What's Wrong With the Offense?

[Bankshot]

They scored less than 90 points two games in a row.  Anyone know what the deal is?  Why does the offense go to a screeching halt at times.

[j804]

havent we always been around that mark?

i dont expect us to drop 110-20 a night

[Fafnir]

They scored less than 90 points two games in a row.  Anyone know what the deal is?  Why does the offense go to a screeching halt at times.

We play at a slow pace, and as of last year had an a league average offense.

I don't think we'll get any better than that, not unless we suddenly stop turning the ball over.

[Chris]

They scored less than 90 points two games in a row.  Anyone know what the deal is?  Why does the offense go to a screeching halt at times.

We play at a slow pace, and as of last year had an a league average offense.

I don't think we'll get any better than that, not unless we suddenly stop turning the ball over.

Yeah, I think it was KG who described them as "a defense team that can score the basketball."  They win with defense, not with offense.  The important thing is being able to execute when it counts.  So far, they are 1 and 1 on that board.

Ultimately though, I wouldn't worry too much about the offense.  If they play defense, the offense will come.

[housecall]

Im keeping in mind they have only played 2 games so far but i expect KG to step his offensive game up a bit.So far he has played great on the defensive end but 9.5 per game is not good enough.Im sure he will pick it up soon but it isn't enough scoring punch coming from the core players so far.IMO

ATTN:Im a big KG fan

[youcanthandlethetruth113]

They scored less than 90 points two games in a row.  Anyone know what the deal is?  Why does the offense go to a screeching halt at times.

We play at a slow pace, and as of last year had an a league average offense.

I don't think we'll get any better than that, not unless we suddenly stop turning the ball over.

2 ways to turn the ball over less:

1. Keep Nate Robinson on a shorter leash when he fails to pass to a wide open Marquis Daniels under the net (instead he chucked up an off balance heavy English shot with the opposition capturing the rebound easily - might as well be a turnover).

2. Make sure Rondo is more vocal when his defender cheats off him to double-team an unsuspecting teammate. This happened in the final 3 minutes of the Heat game when Wade left Rondo to go to KG's "blind side" for the classic MJ-esque (on Malone/Ewing back in the day) steal. All Rondo has to do is inform his teammate of the double-team and the teammate will then not turn the ball over. 

[BballTim]

  It's obviously a new year but it's worth pointing out that Cleveland and Miami were both near the top of the league defensively last year. I'll bet they'll both be good this year as well.

[ScoobyDoo]

Turnovers and then I just think they don't take good shots. One thing about this team, when their offense stalls, I've never seen them just start heading head long for the rim, which is what I'd do, at least in part, if my O was failing.

They don't take care of the ball, which is really aggravating. They set Ray up for another three when they were only 3 down with 1:23 left. A quick two would have been much better, make Cleveland nervous, stop them on the other end, you still have time for the three if necessary...

[Fafnir]

  It's obviously a new year but it's worth pointing out that Cleveland and Miami were both near the top of the league defensively last year. I'll bet they'll both be good this year as well.

Especially if they don't play Mo Williams and only play Jamison 20 minutes.

I don't think they'll be a good defensive team however, Moon/Williams will cost them eventually.

[PosImpos]

We play at a slow pace and we no longer have any transcendent offensive players.  Our offense isn't going to be great.

With a more reliable post presence in the form of Shaq and (hopefully) Jermaine, we should be able to at least be more consistent than we were last year. 

It's possible to win it all if your offense is merely average and your defense is phenomenal, but our offense last year was too prone to stalling (mainly due to no reliable inside scoring) and we didn't rebound enough.  We need to hope those two things change this year.  It's not so much about how many points our team scores, but how efficiently, and how consistently they can score. 

So far, early returns say that our rebounding is improved a bit, and we can get it inside more, but we're still very turnover prone and the offense still stalls, especially in the second half at critical times.  That's troubling.

[pengaloo]

Probably lots of reasons why the offense looks dysfunctional at times -

1. We're too unselfish with the ball sometimes... e.g, KG, Rondo, Nate passing up open looks, passing the ball to a teammate with a lower-percentage shot who has very little (or no) time on the clock to work with.

2.  Rondo thinking too much and spending too much time reading defenses (I think this is what he does when he walks up the ball because you can see his eyes darting from one place to another).

3. Our bigs keep getting called for moving picks.

4. If we start a play for Ray, we have the mindset of finishing the play for Ray (i.e., Ray runs around and tries to get open. After running 10 seconds off the clock with Ray running around, he still doesn't get open - but we pass it to him anyway and expect him to make plays). We should look for our second and third options earlier.

5. Paul and Ray don't pay enough attention to their dribble and get the ball stolen, poked out of bounds, etc.

6. In the half court, due to all the new people on our team, Rondo has to spend more time setting up plays because people don't know where to be.

[Celtics4ever]

Rondo did not score much in transition against MIA.

[Who]

We play at a slow pace and we no longer have any transcendent offensive players. 

The underlined part ... that is the reason for the Celtics offensive issues.

[Eeyore III]

Regarding the turnovers, Zach Lowe has an excellent (in my opinion) analysis up on SI. 

http://nba-point-forward.si.com/2010/10/28/pointing-the-finger-for-bostons-to-problem/?eref=sihp

He really articulates precisely some of the turnover patterns that I've seen a thousand times but never quite focused on.  Highly recommended.

[greenpride32]

We shot 46% and 47% from the field in the first two games respectively, so not too bad.

TO's vs MIA was about the same but we had a lot more against CLE.

Without Shaq in the game, our rebounding is poor (it's what we had last year).  Haven't seen enough of JO to say whether he makes an impact. But Shaq's precense is felt on both ends for rebounding.  And on the offense end should increase our 2nd chance points.