STOP WALKING THE BALL

[Change]

For a point guard who can't score in the half-court, What is Rondo achieving by walking the ball every single play? Its dreadful to watch precious second are being wasted walking the ball up. Does he not know 24second shot clock? Celtics leave themselves no room for error playing that kind of basketball. Everything then becomes a grind.

I'm flabbergasted Doc hasn't addressed walking the ball thing. Doc answer to everything is "Hero Ball" NO DOC!! Its Celtics pace Doc. Year after year the same deficiency persists; the Boston Celtics can't score enough points. And the sole perpetrator is RAJON RONDO walking the ball. Either he picks up the pace, or they will going fishing soon.

[lightspeed5]

good point. walking the ball also lets miami get into their defensive sets/positions. by rondo running in, he can disrupt that and attack. He's fast and a great ball handler, so turnovers shouldnt be a concern.

[Change]

good point. walking the ball also lets miami get into their defensive sets/positions. by rondo running in, he can disrupt that and attack. He's fast and a great ball handler, so turnovers shouldnt be a concern.

Touché

[hpantazo]

For a point guard who can't score in the half-court, What is Rondo achieving by walking the ball every single play? Its dreadful to watch precious second are being wasted walking the ball up. Does he not know 24second shot clock? Celtics leave themselves no room for error playing that kind of basketball. Everything then becomes a grind.

I'm flabbergasted Doc hasn't addressed walking the ball thing. Doc answer to everything is "Hero Ball" NO DOC!! Its Celtics pace Doc. Year after year the same deficiency persists; the Boston Celtics can't score enough points. And the sole perpetrator is RAJON RONDO walking the ball. Either he picks up the pace, or they will going fishing soon.

Well said, TP.  Even when I coach kids teams who have no shot clock, I yell at them for walking the ball. Then they turn the celtics game on and see Rondo and the big 3 walking the ball up every possession and waiting until 10 seconds are left on the shot clock to go into their offense. Infuriating!

[guava_wrench]

Were guys too tired to run with him?

[Mr October]

The Celtics can only be opportunistic runners. A number of times I saw Rondo take a couple quick strides, but by mid court saw that he was at a 1 on 3 disadvantage, so he slowed up and waited for his teammates.

The Celtics do not have the youth, health to run consistently. I would rather they save that energy for getting back in transition.

[hpantazo]

The Celtics can only be opportunistic runners. A number of times I saw Rondo take a couple quick strides, but by mid court saw that he was at a 1 on 3 disadvantage, so he slowed up and waited for his teammates.

The Celtics do not have the youth, health to run consistently. I would rather they save that energy for getting back in transition.

They don't have to be a consistent running team, but they HAVE to get into their offense much earlier. It's a must if they want any chance of winning the series. They never get to tthe 2nd or 3rd option because there is no time to get to it.

[Change]

For a point guard who can't score in the half-court, What is Rondo achieving by walking the ball every single play? Its dreadful to watch precious second are being wasted walking the ball up. Does he not know 24second shot clock? Celtics leave themselves no room for error playing that kind of basketball. Everything then becomes a grind.

I'm flabbergasted Doc hasn't addressed walking the ball thing. Doc answer to everything is "Hero Ball" NO DOC!! Its Celtics pace Doc. Year after year the same deficiency persists; the Boston Celtics can't score enough points. And the sole perpetrator is RAJON RONDO walking the ball. Either he picks up the pace, or they will going fishing soon.

Well said, TP.  Even when I coach kids teams who have no shot clock, I yell at them for walking the ball. Then they turn the celtics game on and see Rondo and the big 3 walking the ball up every possession and waiting until 10 seconds are left on the shot clock to go into their offense. Infuriating!

Its not a coincidence Celtics had a lot success with Avery at point. He doesn't mess around with the ball. Get the ball up the court as fast as he can. Celtics get into their sets faster. The ball is moving, and bodies are moving.

[Celtics18]

The Celtics can only be opportunistic runners. A number of times I saw Rondo take a couple quick strides, but by mid court saw that he was at a 1 on 3 disadvantage, so he slowed up and waited for his teammates.

The Celtics do not have the youth, health to run consistently. I would rather they save that energy for getting back in transition.

Agreed.  I like it when they mix it up by pushing the pace at times and getting into half court sets at times.  If you check last night's game again, they actually got into their half court sets relatively quickly on most possessions.  They usually got into their sets within about 8 to 10 seconds when they were in the half court offense.  

[Mr October]

The Celtics can only be opportunistic runners. A number of times I saw Rondo take a couple quick strides, but by mid court saw that he was at a 1 on 3 disadvantage, so he slowed up and waited for his teammates.

The Celtics do not have the youth, health to run consistently. I would rather they save that energy for getting back in transition.

They don't have to be a consistent running team, but they HAVE to get into their offense much earlier. It's a must if they want any chance of winning the series. They never get to tthe 2nd or 3rd option because there is no time to get to it.

Yes I agree that getting into their stuff 2-3 seconds early would help a lot. But that falls on the team getting up the court faster. It was sad to see how often Rondo was waiting with the ball around the 3 point line with 3-4 Miami defenders already back, and no other Celtics.

[SHAQATTACK]

seems that we discussed this several times before.  And yes I thought about it too as I watched the game. It was maddening.

When Bradley took over for ROndo , this was one of first and best things we noticed about AB's game...he gets the ball moving, the Celtics offense starts in motion sooner and the result is a a powerful flowing offense. That is quick to attack , and keeps everybody on their toes and involved.

Rondo moves the sets WAY TO SLOW .  Its like watching a SLOW DEATH when Rondo stands around dribbling and walking the ball up. The opponents stare at this , size up the situation and pick our pockets while it looks like we are standing around day dreaming.  I even get sleepy watching this ....ROndo gets into this self induced BASKETBALL LULL" and it is like a CHinese water torture.  Bass just stands there and watchs , PP gets his pockets picked, KG will get a 3 sec violation...the whole ROndo standing around deal has got to stop .

I knew this team would suck without Bradley to move the offense and score some points .
 Back to the same poor , slack , lost look we had before ROndo was injured and Bradley came in.  (except  KG ) who I feel sorry for ... I blame it on Rondo .   Doc need s to chew his tail good.

RONDO !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! DO something ...don't stand there like a statue looking around waitng for something to happen .  ARRRRGG


BTW...this is ALSO the problem with the LAKERS offense too, I've heard Magic comment as well.  The LAkers go to sleep and stand around watching Kobe play ball by himself.

And the LAKERS need a point guard too .

[pearljammer10]

Amen to this thread. The more we walk, the longer it takes us to get into any offense, if any. We walk it up, Rondo usually dribbles for 20 seconds and after one pass someone jacks a jumper. There has been hardly any pushing of the ball whatsoever by us and it is really killing our offense and our momentum.

[2short]

Ray & Paul are definitely hurt so I'm not knocking them or even making excuses.  BUT Rondo is basically running a one man fast break with Bradley out.  While people like to knock rondo for all sorts of things, I would be knocking him if he was going 1 on 4.  What we need are the subs to come in and outwork guys.  MP, Dooling, Hollins, Greg if he can run, those guys are in SPRINT down the floor fill the lanes for rondo.  He'll either get us a layup or the guy running will open lane or collapse the defense for a trailers jumper.
If we don't have Bradley running the break with rondo we are left with paul and ray running off picks.  Neither guy is fast enough injured to be open.  This is a stagnate offense when this happens, either doc drops these plays all together or we have to run them. 

[CelticsFanNC]

  What exactly is the point of Rondo pushing the ball up the court when no one else is running with him??  

  He pushes the ball plenty when Bradley or someone else with young legs is running with him.  The Big Three don't run up and down the court because they prefer to play in the half court and they lack that stamina needed to play at a faster pace.

  This is the same identity crises we went through earlier in the season when we were struggling.  We have a truly gifted open court PG but it does us no good if he is playing all of his minutes with old guys who don't run much if at all.  Bradley was the quick fix and it worked leading to Rondo playing the best, most consistent ball of his career.  Without Bradley or someone else who can get out in front of Rondo, there is no positive that comes from him pushing the pace all by himself.

[green7]

i really wish the allen for mayo deal went thru,so that even when bradley went down with that shoulder injury mayo could've been that force that rondo could look to on fast breaks.