db

cowens/oldschool wrote:Olynck, Hero and Robinson are all very weak defenders, Crowder is a little above average, nothing special defensively, but works hard. Jimmy Butler is a past all defensive force, clearly their best wing defender, but theres only one of him and Iggy has clearly lost a step, so the more you play him, the more you take away from their offense. I’d say we have a big advantage and should attack their weakest defenders, just go right at them. We can go thru, over and around their weak defenders. Play up on their shooters, they can shoot given space and make them drive and our defense should be able to cause a lot of havoc. All our top guys have shot blocking ability in Theis, finally RWill and 2 J’s and Smart and GH, obviously they can cover a lot of ground and get steals and blocks. We have like 3 guys with as much or more defensive ability than their best defender in 2 J’s and Smart. I think we match up pretty well with them, stay on top of their shooters and attack their weak links on offense, wear them out by attacking them.

Cow

I agree completely I did not mention the defense or lack there of by them. But they can shoot and our defense will come into play.

dbrown4 wrote:dboss,

Excellent analysis as always and very helpful for those of us who love the game and don't know why!

I don't understand why we would "waste" MS on Herro.  I know Herro can get open and be dangerous from 3, but he's a rookie and eventually the big stage playoff pressure is going to get to him and Bricksville/I Can't throw it in the ocean will be his battle cry.  Shouldn't Marcus be shading/guarding on Jimmy Buckets?  Can't Kemba take care of Herro?  

I'd love to one day watch game film with you.  You'd have to start pretty much from scratch but it would be a blessing.  (Maybe I should start with Kobe -Detail?)  I might be able to do it with my son who is in 15U AAU in Texas when I see him next.  He's getting to the finals pretty regularly.  

I'm starting to sour as well on Doc and the boys overcoming LAL myself, assuming all goes well today.  Offense vs. Defense.  Tim Legler seems to be suggesting BOS might be the fave of the 4 to be left to beat LAL.  He was talking about our "string" defense.  How fluid, confluent and continuous it is and the Lakers not having seen anything like that in the first two rounds nor will they see that vs. Clips/Nuggets.  Plus the fact that they suck from 3-ville.

I'm not expecting too much out of Hayward in this series.  Just as a reliever and moderate scorer off the bench.  Anything more like going for 30 is gravy.  We kinda need to know whether he's going to be there the whole time.  (It's a tough choice, I understand.  But totally his call.  You can tell he is torn otherwise he would have made up his mind to stay or go, but when he tells his son years from now that he was at his birth but no trophy, his son's going to be po'ed!!  If he faced-times the birth and stays in the bubble and shows him the ring on his finger from the championship won, his son will be over the moon proud and happy.  I know, I've left out his wife but she has all the medical help she will need for a normal birth.  Gordon isn't adding anything except support to the equation there.  However, if things go awry then no question he has to go)  

I hope Brad does not throw him back into starting line up and blow the mo and synergy from the first two rounds.  He's more for relief this round and if we move on we will definitely need him for the Finals.

db        

dbrown

Herro has some JJ Reddick in him. I think Marcus will cover a lot of different guys during the game including Herro. As you know we switch a lot. You may have Jaylen on Jimmy Butler or Bam or Crowder or Robinson. I realize they are just rookies but the reason why Miami is in the ECF is because of those rookies. They are part of the Heat top 8 rotation. Herro by the way is a 6' 5" SG besides Kemba will have his hands full with trying to stay with the 6' 3" PG Dragic. Herro comes off the bench. Duncan Robinson starts.

kdp59 wrote:position-less basketball  match up, based on playoff minutes per game

Tatum- Butler

Brown- Bam

Kemba- Dragic

Smart- Herro

Theis- Crowder

Wanamaker- Robinson

Time Lord- Iguodala

Grant W.- Kelly O.

Semi- Nunn

Langford- Jones


since there really are no positions now  or any real match ups with switching defenses anymore.

Miami offers as much of a battle as Toronto the way they have been playing now, IMO.

but we may just see a Celtics/Lakers finals after all this year.

kdp59

The Heat are not to be taken lightly. They are well coached and play well together including using a 3-2 zone on us that was very effective in the bubble game that they won. They cannot cover our team man to man so expect a lot of zones from them.

dboss wrote:

kdp59 wrote:position-less basketball  match up, based on playoff minutes per game

Tatum- Butler

Brown- Bam

Kemba- Dragic

Smart- Herro

Theis- Crowder

Wanamaker- Robinson

Time Lord- Iguodala

Grant W.- Kelly O.

Semi- Nunn

Langford- Jones


since there really are no positions now  or any real match ups with switching defenses anymore.

Miami offers as much of a battle as Toronto the way they have been playing now, IMO.

but we may just see a Celtics/Lakers finals after all this year.

kdp59

The Heat are not to be taken lightly.   They are well coached and play well together  including using a 3-2 zone on us that was very effective in the bubble game that they won.  They cannot cover our team man to man so expect a lot of zones from them.

Good point, in man to man we have a lot of advantages, even more if GH can come back near his previous form. Was looking forward to our guys attacking their weak links, they are going to have to go to a zone, hopefully Brad can figure out a way to exploit our superior athletes.

kdp59 pointed out in our zoom session that Duncan Robinson is not a rookie.

He is correct as Robinson played last year although sparingly.

This is a copycat league.

If a coach sees something from another team that works you may see them use it as well.

The Miami Heat play a lot of zone defenses, They were in a 3-2 quite a bit in our Bubble game and you can expect other variations like a 1-2-2 and maybe some 2-3 if they have issues keeping us away from the rim. Would they dare roll out the now infamous box and 1?

The Celtics need to be prepared for all of these options because Miami may not have enough on the ball defenders to check our diverse and talented team.

Boston needs to quickly recognize the defense that is being played and move the ball and players need to move themselves as well.

Getting GH up to speed will take a few games because there is simply no way to simulate the high level of intensity that we saw against Toronto.

GH's return gives us a clear advantage in several areas.

With Boston pulling closer in this series after winning game 3 the matchups continue to loom large.  

Here is a stat that blows me away.

The Celtics have 4 players averaging 20 or more per game during the first 3 games.

The one area that has been troubling has been our P N R defense with Kemba and Theis.  Bam is getting too many free runs at the rim because Kemba is getting picked off.  They have not been able to switch back quick enough to get Theis back on Bam.  If you bring help defense it opens up passing lanes for their shooters.  Bam is an above average passer and is averaging almost 5 assists per game.  

In game 3 the Celtics did a much better job attacking their zone defense but there were still occasions where they did not move the ball as well as they should.  Jaylen did a fantastic job going right at them.  They really do not have an answer for his quickness an strength.

Goran Dragic has played well however in game 3 the Celtics limited him to 11 points on 2-10 shooting .  In our 2 losses he attempted 19 shots in each game.  Therefore a key to beating them is to limit his scoring opportunities.

Sharp shooter Duncan Robinson is shooting 42.9% from the field including 42.9% from deep.  That is because all 9 of his FGA per game are 3 point attempts.  He has not taken a single 2PT attempt.  He is 1-2 from the line in the 3 games.  He is the ultimate expression of a sniper.  Limiting his attempts will go a long way in beating them.

With the return of Gordon Hayward, it opens up all type of possibilities at both ends.  Marcus Smart is the key because he is a defensive stopper and can be moved around the board.  The Celtics can put him on Dragic and also use Brad Wanamaker on him.  Wear him down.  Dragic is not a good defender so they need to go at him hard.  When GH is in the game with the J's it also opens the door to use JB on Dragic.  There are all types of option to defend them.  

GH played 31 minutes in his return which was way more than I expected.  The 4 days off should give him time to recover.  His presence shifts the series in our favor.  I think their zone defenses will become less and less effective.  They play a lot of zone because they cannot defend Boston man to man.

I think we need to see more minutes with Hayward in there along with the J's Theis and Smart but
Brad may keep Smart in the lineup because we have won the first QTR in all 3 games.  

Our rotation at 5 using Kanter make sense when Bam goes to the bench.

If Boston can win game 4 it turns into a best of 3 series and I think Boston can win that.

Right Kanter vs KO has to be the 2 weakest defensive 5’s ever going right at each other. Smarts defense on Dragic was one of the keys to game 3 victory. Good move putting Kemba on Crowder, odd match up, but it worked as Crowder has no offensive game other than the 3. If not for so many mental lapses and sloppy play/turnovers, we really could easily be up 3-0 in this series. So glad we got GH back, that was the most impactful 6 points 5 board performance you will ever see, his movements added so much efficient movement to the offense, which meant less boneheaded plays by us and more winning plays.

cowens/oldschool wrote:Right Kanter vs KO has to be the 2 weakest defensive 5’s ever going right at each other. Smarts defense on Dragic was one of the keys to game 3 victory. Good move putting Kemba on Crowder, odd match up, but it worked as Crowder has no offensive game other than the 3. If not for so many mental lapses and sloppy play/turnovers, we really could easily be up 3-0 in this series. So glad we got GH back, that was the most impactful 6 points 5 board performance you will ever see, his movements added so much efficient movement to the offense, which meant less boneheaded plays by us and more winning plays.

Cowens/oldschool

GH also had 4 assists and 3 steals in that game and just 1 turnover.  He really helped us at both ends.

I know how happy Rosalie is to have him back.

Can I revisit his regular season numbers one more time:

52 games played and 52 games started.  17.5 PPG and 50% shooting from the field.  An efficient 13.5 FGA per game.  38.6% from deep and 85.5% from the line.  These are off the chart numbers for the 4th option on any team.  Dig a little deeper and he also averaged 6.7 rebounds per game and led all of our wings with 4.1 assists.  Sandwiched between Jayson and Jaylen, our 3 wing combo sets the standard for this new era of NBA basketball.

Dboss right I knew he had some excellent defense too, definitely does it all and on both ends, he gives the game whatever it needs. With him at our best we can wear teams out and attack in waves, and the ball moves faster and more efficiently. These few extra days off are ideal to get GH better further and give us more time to figure out better strategy, I am looking forward to a dynamic performance by us next game.

He does make it tough to cheat on with him back.  Kemba will be wide open now.  Keep him firing at the 3-line and it will be Game, Set and Match.  

I'm afraid we really can't afford to lose either of the next two games.  I'd hate to see this team not get out of the ECF by digging themselves out of a 2-0 deficit to go 2-1 and then lose then next one.  I believe we can do it because MIA doesn't match up talent-wise.  All we have to do is match their grit (we are VERY capable of doing that) and put the seeds of doubt in their heads that a 2-3 game losing streak would do to a team tap dancing through the first two rounds.  Only then will have things changed for the Heat in their eyes.  Always remember the 1st Law Of The Playoffs...EVERY weakness on EVERY team gets exposed.  A victory in G4 for us will def put MIA on the hot seat.

Time for Boston to play up to their potential and win the next 3 games.    

db