First off, hey guys! I'm back regularly again. Sorry I was a bit busy (with life but also Red Sox in playoffs lol) but still have followed the Celtics games along the way.
Anyways, I agree it's been a bit of a frustrating start all-around, but honestly it was expected. We're still 6-3 though and as of now a Top-4 seed in the East, so it's not all doom-and-gloom yet.
Hayward is coming back from a gruesome injury so of course it was going to take some time for him to become adjusted again back on the court, and of course there would be probably a lot of "bad" from Hayward before a lot of "great". I mean, if you were hoping that Hayward would come back and immediately look like his All-Star self again, then you're simply going to have to wait longer. It will be frustrating for now, but folks need to realize that if we want to make another deep run in the playoffs (including the Finals), then we need Hayward to be at 100% and to be one of our best players, which he can't do if we don't ease him in and give him some minutes early in the year.
Same with Kyrie, he's looked red hot lately, but he's also coming off a significant injury so his cold start, although very surprising, was not something I expected would last a long time, and of course it hasn't.
I always expected October and November would primarily be months with a lot of inconsistent basketball since CBS will continue to ease guys back in, figure out rotations and minutes, etc.
Also, I'm not sure why some folks on here seem shocked that the Pacers and Raptors look really good (as in, look like they could actually be Top-3 in the East and Toronto the clear #1). Looking at long-term picture is one thing, but ultimately Toronto were the 1 seed last year and upgraded from DeRozan to Leonard (who is seemingly very close to being 100% healthy). Pacers gave us a ton of trouble last season and are no "middle-of-the-pack" team. Bucks and Sixers are also true threats, though maybe not to the extent of Toronto.
I still am confident we'll figure things out and finish as a Top-2 seed in the East, but for now we just got to be patient and everything will sort itself out.
I do agree that this current style of basketball they are playing is not one I like (just shooting a ton of 3s during the entire game), but CBS isn't stupid. He'll realize it's not working and make adjustments from there. Also, if we're being honest, opposing defenses have actually looked bad against us and are leaving us open behind the arc, so we're trying to take advantage. Maybe Ainge sees this over the course of the season and finds a way to add/trade for another sharpshooter at the deadline as a result? But yeah, we don't have Curry + Thompson's on our team where this is something that will last and win us a ton of games over the course of a whole season.
So guys, R-E-L-A-X. It's been ugly, yes, and frustrating, but better to deal with this stuff now than in say, March/April. We've just got to hope we can stay as healthy as possible but if we do, we're still the biggest threat to Golden State along with Toronto
We can obviously criticize this team and talk about the "bad", but lets just try to avoid a bunch of blazing hot-takes and "this team may not be a Top-5 team in the East" takes on November 4.