Did Doc cost us a championship by going for the 2nd seed?

[youcanthandlethetruth113]

You can't put full blame on Doc.  It has to go upwards to the management as well.  I think had they provided him with better players in certain areas as backups, not going bargain basement shopping, or waiting till the last minute to see what was available, Doc wouldn't have had to run Allen & more specifically Pierce into the ground.  Would the Celts still have made the playoffs if he managed their time better? of course..they may have slipped to the 3rd seed, thus giving them homecourt for only the first round before they faced Orlando...but homecourt is important.  The Celts felt they could win on the road, but everyone wants to play as many games in their own building as possible.  Your rims, your court, your fans, less traveling from state to state. 

You ca go on and on, give scenarios as to "what if things were done this way, etc." at the end of the day, the team did the best they could with what they had. Let them get better, make the roster moves they need to make over the summer & bring on 2009-2010.

Agreed. Doc couldn't rely on Mikki or Pruitt even for spot minutes. We had a lot of blowouts early on, but too many games in the 2nd half of the regular season were extremely tight and thus we needed our starts to play big minutes just to get the W. I'd still rather them play and win 62 games as opposed to sacrificing, say, 10+ wins, just to be more rested.

Pierce said it best after game 6 (i believe) of the Bulls series when he said something along the lines of "how can I be tired if i sleep all day".

[Chris]

You can't put full blame on Doc.  It has to go upwards to the management as well.  I think had they provided him with better players in certain areas as backups, not going bargain basement shopping, or waiting till the last minute to see what was available, Doc wouldn't have had to run Allen & more specifically Pierce into the ground.  Would the Celts still have made the playoffs if he managed their time better? of course..they may have slipped to the 3rd seed, thus giving them homecourt for only the first round before they faced Orlando...but homecourt is important.  The Celts felt they could win on the road, but everyone wants to play as many games in their own building as possible.  Your rims, your court, your fans, less traveling from state to state. 

You ca go on and on, give scenarios as to "what if things were done this way, etc." at the end of the day, the team did the best they could with what they had. Let them get better, make the roster moves they need to make over the summer & bring on 2009-2010.

Agreed. Doc couldn't rely on Mikki or Pruitt even for spot minutes. We had a lot of blowouts early on, but too many games in the 2nd half of the regular season were extremely tight and thus we needed our starts to play big minutes just to get the W. I'd still rather them play and win 62 games as opposed to sacrificing, say, 10+ wins, just to be more rested. 

Yeah, in many cases, Doc tried to get the starters some rest, especially in the first halves of games, but the second unit was so terrible that he would have basically been throwing out the white flag if he had brought them back in the second half, or left them out there longer.

Also, I think this is a pretty pointless argument anyways, because no matter how much rest they got, without KG, the C's were not going to beat this Cavs team, or either of the teams that could come out of the West.  The C's happened to match up well enough with the Magic that they could make a series of it, until the Magic realized they were actually the better team as presently constituted, but without KG and Powe they match up horribly with the Cavs. 

As the Magic have shown (and the C's showed earlier in the year in Boston), the way to beat the Cavs is to pound them inside, and then hit the open 3's, when they start to collapse on offense, and slowing down Lebron just enough, while still sticking with their shooters on defense.  The C's did not have the horses to do that. 

Pierce did a tremendous job last year on Lebron, when they had KG, Perk, and PJ hedging up, and keeping him out from getting into the lane.  Without KG in there, the C's simply aren't as good at helping on that, which allows Lebron to get where he wants using his quickness against Pierce.  While Pierce is a very good defender, he just doesn't have the quick feet of Pietrus, who can do a much better job of staying in front of Lebron, allowing them to single-cover Lebron. 

[Gruntled]

Just how much was he supposed to rest people?:

4/16:
Pierce: 0 minutes
Allen: 0 minutes
Rondo: 9 minutes

4/14:
Pierce: 31 minutes
Allen: 0 minutes
Rondo: 27 minutes

4/12:
Pierce: 29 minutes
Allen: 26 minutes
Rondo: 28 minutes

4/10:
Pierce: 37 minutes
Allen: 39 minutes
Rondo: 34 minutes

4/8:
Pierce: 30 minutes
Allen: 34 minutes
Rondo: 32 minutes

4/3:
Pierce: 31 minutes
Allen: 39 minutes
Rondo: 30 minutes

4/1: (2 overtime)
Pierce: 47 minutes
Allen: 46 minutes
Rondo: 43 minutes

In other words, in the week leading up to the playoffs, only one of the almost big 3 played more than 30 minutes in one game, and that was Pierce playing 31 minutes.  Of the three, Rondo played the most minutes (65) of basketball in the week before the playoffs (3 games).  How much more rest would they have needed to be "rested?"  There was probably less wear and tear on the players during that last week than if they had just practiced for a week.

The only game in all of April that any of the 3 played more than 39 minutes was the double overtime game against Charlotte.  The game before that they barely broke 30 minutes each in total.

For all of April leading up to the playoffs, Allen, Pierce, and Rondo were all averaging more than 10 minutes less per game than they were during the rest of the season.  Even if you throw out the games they sat, they averaged more than 5 minutes less per game.  In other words, Doc did pull back on their minutes at the end of the season.

The reason they got the number 2 seed was not that they were playing all out through the end of the season...  the reason is that they had a very easy April and won while resting the starters more than they usually do - plus - Orlando finished the season losing 5 of their last 9 games against mediocre opponents.

What should Doc have done?  Can you imagine what the league would do if they saw a team sitting multiple all-stars more than a month before the season was over?  Can you imagine what the ticket holders would do?

But if playing low minutes for 2-3 weeks was not enough to help get rested up for the playoffs, I don't know what would make a difference?  We won in part because we were able to integrate Davis into the line-up with the starters.  There is a good chance that sitting the starters even more than we did would have resulted in us playing even flatter and sloppier against the Bulls.

[BudweiserCeltic]

Doc overplayed veterans like Pierce and Ray, because he "overvalued"  being the 2nd seed.

He thought home court was the be all and end all.

I don't think this is true at all.  If it was the case, he would have pushed harder for Garnett to play more, rather than hoping to rest him for the playoffs.

Doc was coaching to win games.  It wasn't about seeding or anything like that, it was about winning games. 

I would argue that this attitude that Doc has about trying to win every game is the same attitude which makes this team run.  Doc expects his players to come out and play hard every minute of every game.  If he is not coaching his ass off, and doing everything he can to win every game, then the players will catch on to that, and it can change the entire dynamics of the team.

This is the type of thing I was trying to get across earlier when I discussed Doc possibly losing the team if he came forward with this "we'll lose more games but be rested" philosophy. Excellently expressed Chris TP4U.

Fact is there are a ton of different factors that lead to the Celtics having to play Ray and Paul more and a ton more as to why Doc coached the way he did. To just come out and blame Doc for the way he handle things is ludicrous. I think he walked a very fine line with how he could have handled things and probably, except for game 7 vs Orlando, got the most out of this team that he could have gotten this year.

Again, here's the missing factor: balance. You can still play good basketball and win games without having your stars playing 40 minutes a game. You can easily accomplish it with them playing around 38 minutes at the most during that stretch. About 36-37 minutes would've been great. Do you seriously believe that we would've lost a ton of games with them playing that much? It's not like our first unit was clicking on all cylinders either, especially at the start of games.

Again, I point out how they played a ton of minutes even when Pierce and Ray were playing poorly. I could understand when they're hot and you really want to win a game. But when they're not playing good, it's the perfect opportunity to give them some rest and roll the dice with your bench.

Again, balance is the key here. I don't know how people could translate "not playing you stars 40 minutes" as "losing a ton of games" and "losing your team". Everyone in the locker room had a clear understanding of what the goal was. He was not going to lose his team over this. Sounds to me like a ton of rationalization.

A semi-related question, has Pop lost his team?

[xmuscularghandix]

KG lost us a championship by getting hurt. Fans that blame things on Coaches and GMS are just ridiculous... esspecially when you were a top 4 team in the league.

[Gruntled]

Again...  Since the all-star break, Allen only played 37 minutes a game.  If you average in the games he sat out at the end of the season, he is down to 34 minutes a game.  Pierce played 38 minutes a game since the all-star break.

They did have some games they played 40+ minutes, but most games they played less than 37 minutes.  In other words, Doc did limit their minutes as the season went on.

From the point KG went down the second time, Allen and Pierce both averaged 35 minutes a game (if you count games they didn't play, they go down a lot further.)  That sounds to me like Doc did limit their minutes a lot after it was clear KG couldn't play.  What more should he have done?

I don't think it makes sense to say they would never play either Pierce or Allen more than 36-37 minutes in a game.  I don't think one or two games playing a couple extra minutes makes much difference over the course of a month.

[nickagneta]

Doc overplayed veterans like Pierce and Ray, because he "overvalued"  being the 2nd seed.

He thought home court was the be all and end all.

I don't think this is true at all.  If it was the case, he would have pushed harder for Garnett to play more, rather than hoping to rest him for the playoffs.

Doc was coaching to win games.  It wasn't about seeding or anything like that, it was about winning games. 

I would argue that this attitude that Doc has about trying to win every game is the same attitude which makes this team run.  Doc expects his players to come out and play hard every minute of every game.  If he is not coaching his ass off, and doing everything he can to win every game, then the players will catch on to that, and it can change the entire dynamics of the team.

This is the type of thing I was trying to get across earlier when I discussed Doc possibly losing the team if he came forward with this "we'll lose more games but be rested" philosophy. Excellently expressed Chris TP4U.

Fact is there are a ton of different factors that lead to the Celtics having to play Ray and Paul more and a ton more as to why Doc coached the way he did. To just come out and blame Doc for the way he handle things is ludicrous. I think he walked a very fine line with how he could have handled things and probably, except for game 7 vs Orlando, got the most out of this team that he could have gotten this year.

Again, here's the missing factor: balance. You can still play good basketball and win games without having your stars playing 40 minutes a game. You can easily accomplish it with them playing around 38 minutes at the most during that stretch. About 36-37 minutes would've been great. Do you seriously believe that we would've lost a ton of games with them playing that much? It's not like our first unit was clicking on all cylinders either, especially at the start of games.

Again, I point out how they played a ton of minutes even when Pierce and Ray were playing poorly. I could understand when they're hot and you really want to win a game. But when they're not playing good, it's the perfect opportunity to give them some rest and roll the dice with your bench.

Again, balance is the key here. I don't know how people could translate "not playing you stars 40 minutes" as "losing a ton of games" and "losing your team". Everyone in the locker room had a clear understanding of what the goal was. He was not going to lose his team over this. Sounds to me like a ton of rationalization.

A semi-related question, has Pop lost his team?

And again you need to rationalize the balance of giving players that don't deserve time on the floor, playing time, and that of making them earn it and how that translate to the effect it will have on the veterans if they see people getting undeserved minutes.

Consistency is also something that is important. Pops has always believed in the limiting of players minutes because of the whole sprint vs marathon argument. Doc has always had the philosophy that you earn minutes and not get minutes and that winning every game is the goal.

Deviating from that can have long term negative effects. He did the right thing given the circumstances and the hand dealt to him.

[BudweiserCeltic]

Again...  Since the all-star break, Allen only played 37 minutes a game.  If you average in the games he sat out at the end of the season, he is down to 34 minutes a game.  Pierce played 38 minutes a game since the all-star break.

They did have some games they played 40+ minutes, but most games they played less than 37 minutes.  In other words, Doc did limit their minutes as the season went on.

From the point KG went down the second time, Allen and Pierce both averaged 35 minutes a game (if you count games they didn't play, they go down a lot further.)  That sounds to me like Doc did limit their minutes a lot after it was clear KG couldn't play.  What more should he have done?

I don't think it makes sense to say they would never play either Pierce or Allen more than 36-37 minutes in a game.  I don't think one or two games playing a couple extra minutes makes much difference over the course of a month.

Yet Ray was the least of my worries. It was Pierced, and he had a month where he played 41 minutes a game and another of 39 minutes a game before the final month. Makes zero sense. Averaging 36-37 minutes a game when you add the final stretch when finally Doc gave them some decent rest, it's not good enough. Even against the Bulls Pierce was already visibly battling tiredness.

And sorry, Pierce played most games ABOVE 37 minutes.

[BudweiserCeltic]

Doc overplayed veterans like Pierce and Ray, because he "overvalued"  being the 2nd seed.

He thought home court was the be all and end all.

I don't think this is true at all.  If it was the case, he would have pushed harder for Garnett to play more, rather than hoping to rest him for the playoffs.

Doc was coaching to win games.  It wasn't about seeding or anything like that, it was about winning games. 

I would argue that this attitude that Doc has about trying to win every game is the same attitude which makes this team run.  Doc expects his players to come out and play hard every minute of every game.  If he is not coaching his ass off, and doing everything he can to win every game, then the players will catch on to that, and it can change the entire dynamics of the team.

This is the type of thing I was trying to get across earlier when I discussed Doc possibly losing the team if he came forward with this "we'll lose more games but be rested" philosophy. Excellently expressed Chris TP4U.

Fact is there are a ton of different factors that lead to the Celtics having to play Ray and Paul more and a ton more as to why Doc coached the way he did. To just come out and blame Doc for the way he handle things is ludicrous. I think he walked a very fine line with how he could have handled things and probably, except for game 7 vs Orlando, got the most out of this team that he could have gotten this year.

Again, here's the missing factor: balance. You can still play good basketball and win games without having your stars playing 40 minutes a game. You can easily accomplish it with them playing around 38 minutes at the most during that stretch. About 36-37 minutes would've been great. Do you seriously believe that we would've lost a ton of games with them playing that much? It's not like our first unit was clicking on all cylinders either, especially at the start of games.

Again, I point out how they played a ton of minutes even when Pierce and Ray were playing poorly. I could understand when they're hot and you really want to win a game. But when they're not playing good, it's the perfect opportunity to give them some rest and roll the dice with your bench.

Again, balance is the key here. I don't know how people could translate "not playing you stars 40 minutes" as "losing a ton of games" and "losing your team". Everyone in the locker room had a clear understanding of what the goal was. He was not going to lose his team over this. Sounds to me like a ton of rationalization.

A semi-related question, has Pop lost his team?

And again you need to rationalize the balance of giving players that don't deserve time on the floor, playing time, and that of making them earn it and how that translate to the effect it will have on the veterans if they see people getting undeserved minutes.

Consistency is also something that is important. Pops has always believed in the limiting of players minutes because of the whole sprint vs marathon argument. Doc has always had the philosophy that you earn minutes and not get minutes and that winning every game is the goal.

Deviating from that can have long term negative effects. He did the right thing given the circumstances and the hand dealt to him.

Well I guess I have to lose a ton of respect for Doc's ability to coach. It's simply smallminded and not keeping the eye at the prize. I question his priorities to make the team successful. Again, I'm not arguing that you play your bench an absurd amount of minutes. But come on, he was playing Pierce 39-41 minutes a game as the season ended (not counting the final week of rest by default). How in the world is playing your stars 36-37 minutes really going to kill your consistency as a team? 37 minutes is alreadt plenty of playing time.

So Eddie House didn't earn more playing time, especially when he was as hot as he was in the second half of the season? He could've easily played more than 20 minutes and let Ray play a bit more of SF.

Couldn't Billy play in a bit of more games, or get at least consistent 5 minute stints? Since aside from being a rookie and a bit foul prone, he was being quite productive in there. Efficient with his shots, and kept the ball movement. Did Marbury and Mikki earn their minutes from Doc's point of view? Or did he simply hand it to them? Because by your explanation, Marbury and Mikki should've stayed on the bench until they were ready.

[Chris]

Doc overplayed veterans like Pierce and Ray, because he "overvalued"  being the 2nd seed.

He thought home court was the be all and end all.

I don't think this is true at all.  If it was the case, he would have pushed harder for Garnett to play more, rather than hoping to rest him for the playoffs.

Doc was coaching to win games.  It wasn't about seeding or anything like that, it was about winning games. 

I would argue that this attitude that Doc has about trying to win every game is the same attitude which makes this team run.  Doc expects his players to come out and play hard every minute of every game.  If he is not coaching his ass off, and doing everything he can to win every game, then the players will catch on to that, and it can change the entire dynamics of the team.

This is the type of thing I was trying to get across earlier when I discussed Doc possibly losing the team if he came forward with this "we'll lose more games but be rested" philosophy. Excellently expressed Chris TP4U.

Fact is there are a ton of different factors that lead to the Celtics having to play Ray and Paul more and a ton more as to why Doc coached the way he did. To just come out and blame Doc for the way he handle things is ludicrous. I think he walked a very fine line with how he could have handled things and probably, except for game 7 vs Orlando, got the most out of this team that he could have gotten this year.

Again, here's the missing factor: balance. You can still play good basketball and win games without having your stars playing 40 minutes a game. You can easily accomplish it with them playing around 38 minutes at the most during that stretch. About 36-37 minutes would've been great. Do you seriously believe that we would've lost a ton of games with them playing that much? It's not like our first unit was clicking on all cylinders either, especially at the start of games.

Again, I point out how they played a ton of minutes even when Pierce and Ray were playing poorly. I could understand when they're hot and you really want to win a game. But when they're not playing good, it's the perfect opportunity to give them some rest and roll the dice with your bench.

Again, balance is the key here. I don't know how people could translate "not playing you stars 40 minutes" as "losing a ton of games" and "losing your team". Everyone in the locker room had a clear understanding of what the goal was. He was not going to lose his team over this. Sounds to me like a ton of rationalization.

A semi-related question, has Pop lost his team?

And again you need to rationalize the balance of giving players that don't deserve time on the floor, playing time, and that of making them earn it and how that translate to the effect it will have on the veterans if they see people getting undeserved minutes.

Consistency is also something that is important. Pops has always believed in the limiting of players minutes because of the whole sprint vs marathon argument. Doc has always had the philosophy that you earn minutes and not get minutes and that winning every game is the goal.

Deviating from that can have long term negative effects. He did the right thing given the circumstances and the hand dealt to him.

Well I guess I have to lose a ton of respect for Doc's ability to coach. It's simply smallminded and not keeping the eye at the prize. I question his priorities to make the team successful. Again, I'm not arguing that you play your bench an absurd amount of minutes. But come on, he was playing Pierce 39-41 minutes a game as the season ended (not counting the final week of rest by default). How in the world is playing your stars 36-37 minutes really going to kill your consistency as a team? 37 minutes is alreadt plenty of playing time.

Did you watch how terrible the second unit was?

In theory, I agree with you, but I can think of so many times when the second unit came in, and the flow of the game completely fell apart, and either a big lead was lost by the C's, or a big lead was gained by the other team.  If that happens, and the coach doesn't put the starters back in to get it back under control...well, I would THEN lose respect for that coach.

[BudweiserCeltic]

Doc overplayed veterans like Pierce and Ray, because he "overvalued"  being the 2nd seed.

He thought home court was the be all and end all.

I don't think this is true at all.  If it was the case, he would have pushed harder for Garnett to play more, rather than hoping to rest him for the playoffs.

Doc was coaching to win games.  It wasn't about seeding or anything like that, it was about winning games. 

I would argue that this attitude that Doc has about trying to win every game is the same attitude which makes this team run.  Doc expects his players to come out and play hard every minute of every game.  If he is not coaching his ass off, and doing everything he can to win every game, then the players will catch on to that, and it can change the entire dynamics of the team.

This is the type of thing I was trying to get across earlier when I discussed Doc possibly losing the team if he came forward with this "we'll lose more games but be rested" philosophy. Excellently expressed Chris TP4U.

Fact is there are a ton of different factors that lead to the Celtics having to play Ray and Paul more and a ton more as to why Doc coached the way he did. To just come out and blame Doc for the way he handle things is ludicrous. I think he walked a very fine line with how he could have handled things and probably, except for game 7 vs Orlando, got the most out of this team that he could have gotten this year.

Again, here's the missing factor: balance. You can still play good basketball and win games without having your stars playing 40 minutes a game. You can easily accomplish it with them playing around 38 minutes at the most during that stretch. About 36-37 minutes would've been great. Do you seriously believe that we would've lost a ton of games with them playing that much? It's not like our first unit was clicking on all cylinders either, especially at the start of games.

Again, I point out how they played a ton of minutes even when Pierce and Ray were playing poorly. I could understand when they're hot and you really want to win a game. But when they're not playing good, it's the perfect opportunity to give them some rest and roll the dice with your bench.

Again, balance is the key here. I don't know how people could translate "not playing you stars 40 minutes" as "losing a ton of games" and "losing your team". Everyone in the locker room had a clear understanding of what the goal was. He was not going to lose his team over this. Sounds to me like a ton of rationalization.

A semi-related question, has Pop lost his team?

And again you need to rationalize the balance of giving players that don't deserve time on the floor, playing time, and that of making them earn it and how that translate to the effect it will have on the veterans if they see people getting undeserved minutes.

Consistency is also something that is important. Pops has always believed in the limiting of players minutes because of the whole sprint vs marathon argument. Doc has always had the philosophy that you earn minutes and not get minutes and that winning every game is the goal.

Deviating from that can have long term negative effects. He did the right thing given the circumstances and the hand dealt to him.

Well I guess I have to lose a ton of respect for Doc's ability to coach. It's simply smallminded and not keeping the eye at the prize. I question his priorities to make the team successful. Again, I'm not arguing that you play your bench an absurd amount of minutes. But come on, he was playing Pierce 39-41 minutes a game as the season ended (not counting the final week of rest by default). How in the world is playing your stars 36-37 minutes really going to kill your consistency as a team? 37 minutes is alreadt plenty of playing time.

Did you watch how terrible the second unit was?

In theory, I agree with you, but I can think of so many times when the second unit came in, and the flow of the game completely fell apart, and either a big lead was lost by the C's, or a big lead was gained by the other team.  If that happens, and the coach doesn't put the starters back in to get it back under control...well, I would THEN lose respect for that coach.

This can be resolved with a better mixture of starters and bench players. And again, it's not like the first unit was playing like a powerhouse either. They struggled also, but as I said before even when struggling Doc stuck with them (which would be fine in important games). But playing Pierce, for example, 39 minutes in a game he went 3 for 16 when he's already been playing heavy minutes it's quite hard to understand. Doc could've done a better job in picking games where he could give him some better rest.

[wdleehi]

Doc could have rested players, but he didn't have the extra horses to do it. 


Ainge is to blame for the wear and tear this season.

[nickagneta]

See, I will never agree with the theory of just giving Walker minutes. He never showed me anything that resembled quality NBA basketball this year. He's a great prospect and showed skills that could at some future time translate into a good NBA game, but he was nowhere good enough to warrant earning time on an NBA champion trying to defend their title.

Doc was forced to use Marbury and Mikki and at times Walker. He was forced into doing many of the things that he had to do this year. Just because he did them doesn't mean and wanted to.

So, no, I don't thik tha giving Walker, even 5 more minutes of time that time he has hasn't clearly proven to the coach that he deserves those minutes.

And really, it's all irrelevant since KG and Powe going down basically negated any chance of the Celtics repeating.

And let's not forget, that for a long stretch of the time that Doc was coaching during the injuries, he was under the impression that he would be getting those players back sohe didn't know for sure thathe would be having to use the players he was "overusing" as long as he ended up doing.

[BudweiserCeltic]

Doc was forced to use Marbury and Mikki and at times Walker. He was forced into doing many of the things that he had to do this year. Just because he did them doesn't mean and wanted to.

He should've forced himself to do it more and more often regardless of the shortocmings of the players. It's not like I'm asking for Bill Walker to have a substantial hand in the playoffs... just give our star Paul Pierce a bit of rest, that's all. It's not a hard assignment, and one he was fully capable of doing.

You have to trust the bench and use it. Using it to win games is not the sole pupose of it. You don't run a marathon at full speed.

And although I agree that health and injuries are really the reason we lost, it will be quite hard to convince me that this Celtics team as decimated as it was had no chance of repeating. They blew a game that should've clinched them the series against the Magic because they started playing lazy. When they really wanted, they completely dominated.

And the Cavs can suck it. For two seasons the Celts were battling adversity and winning the hard way... they were fully capable of going all the way. But even our "healthy" people weren't really healthy.

The team had already built quite a cushion earlier in the season by winning a ton of games. They should've used it. Again, I had founnd the complaints about minutes ridiculous last year, and during the early portion of this season because I trusted Doc but he failed to deliver this year.

Too big of a focus to win games during the season, and the cost wasn't appropiate.

[cordobes]

If the Cavs had won that game 7 (an extremely close one) last season, people would blame Doc for resting his stars too much during the regular season - that was one of the favourite explanations on why the team was underperforming in the first 2 rounds at some point.

The idea that saving Pierce 60 minutes of floor time would make a substantial difference on his game doesn't make sense. If anything, I thin the team over-performed in this playoffs, especially versus Orlando, that had a sizeable talent advantage over use. And in fact the series went to 7 - we didn't take advantage of playing the elimination game in our homecourt but it was there.