The Celtics would have to go undefeated the rest of the way and dominate their way to an easy title to be in this conversation.
Not gonna happen.
Why? They would have to go 22-3 the rest of the way to match the 86 team's record (which isn't gonna happen), but I don't see why they'd have to win 70 games to be in the conversation
86 Celtics are an absolute juggernaut of an all time team that is still talked about regularly and will live on in near perfect infamy in Celtics lure. This team would have to do something pretty darn special to be remembered like 86.
If they win the crown will they be considered as at least equal to the 08 team? After the win vs the Knicks, the 24 team’s average margin of victory was percentage points better than that of the 08 team (a bit over 10 points). This team has been dominating so far. Fingers crossed a championship is in the horizon!
The 86 team is the best ever Championship team for some. The 24 team will have to bulldoze its way in the playoffs to equal that.
I don't think so, but that's because the narrative is different. The 08 squad was the definition of lightning in a bottle, especially compared to the previous season. So the mythos is there. I'll talk more about that in a moment.
But: the Tatum-era Celtics have been about as successful as the Big Three Celtics overall, even factoring in the massive and obvious caveat that this new core hasn't won a championship to this point.
Consider, the Big 3 (2007-2008 to 2012-2013):
314 wins, 161 losses (66.11% win rate)
Postseason campaigns in chronological order: [Won it all, Second round exit, Jobbed in the Finals, Second round exit, Lost in the ECF (Allen leaves), First round exit]
The Tatum Era (2017-18 to present):
341 wins, 188 losses (64.46% win rate)
Postseason campaigns in chronological order: [Lost in the ECF, Second Round Exit, Lost in the ECF, First round exit, Lost in the Finals, Lost in the ECF].
Now, there's a subset of folks who will slap their suspenders against their chests and say "Welp, looks like a lot of losing to me" and then sprain their arms enthusiastically patting each on the back in the wake of this novel pronouncement because, essentially, the Celtics have yet to win a ring over six seasons with Tatum on the team whereas the Big Three came out the gates and proved their be-ringed
bona fides to be in order.
This is silly for a couple of reasons (and we can hope that this is the last, dying twitch of the 'title town' impulse) but the biggest one is that it conveniently ignores the fact that the Big Three era was, almost to an absurd degree, a six-season 'one last ride' for KG, Pierce, and Ray.
Most of us were there for the wasteland of the mid 90's and Paul's 'wasted prime', and certainly a few of us would have been paying attention to Ray and KG's careers and coming to similar conclusions - The Big Three came together with 11,12, and 9 seasons under their belts, respectively.
In contrast, JT has only been in the league for six seasons, and he's already matched the success of the Big Three. I don't like this comparison for a whole lot of reasons, but you'd be insane to look at MJ's career now and say 'well, he didn't win a championship in his first six seasons, might as well take him out of the oven, he's cooked.' It's also why I tend to think the doom posting is generally a bit over the top as well - not only are we winning a hell of a lot, but we're doing it with a core that's on the right side of 30.
edit: you can also make the argument that we should really 'start the clock' for JT with the 2019-2020, in which case the team record is 237-128 (64.93%) and post-seasons read, in order: Lost ECF, Lost Finals, First Round Exit, Lost ECF. That's absolutely nothing to sneer at, even if some people have a Sauron-level ring obsession when it comes to evaluating success.
