Feelings on the In Season Tournament?

[tenn_smoothie]

I am not looking forward to the extra high intensity games v top competition with an extra cross country trip with the possibility of an 83rd game — followed by an intense schedule at home - 2 games each v the Cavs and Magic, and another cross country trip to play both LA teams, GSW, and Sac.   All before Christmas (LAL on Christmas Day). 

VERY reasonable possibility that the stretch following the IST Final in Vegas costs them in seeding for the REAL tournament.  They will be exhausted putting high minutes/effort into the IST (not to mention kicking off the stretch with tomorrow’s game v Sixers) and will be running on fumes by Christmas.  Meanwhile, the Sixers play a relaxed schedule with a 4-day break during the IST and 2 v. Wizards, 2 v. pistons and a game each v. Bulls and Hawks.

I expect the Sixers to be at least 2 games ahead of the Celtics by the end of December.  And surely at least one Celtic comes out of this stretch hurt.

I HATE the IST. I believe there is a decent chance that it costs the Celtics a championship.

Really, living up to your avatar there Neurotic Guy...

Isn't it just like one extra game? The scheduling clustering will even out to thinning (a tiny bit) later in the saeson.. right when we want to having guys fresh before the playoffs no?

LOL - guilty as charged.  I won’t defend the over worries but I still believe the Cs will be well behind the Sixers by the end of December (worse if Cs lose tonight), and the IST will take some blame for the ultimate seeding even though we’re just in December of a long season. The extra intensity could lead to some problems physically. But I guess the bottom line for me is that I get nothing out of the tournament and I all I see are potential cost.

Tatum is playing 37MPG right now, which is high, but no one else on the team is cracking 35 (Holiday and Brown are close). They're young guys, so I don't think they should be particularly worn down by the end of the year. Freak injuries are always a worry, but you can't particularly control for them.

I checked the minutes played on the 85-86, 67 win team:  Bird - 38 m/g; McHale - 35.3; DJ - 35; Chief - 31.7; and Ainge - 30.1.  Except for Jrue, the current starters are about the same or younger than the 80s team.

Different era. More physical but less constant intensity and pace.

As for the Celts core being young, that fact didn't help Tatum in the finals vs Golden State, when he was two years younger and ended up exhausted. I think Joe is playing these guys into the ground. Playing Tatum for 36 minutes to insure a blowout of the Bulls for the sake of this contrived tournament is just plain stupid. The only thing that should matter is #18 - that should drive all decisions.

[Moranis]

I think a guy is better off playing 8 games at 37.5 mpg with 2 games off as opposed to 10 games at 30 mpg.  That gives the body both more real rest and better conditioning.

[johnnygreen]

I'm not sure if it's been mentioned, but the Chicago Bulls approach to their IST game against the Celtics was bush league. From a Celtics fans perspective, it worked great for us. However, the Bulls essentially gave up in the 2nd quarter. Their starters barely played in the second half. With the ridiculous point differential tiebreaker, the game had plenty of meaning for Orlando and some other teams. I'm sorry, but when the Celtics started deploying hack-a-Drummond, I would have brought back my starters if I was Coach Donavan.

[ChillyWilly]

I'm not sure if it's been mentioned, but the Chicago Bulls approach to their IST game against the Celtics was bush league. From a Celtics fans perspective, it worked great for us. However, the Bulls essentially gave up in the 2nd quarter. Their starters barely played in the second half. With the ridiculous point differential tiebreaker, the game had plenty of meaning for Orlando and some other teams. I'm sorry, but when the Celtics started deploying hack-a-Drummond, I would have brought back my starters if I was Coach Donavan.

I doubt they'd go back in they seem to have totally checkout on Donovan. I'm surprised he's still employed.

[Birdman]

Hope UK let Can’t Coach Calipari go & go get Donovan 😁

[Kernewek]

I'm not sure if it's been mentioned, but the Chicago Bulls approach to their IST game against the Celtics was bush league. From a Celtics fans perspective, it worked great for us. However, the Bulls essentially gave up in the 2nd quarter. Their starters barely played in the second half. With the ridiculous point differential tiebreaker, the game had plenty of meaning for Orlando and some other teams. I'm sorry, but when the Celtics started deploying hack-a-Drummond, I would have brought back my starters if I was Coach Donavan.

I doubt they'd go back in they seem to have totally checkout on Donovan. I'm surprised he's still employed.

Donovan and Scott Brooks are two guys who more or less owe their careers to Kevin Durant & Russell Westbrook.

[Celtics2021]

I'm not sure if it's been mentioned, but the Chicago Bulls approach to their IST game against the Celtics was bush league. From a Celtics fans perspective, it worked great for us. However, the Bulls essentially gave up in the 2nd quarter. Their starters barely played in the second half. With the ridiculous point differential tiebreaker, the game had plenty of meaning for Orlando and some other teams. I'm sorry, but when the Celtics started deploying hack-a-Drummond, I would have brought back my starters if I was Coach Donavan.

I doubt they'd go back in they seem to have totally checkout on Donovan. I'm surprised he's still employed.

Donovan and Scott Brooks are two guys who more or less owe their careers to Kevin Durant & Russell Westbrook.

Scott Brooks, yes, but Donovan had a hugely successful NCAA coaching career, and had Durant for only a season.  Donovan is still living off his back-to-back titles with Horford and Noah.

[Kernewek]

I'm not sure if it's been mentioned, but the Chicago Bulls approach to their IST game against the Celtics was bush league. From a Celtics fans perspective, it worked great for us. However, the Bulls essentially gave up in the 2nd quarter. Their starters barely played in the second half. With the ridiculous point differential tiebreaker, the game had plenty of meaning for Orlando and some other teams. I'm sorry, but when the Celtics started deploying hack-a-Drummond, I would have brought back my starters if I was Coach Donavan.

I doubt they'd go back in they seem to have totally checkout on Donovan. I'm surprised he's still employed.

Donovan and Scott Brooks are two guys who more or less owe their careers to Kevin Durant & Russell Westbrook.

Scott Brooks, yes, but Donovan had a hugely successful NCAA coaching career, and had Durant for only a season.  Donovan is still living off his back-to-back titles with Horford and Noah.

I think it's easy to dismiss the Westbrook-led Thunder teams as they didn't see much postseason success, but they were winning much more than they were losing. I definitely don't think Donovan gets the Bulls gig without Russ playing out of his mind.

Should have said specified 'continued NBA careers', perhaps.

[Redz]

It’s funny, I took a look at the brackets for the first time yesterday and it just seems underwhelming.  It’s an odd mish mash of teams.we shall see how it goes.

[libermaniac]

It would be more fun if they intermingled East with West for the brackets. No need to stick to East and West IMO.

[ChillyWilly]

I'm not sure if it's been mentioned, but the Chicago Bulls approach to their IST game against the Celtics was bush league. From a Celtics fans perspective, it worked great for us. However, the Bulls essentially gave up in the 2nd quarter. Their starters barely played in the second half. With the ridiculous point differential tiebreaker, the game had plenty of meaning for Orlando and some other teams. I'm sorry, but when the Celtics started deploying hack-a-Drummond, I would have brought back my starters if I was Coach Donavan.

I doubt they'd go back in they seem to have totally checkout on Donovan. I'm surprised he's still employed.

Donovan and Scott Brooks are two guys who more or less owe their careers to Kevin Durant & Russell Westbrook.

Scott Brooks, yes, but Donovan had a hugely successful NCAA coaching career, and had Durant for only a season.  Donovan is still living off his back-to-back titles with Horford and Noah.

I forgot all about Scott Brooks...Donovan is definitely living off something he did 17 years ago outside the league. I remember he came into the league hot taking OCK to the conference finals but he hasnt won a playoff series since. To me he's an avg NBA coach.

[keevsnick]

I think its a good mix of teams for the league. A few prestige franchises like Celtics, Lakers, Knicks. Some very good veteran teams among the favorites for the title like Celtics, Suns, Bucks. Some up and coming teams with young stars to showcase in Pelicans, Kings and Pacers. Good mix.

I think it will be fun, the players clearly cared about making it and now that they're in they will play hard to win it I think.

[theswitch]

It's definitely made some of these games really interesting and fun. It's certainly worked -- the players seem to care quite a bit.

I don't love the perverse incentive of if you win, you have to play the winners...that means your strength of schedule gets hit. The Knicks play the Bucks. We get the winner if we advance. The Lakers have the Suns. There are some other non-IST matchups that are compelling (Nuggets - Clippers, Cavs - Heat) but wouldn't you rather play the Spurs? Rockets? You're much more likely to get a bad team if you don't advance in the IST. We probably got the luckiest draw with the Pacers. And that all counts the same in the 82.

So I found it a little awkward to say "well the Celtics are going to probably get the #1 or #2 seed anyways so what's a game or two" but if I'm a team like the Lakers then two more tough regular season games might be the difference between the #5 seed and the play-in. It's material.

An example of this -- Minnesota has San Antonio (3-16) and Memphis (5-14). Might be the difference between HCA or not, or a 3 seed v. 5 seed. Meanwhile others have to battle it out. Phoenix, Sacramento, Pelicans, LA Lakers are all right there in the mid for whether or not they get home court in the first round or are play-in game participants. Have to claw each other for it. I'm sure they'd all rather play SAS and Memphis.

[Goldstar88]

I’m glad the C’s are out. Not interested in risking injury over meaningless tournament games.

[ozgod]

Yup, hate it now...never liked it anyway. Mickey Mouse tournament