The above is a picture that Adam Himmelsbach tweeted with the caption:
"A rare time the comments section accurately portrays a divided fan base lol"
The funny thing is I think it really does perfectly capture the dynamic in the fanbase right now. I don't think it's a dynamic between different Celtics, fans either. I feel that conflict in myself.
On the one hand -- I want a likeable home grown team I can enjoy and feel good about.
On the other hand -- I'm tired of waiting for the team to finally become a legitimate contender again.
I took a look at the history of the Celtics since Larry Bird retired. 28 seasons. 92-93 to 18-19.
In many respects the Celtics have been a very successful franchise over that time.
The Celtics have made the playoffs 17 times in those 28 years. They've won 50+ games 6 times, and 60+ games twice.
In their playoff runs, they've lost in the 1st round 7 times, lost in the 2nd round 4 times, lost in the ECF 4 times, lost in the Finals once, and they've won a single championship.
Yet in those 28 years, how many times could you say they were a legitimate contender? Probably only in the 08, 09, 10, and 11 seasons, right?
Over that time period, despite the fact that they made the playoffs more often than they didn't, they only averaged 39 wins -- meaning they've lost more regular season games than they've won.
This I think is the heart of the problem. Yes, the Celtics have had a good amount of success in the last (roughly) 30 years. They've reached heights that many franchises have never reached during that time.
At the same time, many Celtics fans can still remember when the team was the most successful franchise in the league. They can remember the days of Larry Bird, when the Celtics dueled the Lakers throughout basically the entire 1980s and won three titles.
Younger fans like myself remember the 08 title run and the runs that directly followed it. That was their primary introduction to the team, and that in many respects set their expectations for what the Celtics franchise is about. Ubuntu. Multiple All-Stars. Deep, gritty playoff runs.
Fans of other teams can remember those peak years too. They look at Celtics fans and see us as spoiled brats. The success of other Boston sports teams doesn't help in that regard.
At the same time, despite the fact that as fans we've been primed to think that the measure of success for a team is contending for and winning titles, the team has only really been among the teams with a realistic chance at winning it all four times. The Celtics have not had a single player win the MVP award in that time frame.
So even though we've had the privilege to watch a lot of reasonably successful Celtics seasons, and we've seen many fun and exciting players wear the jersey, we haven't had very many opportunities to cheer a team that was really good enough to go all the way.
So I look at our team right now and I think, "Yeah, I believe The Jays are gonna be really good. We're going to have fun watching this team grow. Brad Stevens is going to remind everybody how good he is. We're going to be a scrappy underdog and we'll get to see some version of that 2018 Celtics playoff team grow and learn together over the next few years."
At the same time I'm wondering, "When will this team finally figure out how to put together the talent and the chemistry and the system to be good enough to really contend? How many more versions of this team will we watch before they get there?"
It's a weird place to be.
