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

[slamtheking]

I've always been in the Fire Joe camp.  Never left.  feel even after a great regular season he still needs to go.

[SparzWizard]

People keep saying that the 08 Celtics went to 7 games against the Hawks.

You cannot compare this team to that 08 squad. Different mentality. At least that 08 squad knew how to defend home-court. They were winning games by an average of like 80 or 90 points every game at home.

Even the backups/3rd stringers tonight were playing unselfish basketball and with grit. When JT and JB were out there, they'd dribble dribble dribble to like 5 seconds left and either clank a 3, or get tunnel vision while driving in the lane and lose the ball. And Joe allows that to happen.

Joke Mazzulla. That's his name.

[Celtics4ever]

I think Coach Maz, gave us a wonderful season, with a team that over achieved much more than any of us predicted.  The trouble is our guys are soft,over dependent on the three, and  they showed these same behaviors against the Knicks last year and the same old mistakes are killing us against Philly.

I really think we miss veteran leadership of Al and Jrue and this aspect may have been more important than their play and production.

[Kernewek]

Oldy but a goody!

But, yeah, at some point you do have to look at the results with the proof being in the pudding. If things continue down this path and we lose game 7, that will be three out of four years that we've underperformed relative to expectations in the playoffs, which is unacceptable.

Maybe we'll get a Dwyane Casey situation - COTY to firing all in one season! 

(Seriously, though, he does get props for the regular season coaching job, but you don't get that praise without the criticism for not backing it up in the playoffs.)

Depends on your expectations - go back and look at the regular season predictions thread.

The J&J era of the Celtics has always been bad at closing things out. It's not a Mazz problem (although, clearly, he hasn't solved it).

[ozgod]

Oldy but a goody!

But, yeah, at some point you do have to look at the results with the proof being in the pudding. If things continue down this path and we lose game 7, that will be three out of four years that we've underperformed relative to expectations in the playoffs, which is unacceptable.

Maybe we'll get a Dwyane Casey situation - COTY to firing all in one season! 

(Seriously, though, he does get props for the regular season coaching job, but you don't get that praise without the criticism for not backing it up in the playoffs.)

Depends on your expectations - go back and look at the regular season predictions thread.

The J&J era of the Celtics has always been bad at closing things out. It's not a Mazz problem (although, clearly, he hasn't solved it).

Yes they always seem to take things for granted, have a lack of urgency. The only time they had it was in 2024 when they closed out the Finals with a thrashing of Dallas.

[Larry for 3]

Oldy but a goody!

But, yeah, at some point you do have to look at the results with the proof being in the pudding. If things continue down this path and we lose game 7, that will be three out of four years that we've underperformed relative to expectations in the playoffs, which is unacceptable.

Maybe we'll get a Dwyane Casey situation - COTY to firing all in one season! 

(Seriously, though, he does get props for the regular season coaching job, but you don't get that praise without the criticism for not backing it up in the playoffs.)

Depends on your expectations - go back and look at the regular season predictions thread.

The J&J era of the Celtics has always been bad at closing things out. It's not a Mazz problem (although, clearly, he hasn't solved it).

Expectations change as the season goes along. It?s the coaches job to prevent these things. At some point a change needs to be made. That?s why Stevens stepped down. That?s how it goes. In every sport on every team. Celtics fans keep ignoring this. Changes are coming. One way or another. This guy is not a good coach. Zero adjustment. They lose the same way every time. Can?t believe people don?t see this.

[celticinorlando]

Joe had a great regular season.

But he is proving to struggle in the playoffs. 3 out of the 4 years now.

[Kernewek]

Oldy but a goody!

But, yeah, at some point you do have to look at the results with the proof being in the pudding. If things continue down this path and we lose game 7, that will be three out of four years that we've underperformed relative to expectations in the playoffs, which is unacceptable.

Maybe we'll get a Dwyane Casey situation - COTY to firing all in one season! 

(Seriously, though, he does get props for the regular season coaching job, but you don't get that praise without the criticism for not backing it up in the playoffs.)

Depends on your expectations - go back and look at the regular season predictions thread.

The J&J era of the Celtics has always been bad at closing things out. It's not a Mazz problem (although, clearly, he hasn't solved it).

Expectations change as the season goes along. It?s the coaches job to prevent these things. At some point a change needs to be made. That?s why Stevens stepped down. That?s how it goes. In every sport on every team. Celtics fans keep ignoring this. Changes are coming. One way or another. This guy is not a good coach. Zero adjustment. They lose the same way every time. Can?t believe people don?t see this.

No one's ignoring anything - it's just that most of us would prefer to have a team that wins more often than not, and the current Celtics org seems to be happy with this as well.

I am curious as to what the expectations for the team are now. Is it a second-round exit? ECF? Championship? It's impossible to evaluate whether expectations are reasonable (or otherwise) when we don't know what they are.

[Vermont Green]

I am going to wait for the dust to settle before I get my pitchfork to chase Mazzulla out of town.  Several things appear to be true at the same time.  Mazzulla is a title winning coach.  He is a finalist for coach of the year, and deservingly so.  Has been one of the top coaches in COTY voting every season.

OTOH, there has been some underachievement in the playoffs the last two seasons (I give him a pass on the MIA series his rookie coaching season).  He has a very unconventional approach and demeanor that plays fine when things are good but will get old fast when things are not going well.

Fan perception will change a lot based on how game 7 goes.  But if at the start of the season, you were told that BOS would lose in the second round to the Knicks, most would have said that was OK.  The expectation changed, understandably, and now a second round loss (and certainly a first round loss) will be viewed as underachieving. But is it?  How good is this team really?  Has Mazzulla lost the room?  These are not easy questions, and should not be decided based on heat of the moment reactions.

[Banner18now!]

Even if the C?s blow game 7 I highly doubt Brad fires Joe. I think they should move on from him since they have underachieved more with Joe. They will give him one more year and if they go nowhere next year again in the playoffs then I could see Brad getting rid of him.

I do not take away what Joe did this regular season as he had them playing hard and they overachieved. However, getting a very good Tatum back the expectations went up a little as far as making the ECF or possibly the finals.
That being said coaches are judged by the playoffs and not having good regular seasons.

If they lose this round then that will be 3 out of 4 years this team has underachieved.

[celticinorlando]

3 out 4 playoffs with Joe have been first round exits or a choke job in the second round vs Knicks.

The one they won was because that team was coach proof. Not good enough.

[Roy H.]

3 out 4 playoffs with Joe have been first round exits or a choke job in the second round vs Knicks.

The one they won was because that team was coach proof. Not good enough.

I think that you're misremembering.

I think that we've underachieved in the playoffs other than the title year, but in 2023 we lost in Game 7 of the ECF (after falling behind 3-0).

Joe's track record is:  2023:  ECF; 2024: Championship; 2025: Second Round; 2026: TBD

[Goldstar88]

The Celtics are losing because their shots aren?t falling. Tuesday loss: 40% from the field, 28% from 3pt and 61% from the line. Last nights loss: 42% from the field, 29% from 3pt, 56% from the line. Not going to win many games shooting like that. Also had 25 turnovers combined in those two games which didn?t help. Thats on the players.

How many layups did they miss last night?

[Roy H.]

So, one of the biggest critiques of Joe in 2023 was his lack of adjustments, not only in-game but from game to game.  Once we lost momentum we couldn't right the ship.

The team seemed to get over that in 2024.  The following season it was hard to determine, because while we were flat against NY and never recovered, we were dealing with some pretty big injury issues (KP, Jrue and Brown, along with Tatum eventually). 

I think this playoff we're kind of back to the 2023 coaching.  Joe hasn't implemented any real changes in strategy or done anything successful to get us going. 

I've raised this before, but I really think that the team misses Charles Lee. 

[smicker16]

I understand the calls for a coaching change mainly because it is the easiest solution in sports.  It is a lot more challenging to change the players and in reality I just do not think the Cs are talented enough to win it all.  It does not mean they cannot but they would need some things to go their way and they need to shoot really well from 3 to overcome the talent issues they have especially with Tatum still not 100% although he has looked great.  This team is in my opinion worse than last year even factoring in all the injuries the team had last year. 

Should they win this series?  Sure and I think talent wise they are equal to or slightly more talented than the Sixers.  The Knicks though I do think are more talented. 

I am fine with a coaching change because then I can convince myself next year may be different when in reality I think this team needs more high end talent and I do not see that happening this offseason.