Knowing what we do now, would you change anything about the regular season?

[Roy Hobbs]

Dang it, I just lost a fairly lengthy post in the ether.  Anyway, the gist of it was this:

Knowing what you do now about our team, was the difficult regular season worth it?  This year was pretty miserable at times as a fan, as over the last 3/4 of the year, the team played sloppy, unmotivated, lazy basketball, even when healthy.  Loyal fans suffered through home losses to some of the worst squads in the NBA, and in my opinion, the booing of the home crowd was at times completely justified.

At the same time, the team entered the playoffs healthy and rested, and has looked brilliant thus far.  It's difficult to imagine a scenario where things would have played out better for us if we had a better regular season record.  In fact, had we played harder, we might have been more exhausted or injured. 

Similarly, we ended up with the #19 pick in the draft, rather than the #27 - #30 pick, which we otherwise would have received.  There's no doubt that moving up ten draft positions or so gives us a chance at a better player than we otherwise could have gotten; if we had the #19 pick in 2008, Danny would have drafted Courtney Lee or George Hill, rather than J.R. Giddens.

So, in hindsight, was it all worth it?  Would you gladly endure the same regular season again?  What would you do differently?

[Mr October]

In general I always want the Celtics to win 60+ games.

There are 2 exceptions:

1. If the team is clearly bad, I want the young guys to play and I want a better draft pick.

2. If the team is older, has injury issues, and is still close to contention, I want the older guys to get as much rest as possible - even more so than this year. Having said that, 4 old guys in the core rotation is the max this team should carry (Ray, Pierce, KG, Rasheed). When the old guys need rest and recovery, the young guys need to play. I would like to see the Celtics get a couple more young horses to run with Rondo.

So yes this regular season was worth it. Yet I would hope that next time around we have more energy guys like Tony and Davis that can play when the old guys need rest.

[ManchesterCelticsFan]

For this specific team it definately was now that we know they can flip the switch and considering how last year ended with an injured KG. Had they not been capable of flipping the switch, Ainge would blow the team up. I'm thinking because of Rondo's improvement, and he will only get better and more consistant at 24 to offset additional aging of the Big 3, let this thing ride until KG's contract expires. Resign Ray while getting Reggies longevity secrets, get a leaner Paul, do physical therapy on KG's knee, develop the younger players on our roster, get better draft picks in a range which is Danny's forte, and lets get this one and try for 1-2 more.

And this is from a fan who's only playoff game this year so far was Game 3 of the Cavs series; a complete waste of my $$$ in hindsight but their recent play made up for it.

[Redz]

I'll let you know in a few weeks.  Prior to the season starting I had fully expected this team to win a championship.  I had to readjust my expectations somewhat after they stunk for so long, but now that they are playing like what I had hope for initially I'll be really disappointed if we don't win it all. 

I guess that doesn't answer the question. 

I'll take the 19th pick I suppose, but I could have done without the sucking.