Fire Joe! ... or critique Joe ... or defend Joe... or worry about Joe's coaching

[Boston Garden Leprechaun]

I expect they run it back next year as is with a healthy Gallo. They add two vet coaches on the staff.

I'm fine with this, assuming they hire a competent head coach (and coaching staff).

not firing joe is called SETTLING and leaving him with this team who has a title window now open is beyond imbecilic.  brad is a soft weak person.

[jpotter33]

For all the crap we give Joe, we need to give him his props when he does well, too.

I thought last night was one of if not his best coached games this year. In particular, his timeout management was superb last night. He minimized several Heat runs with appropriately timed timeouts and good ATO plays afterwards. He’s also finally bit the bullet on GWill and played him nearly thirty minutes, which is a big step for him given what appears to be a personal vendetta against GWill.

Still had some questionable rotations, and I think he plays with fire when he takes Tatum out early in these games where the others don’t have it. Also, I still think his overall gameplan is fatally flawed and needs to be more dynamic and flexible.

It’s almost like the pressure made him get away from his natural instincts and be more assertive with the guys, which is exactly what they need. I hope we can see more of this moving forward, but unfortunately history suggests that this is a one game blip on the radar.

[Roy H.]

For all the crap we give Joe, we need to give him his props when he does well, too.

Do we, though?  If a coach does well once every five games, I think it's still okay to demand his reassignment. 

[SparzWizard]

I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if Brad Stevens was internally calling the shots when it comes to coaching last night's game, after the media unleashed fire post-Game 3.

Joe still isn't the answer and will never be the answer to this team.

[angryguy77]

For all the crap we give Joe, we need to give him his props when he does well, too.

I thought last night was one of if not his best coached games this year. In particular, his timeout management was superb last night. He minimized several Heat runs with appropriately timed timeouts and good ATO plays afterwards. He’s also finally bit the bullet on GWill and played him nearly thirty minutes, which is a big step for him given what appears to be a personal vendetta against GWill.

Still had some questionable rotations, and I think he plays with fire when he takes Tatum out early in these games where the others don’t have it. Also, I still think his overall gameplan is fatally flawed and needs to be more dynamic and flexible.

It’s almost like the pressure made him get away from his natural instincts and be more assertive with the guys, which is exactly what they need. I hope we can see more of this moving forward, but unfortunately history suggests that this is a one game blip on the radar.

He had a good game, but this is just evidence of the sorry state we're in. Our coach used common sense and that's praise worthy.

Win the finals and be part of the reason and I'll change by tune on him.

[Vermont Green]

Based on everything that is being reported, it appears that a big contributing factor to the "funk" that the team was in started when Udoka got the job in Houston, or at least this had an impact on the team.  This seemed to rekindle some feelings that many of the players had regarding how Udoka was let go and how they ended up with Mazzulla as their coach.  Then there was a series of questionable coaching calls, like not playing Grant, not starting RWill.  Then some undrafted scrubs from MIA played like hall of famers for 3 games while the Celtics kind of mailed it in.  The culmination of all this was game 3, one of the most disappointing performances by a Celtics team that I can remember.

My point of this recap is that much of this is not Mazzulla's fault.  He didn't fire Udoka.  He had no control over what the owners/mngt told the players about the decision.  He was handed a very difficult situation.  The team was not bought into him as their coach right from the start, or even the overall decision to let Udoka go, that is only now becoming more clear.  Mazzulla did not help his cause with his strange TO approach and some of the other unconventional things he did, that is for sure.

But here we are.  Under most any other circumstance, if a young rookie coach got his team to the ECF, that coach would probably be viewed as a rising star, even if you didn't agree with his TO calls.  But in this case, it is being viewed as a failure, an under-achievement, and for understandable reasons.  Again, tough situation for a young coach to be in.  I have my doubts about Mazzulla as the coach of this team moving forward.  I will think more about that after the Celtics play their last game (hopefully a win in the final game of the finals).  For today though, it is all about circling the wagons, forgetting about Udoka, and making some history.

[Roy H.]

Based on everything that is being reported, it appears that a big contributing factor to the "funk" that the team was in started when Udoka got the job in Houston, or at least this had an impact on the team.  This seemed to rekindle some feelings that many of the players had regarding how Udoka was let go and how they ended up with Mazzulla as their coach.  Then there was a series of questionable coaching calls, like not playing Grant, not starting RWill.  Then some undrafted scrubs from MIA played like hall of famers for 3 games while the Celtics kind of mailed it in.  The culmination of all this was game 3, one of the most disappointing performances by a Celtics team that I can remember.

My point of this recap is that much of this is not Mazzulla's fault.  He didn't fire Udoka.  He had no control over what the owners/mngt told the players about the decision.  He was handed a very difficult situation.  The team was not bought into him as their coach right from the start, or even the overall decision to let Udoka go, that is only now becoming more clear.  Mazzulla did not help his cause with his strange TO approach and some of the other unconventional things he did, that is for sure.

But here we are.  Under most any other circumstance, if a young rookie coach got his team to the ECF, that coach would probably be viewed as a rising star, even if you didn't agree with his TO calls.  But in this case, it is being viewed as a failure, an under-achievement, and for understandable reasons.  Again, tough situation for a young coach to be in.  I have my doubts about Mazzulla as the coach of this team moving forward.  I will think more about that after the Celtics play their last game (hopefully a win in the final game of the finals).  For today though, it is all about circling the wagons, forgetting about Udoka, and making some history.

I don't believe that the team was triggered by Ime being hired in Houston.  I think that's a silly narrative.  I'm sure that some players were p---ed he was fired, and were p---ed by the lack of information, and were p---ed that the team hired a third stringer instead of an established coach.  But the story that everything was cool until Ime got a new job (rather than when Ime was fired) makes no sense.

[johnnygreen]

Based on everything that is being reported, it appears that a big contributing factor to the "funk" that the team was in started when Udoka got the job in Houston, or at least this had an impact on the team.  This seemed to rekindle some feelings that many of the players had regarding how Udoka was let go and how they ended up with Mazzulla as their coach.  Then there was a series of questionable coaching calls, like not playing Grant, not starting RWill.  Then some undrafted scrubs from MIA played like hall of famers for 3 games while the Celtics kind of mailed it in.  The culmination of all this was game 3, one of the most disappointing performances by a Celtics team that I can remember.

My point of this recap is that much of this is not Mazzulla's fault.  He didn't fire Udoka.  He had no control over what the owners/mngt told the players about the decision.  He was handed a very difficult situation.  The team was not bought into him as their coach right from the start, or even the overall decision to let Udoka go, that is only now becoming more clear.  Mazzulla did not help his cause with his strange TO approach and some of the other unconventional things he did, that is for sure.

But here we are.  Under most any other circumstance, if a young rookie coach got his team to the ECF, that coach would probably be viewed as a rising star, even if you didn't agree with his TO calls.  But in this case, it is being viewed as a failure, an under-achievement, and for understandable reasons.  Again, tough situation for a young coach to be in.  I have my doubts about Mazzulla as the coach of this team moving forward.  I will think more about that after the Celtics play their last game (hopefully a win in the final game of the finals).  For today though, it is all about circling the wagons, forgetting about Udoka, and making some history.

I don't believe that the team was triggered by Ime being hired in Houston.  I think that's a silly narrative.  I'm sure that some players were p---ed he was fired, and were p---ed by the lack of information, and were p---ed that the team hired a third stringer instead of an established coach.  But the story that everything was cool until Ime got a new job (rather than when Ime was fired) makes no sense.

The fact that Ime got another job within a year, seems to indicate that what he did may not have been that bad afterall.

[Vermont Green]

Based on everything that is being reported, it appears that a big contributing factor to the "funk" that the team was in started when Udoka got the job in Houston, or at least this had an impact on the team.  This seemed to rekindle some feelings that many of the players had regarding how Udoka was let go and how they ended up with Mazzulla as their coach.  Then there was a series of questionable coaching calls, like not playing Grant, not starting RWill.  Then some undrafted scrubs from MIA played like hall of famers for 3 games while the Celtics kind of mailed it in.  The culmination of all this was game 3, one of the most disappointing performances by a Celtics team that I can remember.

My point of this recap is that much of this is not Mazzulla's fault.  He didn't fire Udoka.  He had no control over what the owners/mngt told the players about the decision.  He was handed a very difficult situation.  The team was not bought into him as their coach right from the start, or even the overall decision to let Udoka go, that is only now becoming more clear.  Mazzulla did not help his cause with his strange TO approach and some of the other unconventional things he did, that is for sure.

But here we are.  Under most any other circumstance, if a young rookie coach got his team to the ECF, that coach would probably be viewed as a rising star, even if you didn't agree with his TO calls.  But in this case, it is being viewed as a failure, an under-achievement, and for understandable reasons.  Again, tough situation for a young coach to be in.  I have my doubts about Mazzulla as the coach of this team moving forward.  I will think more about that after the Celtics play their last game (hopefully a win in the final game of the finals).  For today though, it is all about circling the wagons, forgetting about Udoka, and making some history.

I don't believe that the team was triggered by Ime being hired in Houston.  I think that's a silly narrative.  I'm sure that some players were p---ed he was fired, and were p---ed by the lack of information, and were p---ed that the team hired a third stringer instead of an established coach.  But the story that everything was cool until Ime got a new job (rather than when Ime was fired) makes no sense.

Well, I don't know of course but it was not just the timing of Udoka getting the job in Houston, in my opinion, based on what I have seen and heard, is that this did contribute to the whole issue coming back to the surface.  It was always there, it was never resolved, that seems to be clear.  Losing two games at home to an inferior team, the new coach being wackier than ever, appearing to be getting out-coached, and then having it rubbed in your face that every other team in the league was perfectly happy to hire Udoka.  I think this all led to a flare up of lack of buy in to Mazzulla, some ill feelings towards owners/mngt, and the whole team-coach-organization relationship temporarily broke down.

There are issues on all fronts.  Mazzulla did get out-coached, he did make some head-scratching calls.  The Celtics Organization apparently did not communicate the rationale for the decision to fire Udoka to the players very well and the players have questions about it.  And the players let all of this get into their heads and it affected their play while some undrafted MIA journeymen played like Hall of Famers.  The result was 3 really painful losses.

I think the good news from the game 3 meltdown is that there was some clearing of the air (or so was reported).  The team went out in game 4, put all this noise aside, and pulled off a tough win.  I am optimistic that they will be able to continue to set aside the noise, spin it around and use it as motivation.

[johnnygreen]

Stan Van Gundy brought this up during one of the recent games. Joe received the job with only a week before the season started. According to Van Gundy, a coach needs at least 5-6 weeks to implement his scheme. Not only that, but Joe couldn't build his own staff. How do you think the other assistant coaches felt about getting passed over by Joe?

[hwangjini_1]

well, it is only one game, which is not enough to convince me mazzulla should definitely be the coach of the celtics going forrward. but yes, the team won that last game in very impressive fashion.

mazzulla is still really learning how to coach, but, can he make the needed adjustments NOW? i am not sure, but I'll give him credit for the last game coaching.

the last game was really well coached game by him.

his timeout usage in particular was spot on, even to the point where JPotter might agree. 

going to Gwill was a good move, though as many here wrote, it was long overdue.

figuring out how to break miami's zone, and doing so quickly enough that spo just said "dang, let's go back to man to man coverage" was impressive.

so, i tip my hat to mazzulla for that game, but it's going to definitely take more than one good game for me to be on board.

[SHAQATTACK]

well, it is only one game, which is not enough to convince me mazzulla should definitely be the coach of the celtics going forrward. but yes, the team won that last game in very impressive fashion.

mazzulla is still really learning how to coach, but, can he make the needed adjustments NOW? i am not sure, but I'll give him credit for the last game coaching.

the last game was really well coached game by him.

his timeout usage in particular was spot on, even to the point where JPotter might agree. 

going to Gwill was a good move, though as many here wrote, it was long overdue.

figuring out how to break miami's zone, and doing so quickly enough that spo just said "dang, let's go back to man to man coverage" was impressive.

so, i tip my hat to mazzulla for that game, but it's going to definitely take more than one good game for me to be on board.

I’m glade he made a few good common calls , but he still needs to go. I guess if fire is the term, yes . He is just too green for this group , they kinda need an older guy IMO….because of the reluctance to lead themselves. Ime was nice fit. Need a guy who has been around the block….but not Doc.

I d inform him he was being released from his coaching duties or demoted by to assistant and get the team a REAL head coach .   The FO messed up handing the job over too quick. He seems  overwhelmed to me .  You can’t go brain dead while the team is on the court. You have to following five guys and game at the same time. Failure and mistakes can’t happen , it’s for keeps, lots of money , it’s business . Brad needs to undo the mess he made. And they really cause a CF of major magnitude.

[Kernewek]

For all the crap we give Joe, we need to give him his props when he does well, too.

Do we, though?  If a coach does well once every five games, I think it's still okay to demand his reassignment.

The timeouts still don’t matter, even if we won the game. They’re like lucky socks at this point.

If Miami continues to shoot 25% from deep the series is ours even if the C’s never call a timeout again.

[greenhead85]

Did Joe just saved his job after Game 5?

[jambr380]

Did Joe just saved his job after Game 5?

If we lose on Saturday, then it won't matter at all. It'll be marginally better than getting swept, but it'll still be the same result in the end.

By taking this one game at a time, they've now given themselves a chance. Of course if they do come out and win the series, then Joe is safe for a while.