I was wrong about this team..

[Goldstar88]

I didn?t believe in this Celtics roster. Thought they?d be play-in team, best case. Really glad to be wrong and I?m now psyched for the rest of the season.

If Tatum comes back in February/March and Brad is able to make a few tweaks to the bench by the deadline..

[Neurotic Guy]

I didn?t believe in this Celtics roster. Thought they?d be play-in team, best case. Really glad to be wrong and I?m now psyched for the rest of the season.

If Tatum comes back in February/March and Brad is able to make a few tweaks to the bench by the deadline..

I?m glad you were wrong too. But in fairness I don?t think anyone was expecting what we?ve seen so far.  Even Moranis on another thread admitted that this team with JT could represent the East. We?ll have come full circle when TennS compliments Joe for the job he?s done so far.   I?m dying to know what is in Brads head right now - who he wants to target.

[Phantom255x]

I was also wrong. I also didn't think the East was gonna be this bad and that some teams like MIL and IND (even without Haliburton) were gonna completely implode.

NY and DET feel like the only real threats in the East. Cleveland has been very iffy and Orlando is also iffy while also dealing with some injuries, and they might have lost Franz Wagner for a bit too. But if JT comes back and they add another big man, this team can contend against anyone in the East for sure. The West? Admittedly there's still 3 teams probably better but whatever.

[keevsnick]

I didn't think they were going to tank, i never understood that idea given the talent they have. But I also didn't think they'd be THIS good. Maybe 42-44 wins, right now they look like they might challenge for 50.

The emergence of Walsh, Queta, Minott and to lesser degrees the solid contributions of Scheierman/Hugo are a complete game changer. This team NEEDS cheap contributors to be able to keep together the Tatum/Brown/White core, and they've found some this year. Walsh especially looks like he may be the glue-guy 5th starter 3+D wing they desperately need.

Add one more rotation center, not even a starter just another roughly Queta level guy to split the minutes at center with him. Get JT back. Do those two things and I think they could make real noise this year. The east is so bad they may challenge for it even if those two things don't happen.

[Goldstar88]

I didn?t believe in this Celtics roster. Thought they?d be play-in team, best case. Really glad to be wrong and I?m now psyched for the rest of the season.

If Tatum comes back in February/March and Brad is able to make a few tweaks to the bench by the deadline..

I?m glad you were wrong too. But in fairness I don?t think anyone was expecting what we?ve seen so far.  Even Moranis on another thread admitted that this team with JT could represent the East. We?ll have come full circle when TennS compliments Joe for the job he?s done so far.   I?m dying to know what is in Brads head right now - who he wants to target.

Or anyone for that matter, lol. Like him or not, he is doing an incredible job with this group.

[hwangjini_1]

I didn?t believe in this Celtics roster. Thought they?d be play-in team, best case. Really glad to be wrong and I?m now psyched for the rest of the season.

If Tatum comes back in February/March and Brad is able to make a few tweaks to the bench by the deadline..

I?m glad you were wrong too. But in fairness I don?t think anyone was expecting what we?ve seen so far.  Even Moranis on another thread admitted that this team with JT could represent the East. We?ll have come full circle when TennS compliments Joe for the job he?s done so far.   I?m dying to know what is in Brads head right now - who he wants to target.

Or anyone for that matter, lol. Like him or not, he is doing an incredible job with this group.

ha, beat you to it. i complemented mazzula in the game thread a few days ago. he started mixing and matching line ups like a mad scientist at first. but that strategy let him figure whom to play. it paid off.

and this team is playing hard, they need to to win given their talent levels. i credit mazzula with that as well.

[Goldstar88]

I didn't think they were going to tank, i never understood that idea given the talent they have. But I also didn't think they'd be THIS good. Maybe 42-44 wins, right now they look like they might challenge for 50.

The emergence of Walsh, Queta, Minott and to lesser degrees the solid contributions of Scheierman/Hugo are a complete game changer. This team NEEDS cheap contributors to be able to keep together the Tatum/Brown/White core, and they've found some this year. Walsh especially looks like he may be the glue-guy 5th starter 3+D wing they desperately need.

Add one more rotation center, not even a starter just another roughly Queta level guy to split the minutes at center with him. Get JT back. Do those two things and I think they could make real noise this year. The east is so bad they may challenge for it even if those two things don't happen.

I mean, they lost so much in the offseason and Tatum was expected to miss the year. So 3 starters and two very good bench players. The guys that Brad brought in over the summer haven?t been good, minus Minott. Simons is so streaky. Garza and Boucher are borderline unplayable. Hugo is hit or miss, the other rookies are long shots at best. Like you said, Some of the other younger guys taking that next step has been the difference. Queta, Minott and especially Walsh. I don?t think anyone saw that coming.

[Neurotic Guy]

I didn't think they were going to tank, i never understood that idea given the talent they have. But I also didn't think they'd be THIS good. Maybe 42-44 wins, right now they look like they might challenge for 50.

The emergence of Walsh, Queta, Minott and to lesser degrees the solid contributions of Scheierman/Hugo are a complete game changer. This team NEEDS cheap contributors to be able to keep together the Tatum/Brown/White core, and they've found some this year. Walsh especially looks like he may be the glue-guy 5th starter 3+D wing they desperately need.

Add one more rotation center, not even a starter just another roughly Queta level guy to split the minutes at center with him. Get JT back. Do those two things and I think they could make real noise this year. The east is so bad they may challenge for it even if those two things don't happen.

I mean, they lost so much in the offseason and Tatum was expected to miss the year. So 3 starters and two very good bench players. The guys that Brad brought in over the summer haven?t been good, minus Minott. Simons is so streaky. Garza and Boucher are borderline unplayable. Hugo is hit or miss, the other rookies are long shots at best. Like you said, Some of the other younger guys taking that next step has been the difference. Queta, Minott and especially Walsh. I don?t think anyone saw that coming.

Simons has been streaky but there are times that I love having him on the floor. He a threat to score on every possession and despite not being a gifted defender he?s shown good effort. 

[keevsnick]

I didn't think they were going to tank, i never understood that idea given the talent they have. But I also didn't think they'd be THIS good. Maybe 42-44 wins, right now they look like they might challenge for 50.

The emergence of Walsh, Queta, Minott and to lesser degrees the solid contributions of Scheierman/Hugo are a complete game changer. This team NEEDS cheap contributors to be able to keep together the Tatum/Brown/White core, and they've found some this year. Walsh especially looks like he may be the glue-guy 5th starter 3+D wing they desperately need.

Add one more rotation center, not even a starter just another roughly Queta level guy to split the minutes at center with him. Get JT back. Do those two things and I think they could make real noise this year. The east is so bad they may challenge for it even if those two things don't happen.

I mean, they lost so much in the offseason and Tatum was expected to miss the year. So 3 starters and two very good bench players. The guys that Brad brought in over the summer haven?t been good, minus Minott. Simons is so streaky. Garza and Boucher are borderline unplayable. Hugo is hit or miss, the other rookies are long shots at best. Like you said, Some of the other younger guys taking that next step has been the difference. Queta, Minott and especially Walsh. I don?t think anyone saw that coming.

Did they though? i mean think about what they actually lost. They lost KP who only played about half the games and even when he didn't play they still won at almost a 75% rate. He was great but never super important to regular season results. They lost Jrue but did get back Simons who may not be as good as an overall player but does give you better microwave scoring off the bench which helps this version of the team without Tatum. They lost Kornet who was good, but more like backup big good and they've more than replaced his output with Queta which is maybe surprising but not shocking I'd say.

Honestly Horford was maybe the most important loss, just because a solid defensive 3+D centers are hard to find but he was a 39 year old who only had so much to give in the regular season.

I don't know, i think people sort of
A) Overrated the guys they lost based off the star power of names rather than what those guys actually were by the time we moved them.
B) Forgot that increased minutes for unknown guys would more than likely lead to at least a few breakouts. Just because Walsh/Minott/Queta/Scheierman didn't get regular minutes on really good teams never meant they were bad, just meant they weren't ready THEN. 
C) Forgot that the C's were a 60+ win team. You can lose a lot of talent off a 60+ win team and still be a good team. Its not the c's were the pacers' who were barely a 50-win regular season team last year. The Celtics had more margin of error to lose guys with how stacked the team was.

I just think in retrospect it was all a bit of an overreaction. The Tatum loss is HUGE, gigantic, he's probably worth 10+ wins himself. But the other guys were always to some degree replaceable, especially considering KP just couldn't stay healthy. You can find 5th, 6th and 7th best players with a little luck, especially during the regular season.

[Goldstar88]

I didn't think they were going to tank, i never understood that idea given the talent they have. But I also didn't think they'd be THIS good. Maybe 42-44 wins, right now they look like they might challenge for 50.

The emergence of Walsh, Queta, Minott and to lesser degrees the solid contributions of Scheierman/Hugo are a complete game changer. This team NEEDS cheap contributors to be able to keep together the Tatum/Brown/White core, and they've found some this year. Walsh especially looks like he may be the glue-guy 5th starter 3+D wing they desperately need.

Add one more rotation center, not even a starter just another roughly Queta level guy to split the minutes at center with him. Get JT back. Do those two things and I think they could make real noise this year. The east is so bad they may challenge for it even if those two things don't happen.

I mean, they lost so much in the offseason and Tatum was expected to miss the year. So 3 starters and two very good bench players. The guys that Brad brought in over the summer haven?t been good, minus Minott. Simons is so streaky. Garza and Boucher are borderline unplayable. Hugo is hit or miss, the other rookies are long shots at best. Like you said, Some of the other younger guys taking that next step has been the difference. Queta, Minott and especially Walsh. I don?t think anyone saw that coming.

Did they though? i mean think about what they actually lost. They lost KP who only played about half the games and even when he didn't play they still won at almost a 75% rate. He was great but never super important to regular season results. They lost Jrue but did get back Simons who may not be as good as an overall player but does give you better microwave scoring off the bench which helps this version of the team without Tatum. They lost Kornet who was good, but more like backup big good and they've more than replaced his output with Queta which is maybe surprising but not shocking I'd say.

Honestly Horford was maybe the most important loss, just because a solid defensive 3+D centers are hard to find but he was a 39 year old who only had so much to give in the regular season.

I don't know, i think people sort of
A) Overrated the guys they lost based off the star power of names rather than what those guys actually were by the time we moved them.
B) Forgot that increased minutes for unknown guys would more than likely lead to at least a few breakouts. Just because Walsh/Minott/Queta/Scheierman didn't get regular minutes on really good teams never meant they were bad, just meant they weren't ready THEN. 
C) Forgot that the C's were a 60+ win team. You can lose a lot of talent off a 60+ win team and still be a good team. Its not the c's were the pacers' who were barely a 50-win regular season team last year. The Celtics had more margin of error to lose guys with how stacked the team was.

I just think in retrospect it was all a bit of an overreaction. The Tatum loss is HUGE, gigantic, he's probably worth 10+ wins himself. But the other guys were always to some degree replaceable, especially considering KP just couldn't stay healthy. You can find 5th, 6th and 7th best players with a little luck, especially during the regular season.

KP wasn?t available for most of the postseason, but he did play in 70% of the regular season games. He took a lot of pressure off of JT and was often the second best player on the Celtics. A big part of why Boston won 60+ games.

I don?t think the C?s win that championship without Jrue, so suggesting Simons is a replacement for him is crazy to me. Simons is not even good enough to start on this Celtics team. He can score, but doesn?t do anything else well. Jrue does everything well.

[Kernewek]

I didn't think they were going to tank, i never understood that idea given the talent they have. But I also didn't think they'd be THIS good. Maybe 42-44 wins, right now they look like they might challenge for 50.

The emergence of Walsh, Queta, Minott and to lesser degrees the solid contributions of Scheierman/Hugo are a complete game changer. This team NEEDS cheap contributors to be able to keep together the Tatum/Brown/White core, and they've found some this year. Walsh especially looks like he may be the glue-guy 5th starter 3+D wing they desperately need.

Add one more rotation center, not even a starter just another roughly Queta level guy to split the minutes at center with him. Get JT back. Do those two things and I think they could make real noise this year. The east is so bad they may challenge for it even if those two things don't happen.

I think the conference being awful is a big part of it, but 50 wins would be wildly over-performing, I think.

[SHAQATTACK]

I don?t think Celtics other than Walsh are too much better than I thought they?d be. Kinda going along with the rest of the east is playing really sad basketball. I?m not convinced this surge will hold up without Tatum?s return and a proper center .

[jambr380]

All of our young guys are now suddenly hits to varying degrees with Queta and Walsh looking like possible long-term starters in this league. I'm glad everybody is signed through at least next season, but those cheap minimum contracts might turn into Nic Claxton and Dyson Daniels level contracts if those guys keep playing like they are. I guess there are worse problems to have.

But I was wrong, too. I thought they'd be a play-in with the potential to be worse with any major injury. Hoping that doesn't happen, but I'm happy to see that our young guys are the one producing rather than our older vets who have a lot less potential. Didn't think our 12th, 13th, and 14th guys on the roster would all be veteran bigs who can't see the floor.

[slamtheking]

time for a mea culpa for me.

Preseason I predicted this would be a lottery team based on:
- they had the worst frontcourt in the league
- they lost 5 rotation players including 3 starters
- what they had for youth on the roster looked like their primary purpose would be trade filler
- they used their late first on someone that was likely 2 years from contributing if they panned out
- Brad's 2 big FA signings, Minott and Garza, would be busts -- if they couldn't get minutes in Minny there was reason for it and a reason why they were available FAs
- Simons would struggle finding his way in Joe's schemes due to his poor defense.  I didn't think he'd necessarily fare well finding his offense either since he's been the go-to in Portland for a bit and that's not how it'll work here.
- Baylor would make a leap to a productive rotation player
- other teams in the league would and should exploit this team's weaknesses such that they could not counteract the lack of rebounders, interior defenders and significant loss in scoring punch.
- Mazzulla is still the coach with a horrid 3-centric offense and poor in-game management.
- Team is so thin on talent that any games missed by JB, White or PP would be an automatic loss

I did think that based on who was left, Brown, White and PP would up their games in an effort to make up for the missing talent.  I also thought that adding Boucher in place in Niang could shift 2-3 games from the loss column to the win column this season.

What I was wrong about:
- Walsh, Minott and Hugo are significantly better than expected. I couldn't imagine myself saying at the beginning of the season that Walsh would be the key to this team being a good team.  I know I'm not the only one in that regard but since he's been starting he's been fantastic.  Minott has been a revelation -- great hustle and solid shooting.  Hugo's D has been terrific.  Just needs to get consistent with his jumper.
- Queta has stepped up big time.  I've been saying the C's need a starting caliber center but he may just be it now.  Defending better, offense is much better.  Only real rebounding big man we have.
- JB has stepped up his game even more than I thought he could.  Love that he's basically making the "JB can't lead a team" naysayers to eat crow.
- White and PP have not stepped up their games until the last few games.  They've struggled more than I thought they would with having to take a step up in the team's hierarchy.
- Boucher has been a dud.  Thought he'd add a solid vet presense to the frontcourt but he's racking up a load of DNPs which I didn't expect.
- Baylor has not made the leap I expected.  He's not unplayable but I had hoped he'd have put it together on offense at least while improving his D.  Offense is a little better as is his rebounding but D still needs work.
- Joe has got this team hustling.  He's getting the most out of this roster with the exception of still taking a lot of 3's when we don't have a lot of elite shooters.  His mix-and-match line-ups to start the season seems to have culled out the weak links on the team and he's now focussing on playing the guys that make a difference when on the floor.

What I was right about:
- C's do have the worst frontcourt in the league.  Q is the only one worth anything.  Garza, Boucher and Tillman kill us anytime they're in the game.  Joe's had to use Minott as a small-ball 5 to offset how bad those other guys are.
- C's had major issues on the offensive boards to start the season and still have issues when the other team has a good rebounder and they focus on crashing the boards.
- Simons has struggled to find his place here.  His D isn't good. 
- Garza's a bust.  has a good touch around the basket when he's not getting blocked or pushed around but his defensive rebounding sucks and he's no rim protector. 
- Joe's still having this team launch too many 3's but at least he's letting the team shoot mid-range shots which has really helped JB become more efficient offensively

TBD:
- Team's health has been stellar this year but we know the injuries are coming.  How will the team handle those players missing games?  JB's the offense.  White and PP are the only PGs.  Q missing games could be devastating depending on who they're playing.
- Can the Walsh/Minott/Hugo group continue to contribute at the level they're playing at or are they going to come back to earth?
- What can/will Brad do with Simons to improve the frontcourt?  Can't see him keeping Simons until the offseason when he hits free agency.  Simons isn't worth nearly what he's paid for this team, he won't be taking a paycut this offseason and letting his contract expire would be a waste of his salary slot that could be used on a player making similar money that would be a better fit.
- Can White and PP finally step up to provide the shooting consistency this offense needs?
- Can Hauser and Baylor provide some consistent shooting off the bench?  Hauser's been making solid contributions when on the court even when his shooting is off but they really need him to have more consistency rather than 1-2 super hot shooting nights offsetting 2-3 really bad shooting nights.