Heat (1-1) at Celtics (1-1) ECF Game #3 5/21/22

[seancally]

Ugh

[ozgod]

I'm questioning his "injury." (Van Gundy called out how his shoulder looked fine when as soon as he came back in he threw his shoulder into someone as a moving screen.)
It looked to me like he wanted to quit and was just trying to find a way to bail.

yeah, hate to admit it but i thought the same when it happened. i played with a guy in college who would do the same when he was stinking up the joint. he’d always miraculously heal when the circumstances were right.

the writhing in pain, followed by the head down walk to the locker room, only to return exactly when the team had cut the lead to four, had all the telltale signs.

ime should have kept him on the bench for the remainder.

I'm prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt. If he does it again I will be skeptical.

[ozgod]

In 12 quarters of basketball Miami has won two of them. Boston has won 10.

Celtics are their own worst enemy.

And those 2 quarters were bad ones that led to us losing 2 games. That's why I'm still confident. We're still the better team. We turned in a shocker in Q1 but the team fought back to only be down by 1. We could have raised the white flag like Miami did in Game 2 but we didn't. We had Smartacus suffer what looked like a season ending injury to come back to show some courage and heart.

But we just made too many mistakes and yes we were our own worst enemy. 27 turnovers to 7, 2 steals to 19, 33 points off turnovers by Miami. But we were still in there with a chance to win. We're the better team. We just have to cut out these big lapses.

[SparzWizard]

I like how folks are stating that ESPN was glossing and salivating all over the Celtics on the two "fake" injuries they sustained in Smart and Tatum, but no love for Jimmy Butler who was out for the game.

As if we're the golden team in the league now 

[Mahk E Mahk]

I'm questioning his "injury." (Van Gundy called out how his shoulder looked fine when as soon as he came back in he threw his shoulder into someone as a moving screen.)
It looked to me like he wanted to quit and was just trying to find a way to bail.

yeah, hate to admit it but i thought the same when it happened. i played with a guy in college who would do the same when he was stinking up the joint. he’d always miraculously heal when the circumstances were right.

the writhing in pain, followed by the head down walk to the locker room, only to return exactly when the team had cut the lead to four, had all the telltale signs.

ime should have kept him on the bench for the remainder.

I'm prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt. If he does it again I will be skeptical.

completely reasonable and pretty much where i am at this point.

injury or not, mr. tatum needs to eliminate these no-show games from his repertoire, especially in big games.

[rocknrollforyoursoul]

Word on Jimmy Butler? Is he going to play Game 4? I thought a knee inflammation can be mitigated with injections?

Should be good to go Game 4. The way it was worded he probably could have came back in.

At this point, it's safe to assume that all injury concerns will work out for Miami but not for Boston. People were talking like Lowry and Tucker could miss Game 3, but both played; meanwhile, it seemed like Boston would be at full strength, but Rob was out again.

[rocknrollforyoursoul]

My 4000th post

We will win game 4.

Go Celtics. This is not who we are.

Winning game 4 will do no good if they turn around and lose game 5. Kinda like how winning game 2 did them no good when they turned around and lost game 3. Instead of winning only after a loss, they need to win two in a row—otherwise, if the current pattern holds, they'll just lose game 7.

[Who]

W/o butler they are a lottery team. Yet we can't beat them with him out?.

I'd say they are more like a .500 team without Jimmy.

They still have Bam. They have Herro for offense. A couple of shooters. Two wily vets in Lowry and PJ Tucker. Extremely well coached. I'd like their chances to win 40-44 games without Jimmy and make the playoffs as a low seed.

[scaryjerry]

W/o butler they are a lottery team. Yet we can't beat them with him out?.

I'd say they are more like a .500 team without Jimmy.

They still have Bam. They have Herro for offense. A couple of shooters. Two wily vets in Lowry and PJ Tucker. Extremely well coached. I'd like their chances to win 40-44 games without Jimmy and make the playoffs as a low seed.

Bam? Lol.
I agree they could be .500 without jimmy, almost entirely based off coaching, not the train wreck of a roster

[scaryjerry]

In 12 quarters of basketball Miami has won two of them. Boston has won 10.

Celtics are their own worst enemy.

And those 2 quarters were bad ones that led to us losing 2 games. That's why I'm still confident. We're still the better team. We turned in a shocker in Q1 but the team fought back to only be down by 1. We could have raised the white flag like Miami did in Game 2 but we didn't. We had Smartacus suffer what looked like a season ending injury to come back to show some courage and heart.

But we just made too many mistakes and yes we were our own worst enemy. 27 turnovers to 7, 2 steals to 19, 33 points off turnovers by Miami. But we were still in there with a chance to win. We're the better team. We just have to cut out these big lapses.

I thought we were the better team too, just as I did in the bubble series. Not sure we are mentally tough enough, which seems to be miamis best and almost only strength

[CelticsWhat35]

In 12 quarters of basketball Miami has won two of them. Boston has won 10.

Celtics are their own worst enemy.

in 12 quarters, Miami has won 2.  C's/Heat have tied for 3 though.  C's have won 7 quarters, unfortunately that's only gotten them 1 win

Yeah the whole “only outscored in two quarters” means very little when you’re down in the series.  Also, one of those tied quarters was coming out of a half with no Jimmy Butler and the Celts already in the midst of a 10-0 run.  They needed to pounce and they let a far inferior team go toe-to-toe with them.

[Birdman]

Gotta win game 4 now..hope Tatum shows up

[Birdman]

Butler with 8 points and they still won

[zeitgeist49]

The fact that the Celtics have had multiple atrocious starts to games and they are 1 - 3 at the Garden in their last 4 playoff games tells me their playing tight ... aka choke.  I'm so tired of Tatum and Brown having yoyo games. Consistency is a true sign of a superstar. They need to get Rob back, cut down on the embarrassing number of turnovers and play aggressive, rather than scared. Remember how aggressive Al played after Giannis dissed him ? This is how the Celtics need to play as a team.

[Birdman]

Lost 3 out of 4 games at home is unacceptable..seems like they more focus on the road