POST GAME ATLANTA

Despite the loss I liked what I saw tonight again with a lot of energy, defense, passing and working the ball in the paint. Pin this loss which was an easy win over a club going now where in the playoffs on DOC. WTF is he going small with the lead IN THE 4TH Q for 3 minutes. You are tell me Doc that you could not milk another 3 minutes out of JON with a time out or something before you put KG back in!!!!!! JC!!!!!!!!!!!!! Again 2 shot attempt's in the last 4minutes in the paint. Paul got to stop playing that hero crap shot he throws up instead of working the ball into the paint.

Give West another Tommy point for another stellar game!!!!!!!!!!!

This Euro Trash Punk Pachulia needs his head kicked in. Year in and year out he is just a punk who cannot backup his trash play on the court. I hope someone takes him out and his career!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh well we'll be best 3 rd seed in east, why even play hard for 3/4 of a season to only wind up 3rd.

GAME STATS
Points 83 /88 BOST / ATL
FG Made-Attempted 33-74 (.446)/ 29-79 (.367)
3P Made-Attempted 6-12 (.500)/ 4-16 (.250)
FT Made-Attempted 11-20 (.550)/ 26-30 (.867)
Rebounds (Offensive-Total) 3-38/ 14-52
Assists 22/ 14
Turnovers 6/ 10
Steals 5/ 2
Blocks 5/ 1
Fast Break Points 6/ 4
Fouls (Tech/Flagrant) 19 (4/0)/ 14 (2/0)
Largest Lead 12/ 7

112288

112288 wrote:Despite the loss I liked what I saw tonight again with a lot of energy, defense, passing and working the ball in the paint. Pin this loss which was an easy win over a club going now where in the playoffs on DOC. WTF is he going small with the lead IN THE 4TH Q for 3 minutes. You are tell me Doc that you could not milk another 3 minutes out of JON with a time out or something before you put KG back in!!!!!! JC!!!!!!!!!!!!! Again 2 shot attempt's in the last 4minutes. Paul got to stop playing that hero crap shot he throws up instead of working the ball into the paint.

Give West another Tommy point for another stellar game!!!!!!!!!!!

This Euro Trash Punk Pachulia needs his head kicked in. Year in and year out he is just a punk who cannot backup his trash play on the court. I hope someone takes him out and his career!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh well we'll be best 3 rd seed in east, why even play hard for 3/4 of a season to only wind up 3rd.

GAME STATS
Points 83 /88 BOST / ATL
FG Made-Attempted 33-74 (.446)/ 29-79 (.367)
3P Made-Attempted 6-12 (.500)/ 4-16 (.250)
FT Made-Attempted 11-20 (.550)/ 26-30 (.867)
Rebounds (Offensive-Total) 3-38/ 14-52
Assists 22/ 14
Turnovers 6/ 10
Steals 5/ 2
Blocks 5/ 1
Fast Break Points 6/ 4
Fouls (Tech/Flagrant) 19 (4/0)/ 14 (2/0)
Largest Lead 12/ 7

112288

DWest had another really nice game tonight. Its a shame that he has played so little this season. He and Rondo certainly do pair up nicely and work well in tandem.

I wonder if you would feel a bit differently about Pachulia if he wore green? I know I would.

You certainly cannot intimidate him.... and he can muscle, rebound and hit FTs.

GC

Some VERY ugly stats: 31 second half points, 55% FT shooting (11 for 20) and 14-3 disadvantage on the offensive boards. And we let a team shooting 36.7% beat us.

I know they played last night while the Hawks rested, got in at 3AM or so from their flight from San Antonio and lost our starting center last night but we completely fell apart down the stretch. Once again, on a back to back on the road.

Thank God there aren't any B to B's in the playoffs.

I'm praying Krstic is only out for a few weeks (I'm sure we could win a playoff series against the Knicks without him), and this is not a season-ending injury. The timing of this is horrendous.

Speaking for myself, if Pachulia wore green I would immediately begin to see him as a fine human being, a pillar of the community, and the most gracious and decent player to ever wear a Celtics uniform.

There is only one thug that I would never see through green colored glasses if they got traded to the Cs, and that is the dastardly Bill Lambieer. The 8th circle of Hell will always be his place in my eyes.

bobc33 wrote:Speaking for myself, if Pachulia wore green I would immediately begin to see him as a fine human being, a pillar of the community, and the most gracious and decent player to ever wear a Celtics uniform.

There is only one thug that I would never see through green colored glasses if they got traded to the Cs, and that is the dastardly Bill Lambieer. The 8th circle of Hell will always be his place in my eyes.

Lambieer???? A larger than life character out of the WWE????

Love him? Hate him? But aren't love and hate "horns on the same goat"?

I have to wonder.

One of the proudest moments in my Celtic fandom was when the Chief punched Lambieer in the face with the world watching... and the officials didn't "see" the foul. As I recall, Parrish was only later disciplined after review by league officials.

I have to believe that the officials wanted to give Parrish a Tommy Point for putting this giant, cowardly PIAT in his place. STFU!!!

The Pistons fans loved him... and I suspect that we would have too if given the opportunity.

It is amazing what deficiencies and flaws fans are willing to overlook.

Besides, this kid, Lambieer, could play.

GC

11,
thx for the glimmers and plusses of a game i missed, that looked in the paper like a HUGE disappointment all around with their 4th Q fade. looks like it wasn't all bad.
at all.
but we still do need to put the hawks away with a lead like that - no glossing that over. other years, we win that game.
color me a little worried, but still bleeding green.

Michael

Last night was more about human physiology than poor basketball play by the Celts. Give this team a day of rest and we'll almost always close out games against the Hawks. Glimmers were the great play of Delonte and improving play of JON. The only way I know of to get into basketball shape is to play, and Jermaine is starting to do that. Soon 20 minutes a game won't phase him. His mobility is back, a big +. Soon his endurance will follow.

worcester wrote:Last night was more about human physiology than poor basketball play by the Celts. Give this team a day of rest and we'll almost always close out games against the Hawks. Glimmers were the great play of Delonte and improving play of JON. The only way I know of to get into basketball shape is to play, and Jermaine is starting to do that. Soon 20 minutes a game won't phase him. His mobility is back, a big +. Soon his endurance will follow.

thanks, Worcester ... not having seen the dang game, all insights are welcome - a welcome respite from the dunning going on in the sports pages.

esp glad that JON's mobility looked good - that could be KEY !

Michael

We had a really good first half. 63% shooting in the second quarter. Good motion on the offense. 15 assists on 20 fga in the second quarter. Then, we stopped moving and started taking the first shot that came to us. That was an indicator of fatigue. Steve's right about thanking God there's no back-to-backs in the playoffs.

If you look solely at stats, we probably shouldn't have lost this game. We shot 45%, they shot 37%. We shot 50% from 3, they shot 25%. We had 22 assists, they had 14. So where'd we go wrong? They had 52 rebounds, 14 offensive and we had 38 rebounds and only 3 offensive. They attacked the boards. We've seen teams do this repeatedly over the past few weeks. They know that if they can get our help defense moving, that will free up a rebounder and that will create second chances. We got horribly outrebounded last night and that is how a team that shot as poorly as they did gets to beat us, they made up for the misses with more opportunities, which provided them with 10 addition fta. The fact that we didn't hit our fts didn't help either. 11-20 vs 26-30. That's 15 points right there. We even that up, by keeping them off the boards, and we win by 10.

1. Jamal Crawford was sensational. He shot from outside, he drove to the hoop, he kept them in the game. Everything you could ask for from a 6th man and more.

2. Glen Davis had his hands full with Horford and Zaza. He's not putting his body on players early like he did earlier this season and last. They're getting too close to the rim and are jumping over him for the ball. He shot 4-11 and at least some of the shots were ones he shouldn't have taken.

3. Too much Zaza. Yes, he's a punk. He's also, what'd I'd call a poor man's Perk. He's a banger, he's a rebounder, he's an opportunistic scorer (read that as "he can't create his own shots"), he's a very acceptable free throw shooter and he is one feisty bastard. I'd love to have him in green. If we lost something in the area of intimidation when Perk left, we'd have it back if we had Zaza. In just 23 minutes he got 10 rebounds (5 of them offensive), 15 points on 4-6 shooting and 7-8 from the line. What's not to like? I mean, other than he's not in green. I was hoping Danny would scoop him up last off-season, but he resigned almost immediately with Atlanta.

bob

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nice summary statement with insights again, as usual, so thx, bobh

traveling and missing the game, i asm feeling like i at least know where we went right and what went wrong against them ...

Michael

Bob,

You may have hit on something when you described ZaZa. Look at Perkins, KG, Cowens, The Chief, Russell.

They played tough and they all had a mean streak in them if and when called upon to show it. Unfortunately for Krstic.....he's too nice and pleasing and I do not think he has a bad bone in his body.........that adds up to.......why trade for him and better yet why resign him? You need attitude and swagger to play center in the NBA!

112288

112288 wrote:Bob,

You may have hit on something when you described ZaZa. Look at Perkins, KG, Cowens, The Chief, Russell.

They played tough and they all had a mean streak in them if and when called upon to show it. Unfortunately for Krstic.....he's too nice and pleasing and I do not think he has a bad bone in his body.........that adds up to.......why trade for him and better yet why resign him? You need attitude and swagger to play center in the NBA!

112288

112288,

You may be right about Krstic being "too nice", but is that a necessity? Robinson played center and was as nice and competitive as you could ask for. Granted, Robinson has physical gifts that Krstic doesn't have, but he wasn't mean.

Remember the first few weeks after the trade? Remember how we thought Krstic was the steal and not Green?

I might be getting a little "psycho-babble" here, but I think part of Krstic's problem is that he's trying to please too much. When he first got here, he knew (and so did everybody else, including the coaching staff) he didn't know the plays, so he just went out worked his ass off playing hard and did a lot of good. Now, he's expected to run plays and when he's not where he's supposed to be Doc gets on him (and KG said the team's feistiness come from their coach. When KG points to someone else as the source of feistiness, you KNOW there's some serious edge there!). You can see he doesn't take it the right way. Sure, he tries to please Doc, but he hangs his head a bit too and that costs him some aggressiveness and instinct. He's trying to think through what he has to do to please Doc and not just going out and doing it. This game is too fast to be thinking about where you should be. That is why, in one previous post, I questioned his basketball IQ.

The funny thing is, for a 7'0" player, he's kinda quick and his hands are reasonably soft. If he was more aggressive (not mean, not bad, just aggressive) and attacked more I think he'd get the productivity of his first few weeks back. Fewer headfakes, more power to the rim and force them to make a clean block. You may get blocked once, you may get blocked twice, but eventually you're going to get them into foul trouble. Move on the shot release for position on the boards and contest the rebound. Set good hard picks (not vicious, not mean, just not brush picks) and create the mismatch and then roll to the basket or to an open place in the floor within your range.

He's having a bit of a crisis of confidence right now. Unfortunately, so is Ray, a bit. Not a good time for these. We gotta get/stay healthy, get Ray some easier shots to get him back into his groove and talk happy, strong thoughts to Krstic.

bob

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Bob, sounds like you're optimistic about the results of his mri...

worcester wrote:Bob, sounds like you're optimistic about the results of his mri...

worcester,

I have no reason to be other than that he walked off the court under his own power, without using someone as a crutch and without hobbling and grimacing like each step was agony.

All observational stuff, but they are some things we can hold onto for while at least.

bob

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I'm very concerned with Ray, he seems in a funk, are all the minutes catching up to him? just saw the game on replay and he missed a few crucial lay ups as did Rondo.....if a few of those makeable fall, we win, but Ray has been off for a few games now. Lets give him a game or two off and get Delonte and Wafer in sync for playoffs. Wafer was playing great right before he got hurt, he was huge against the Heat, we could use his athleticism and shot at the 2.

cowens/oldschool wrote:I'm very concerned with Ray, he seems in a funk, are all the minutes catching up to him? just saw the game on replay and he missed a few crucial lay ups as did Rondo.....if a few of those makeable fall, we win, but Ray has been off for a few games now. Lets give him a game or two off and get Delonte and Wafer in sync for playoffs. Wafer was playing great right before he got hurt, he was huge against the Heat, we could use his athleticism and shot at the 2.

cow,

I'm seeing levels of stress in Ray Allen I haven't seen before.

Right now, we're in a dogfight for 2nd place in the east. If there's any daylight in that playoff seeding, either way, I'd say sit Ray and Paul down for a couple of games and let Sasha and Wafer play.

If it doesn't make a difference if we win or lose until it's the playoffs, then it doesn't make a difference.


bob

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quote]
thanks, Worcester ... not having seen the dang game, all insights are welcome - a welcome respite from the dunning going on in the sports pages.

esp glad that JON's mobility looked good - that could be KEY !
Michael[/quote]

Huumm, Michael your post made me think; and I realized since the advent of this board I don't even look at the sports pages for Celtics stuff anymore. With all the points of view and solid analysis, plus some select posting of good articles in those sports pages here, I have no need for the Globe, the Herald, ESPN...........

I've said it before and I'll say it again. The problem with Ray is not Ray. It's the failure of the bigs to set and hold good picks for him. When Ray's defensive man is able to keep up with Ray on his curls, his distance scoring efficiency goes way down—being limited mainly to transition opportunities. Even when he does get off a shot from outside, it's usually rushed, which invites bad shooting mechanics and poor rhythm. As it is right now, Ray's wearing himself out for very little "return on investment."

Playing Ray less will not help this situation. Schooling the bigs in holding better picks is the primary challenge (and it won't hurt Rondo's and Paul's excursions to the hoop either).

On many occasions lately, the opponents' defense has seemed to be moving better than the Celtics' offense. Better picks can do a lot to solve that situation.

If Kristic continues to prove allergic to setting anything but brush or phantom picks, Doc may have to work out ways to give more of that responsibility to KG, Davis, Jermaine, and hopefully Shaq.

Sam

Hopefully when Shaq does return, alot will change in this offense. I can imagine that Ray is a bit frustrated by the situation right now. He seems to be the scape goat alot when it is time to play the blame game. The one who gets off easy is Baby. It is time for him to stop shooting so many outside shots. Get back on the block, and work for that shot down there.

If any of you were lucky enough to have comcast on last night, you were able to listen to Dave Cowens say that one of the big problems with the Celtics is that they were not putting a body on alot of the Atlanta shooters. I have heard this repeatedly from Cedric Maxwell also. Words from guys who did it so well.

Rosalie,

I heard that to and is a good point. As Doc said, there were playing soft.

112288

Rosalie, ditto on Baby's play. Too many outside shots. Not enough bodying up against opponents bigs. Not enough boxing out.

sam wrote:I've said it before and I'll say it again. The problem with Ray is not Ray. It's the failure of the bigs to set and hold good picks for him. When Ray's defensive man is able to keep up with Ray on his curls, his distance scoring efficiency goes way down—being limited mainly to transition opportunities. Even when he does get off a shot from outside, it's usually rushed, which invites bad shooting mechanics and poor rhythm. As it is right now, Ray's wearing himself out for very little "return on investment."

Playing Ray less will not help this situation. Schooling the bigs in holding better picks is the primary challenge (and it won't hurt Rondo's and Paul's excursions to the hoop either).

On many occasions lately, the opponents' defense has seemed to be moving better than the Celtics' offense. Better picks can do a lot to solve that situation.

If Kristic continues to prove allergic to setting anything but brush or phantom picks, Doc may have to work out ways to give more of that responsibility to KG, Davis, Jermaine, and hopefully Shaq.

Sam

Sam those 2 or 3 blown lay ups had nothing to do with pick execution, a HoF 2 that Ray is should be finishing those, also in transition he seems to also fumble oppurtunities lately or get stripped. Who would think with Perk leaving we really miss his good picks when he did execute them?

Cow,

If they don't get their chemistry down with whatever centers are available, Ray can rest in June. How about the layups he made? And why has he been taking so many layups? Because he can't get free on the perimeter.

Ray's rushing his shots because he can't get separation from his defensive man because no one's impeding the defensive man.

I agree that, just on general principles, it's preferable to have all the starters playing fewer than 40 minutes. And, maybe once the seedings are set, it'll be time to give Ray and Paul a little rest. Meanwhile, if Ray's really tired, perhaps he can limit his pregame regimen to 150 shots instead of 300 (or whatever it is).

Sam

Sam

I agree that hes having problems getting clean looks on perimeter, but lets get him fresh again cause playoffs are gonna be a grind. Team can use first round to get timing and execution down. Doc always limits KG's minutes, well Ray is OLDER, and the 2 is the most athletic position to have to defend night in and night out.

cow

As far as the 4th quarter swoon in atlanta, with about 6 or so minutes left and the guys on the court obviously out of gas...........I'd put the darn bench in that had not played many minutes, roll the dice and see what happens for the next 4+ minutes but the minutes on or starters have got to come down.

Picks yeah it is an issue but jumpers start to miss when the legs get a little rubbery too.

beat