Celtics Reaction To Courtney Lee's Injury

[CelticsFan9]

Wow, I'm pretty surprised by Terry's reaction

He always talks too much. Always has and always will.

About his own teammates?

Yeah, not sure what CC's getting at with that comment.

Terry's been known to be a great teammate throughout his career.  If anything, he kisses up to his teammates.  He certainly doesn't bring them down.

[kozlodoev]

Wow, I'm pretty surprised by Terry's reaction

He always talks too much. Always has and always will.

"Make a shot, Jason. We're trying to win a game or three here."

[LarBrd33]

we're fine... none of this matters at this point.  I'm not losing sleep over it.  It would take a LOT for us to fall out of the playoffs... We're 10 games ahead of Philly.  And arguably it's better for us to face off against Miami in the first round (when presumably Boston is healthy and energized) than deep int he playoffs when everyone is hobbled.  So I really don't care at this point... and I doubt Boston cares either.  Come playoff time, we'll be ready.  And whether we lose to Miami in the 1st round or lose to Miami in the ECF, we'll be prepared to go down swinging.

TP.

I'm still awaiting an explanation on why it's a better idea to face Miami late in the playoffs as opposed to earlier.

For starters, I feel like this team's goal this year is to beat Miami, not win a championship.  Our title aspirations crumbled once Rondo went down, but as we've seen in the two games vs. the Heat, we can hang with them better than anyone in the East.

I'm beginning to hope we fall to the eighth seed so that we can play them in the first round.  That way, we're fresher than we would be if we played them in late May.

Fact is, we'll probably be sitting KG/Pierce during the last handful of regular season games anyways... resting them up for the playoffs.  It's a common practice.  We're going to finish this regular season with a whimper whether you like it or not.  Don't stress about it.  The good news is, Game 1 of the first round, we'll probably be as healthy as we're going to get.  And this team at 100% can at least make Miami sweat. 

I really don't see any reason why we'd need to face them later in the playoffs.  I guess some teams want to "avoid" Miami early with the hope that someone else will wear them down or knock them off, but I don't really see that happening.  Last year we faced Miami with a ton of health problems.  Bradley was already done.  Green was done.  Pierce was playing with a sprained MCL.  Ray was dealing with major ankle problems.

I don't care either way, honestly.  Boston could lose to Indiana,  New York, Brooklyn, etc before even facing off against Miami.  It's going to be an exhausting task to knock off those teams if we even can.  Might as well just play Miami right away and give everything we got.

[PhoSita]

Celtics are unraveling. This is not the time for a veteran team to unravel.

I'm not sure how much this can be called a "veteran team" at this point considering we're relying on so many players under 28 to come up big for us.

The only real "savvy vets" are Terry, Pierce, Garnett, and maybe Wilcox to a lesser extent.  Two of those four guys aren't very good, and the other two can only do so much.

[wahz]

we're fine... none of this matters at this point.  I'm not losing sleep over it.  It would take a LOT for us to fall out of the playoffs... We're 10 games ahead of Philly.  And arguably it's better for us to face off against Miami in the first round (when presumably Boston is healthy and energized) than deep int he playoffs when everyone is hobbled.  So I really don't care at this point... and I doubt Boston cares either.  Come playoff time, we'll be ready.  And whether we lose to Miami in the 1st round or lose to Miami in the ECF, we'll be prepared to go down swinging.

TP.

I'm still awaiting an explanation on why it's a better idea to face Miami late in the playoffs as opposed to earlier.

For starters, I feel like this team's goal this year is to beat Miami, not win a championship.  Our title aspirations crumbled once Rondo went down, but as we've seen in the two games vs. the Heat, we can hang with them better than anyone in the East.

I'm beginning to hope we fall to the eighth seed so that we can play them in the first round.  That way, we're fresher than we would be if we played them in late May.

The explanation to see Miami later is that Lebron has more chances to get hurt and then Mia is toast. Of course if we didn't have bad luck we wouldn't have any at all so I agree we are better of seeing them early

[Lightskinsmurf]

we're fine... none of this matters at this point.  I'm not losing sleep over it.  It would take a LOT for us to fall out of the playoffs... We're 10 games ahead of Philly.  And arguably it's better for us to face off against Miami in the first round (when presumably Boston is healthy and energized) than deep int he playoffs when everyone is hobbled.  So I really don't care at this point... and I doubt Boston cares either.  Come playoff time, we'll be ready.  And whether we lose to Miami in the 1st round or lose to Miami in the ECF, we'll be prepared to go down swinging.

Well said, I'm done caring myself. We aren't getting a top seed or winning the division. We will be in the playoffs and we'll go down swinging.

[rocknrollforyoursoul]

Should have just fouled or something, I suppose.

This is the usual course of action, and I don't know why Boston didn't do this.

I hear that Marc Gasol is missing tonight's game, but I still don't think Boston will win, especially with a gimpy KG and a gimpy Lee. Might as well sit both those guys, and Pierce, since they're probably gonna lose anyway. Give Green 40 minutes, and play Wilcox, White, Randolph, and Williams a bunch to give them some burn.

[crimson_stallion]

Wow, I'm pretty surprised by Terry's reaction

He always talks too much. Always has and always will.

About his own teammates?

Yeah, not sure what CC's getting at with that comment.

Terry's been known to be a great teammate throughout his career.  If anything, he kisses up to his teammates.  He certainly doesn't bring them down.

As above - Terry has never come across as the type to act harshly towards teammates, it's very uncharacteristic of him to respond like this.  I guess you never know from outside the locker room - maybe Doc and Terry know something we don't.

Lee has been very up and down with his game the entire season - solid one game, mediocre the next.  A number of the veterans on this team have also been hinting at issues with some of the new guys not taking things seriously.  Maybe Lee has been one of those guys, and maybe he's been a bit of a drama queen behind closed doors and the vets are a little sick of it.

As for Terry people can say all they want about him - he has a champtionship under his belt, he has a very proven history of performing when it counts, and already this season he has hit his share of huge clutch baskets and made his share of game winning plays.  Right now he's shooting 45% from the field, 36% from three and 85% from the line which are on par with what he's averaged throughout his career and are also about the best overall percentages of anyone on this team.

Everybody misses shots sometimes, but from what I've seen (and I've seen almost every game this season) Terry has played hard every night and has rarely made bonehead plays. 

He's also an incredibly durable player who has missed very few games over his career - maybe he's just lucky, or maybe he's just shut up and played through the injuries the way guys like Pierce and Kobe do.

Kobe disses Dwight for not playing injured and everybody applauds him, Terry does something similar to a teammate and everybody criticises him.  We all know Dwight is a drama queen who cries about everything so we take Kobe's side - maybe Lee has been the same way but we just don't know it.

At the end of the day, you just don't know unless you spend time behind the scenes.

[bfrombleacher]

Kobe disses Dwight for not playing injured and everybody applauds him, Terry does something similar to a teammate and everybody criticises him.  We all know Dwight is a drama queen who cries about everything so we take Kobe's side - maybe Lee has been the same way but we just don't know it.

At the end of the day, you just don't know unless you spend time behind the scenes.

Could explain his journeyman status.

Would make me a little sad if he really is a bad teammate. Lee seems to hustle on the floor.

[clover]

Here's another small oddity, Blakely's post-game analysis credited Lee with the decision not to play:

"Lee ruled himself out prior to the game..."

http://www.csnne.com/blog/celtics-talk/celtics-grizzlies-review-bench-offers-hope

[crimson_stallion]

Kobe disses Dwight for not playing injured and everybody applauds him, Terry does something similar to a teammate and everybody criticises him.  We all know Dwight is a drama queen who cries about everything so we take Kobe's side - maybe Lee has been the same way but we just don't know it.

At the end of the day, you just don't know unless you spend time behind the scenes.

Could explain his journeyman status.

Would make me a little sad if he really is a bad teammate. Lee seems to hustle on the floor.

True, but then you could say the same for Allen Iverson, right?  He always worked his butt off anytime he was on the basketball court, but then apparently he was a lazy SOB in practice and a nightmare of a teammate.

Lee does come across as a really hard worker in games, but Doc usually LOVES guys who have that type of attitude.  Look ad how much he has loved guys like Marquis, Tony Allen and Avery Bradley - all guys who played great defense and left 110% effort on the floor every night.  He doesn't seem to like to give Lee more minutes than he has to and seems to always give more minutes to Terry over Lee. Some would argue that this is because of Doc's love for veterans, but he has no trouble playing AB big minutes. 

I could be reading too much into it, but maybe Lee is just one of those guys who is very skilled, but only shows up for games, takes practices off, etc. 

Wwho knows really!

[clover]

Whatever the deal with Lee, I think it important to note that he was one of just four Celtics to play every one of the first 68 games of the season.