Big Baby - one point shy of career high

[Jeff]

you know, the fact that 23 points was one shy of his career high didn't even occur to me last night and I think that says a lot about how far he's come on this team

he's no longer the young guy you pull for because he shows promise - he's a veteran now (far from perfect, but a solid rotation veteran player on a Championship team)

let that sink in for a bit and discuss

[Bankshot]

Tell that to the haters to start a thread after every bad game he has.

[Bankshot]

“He’s been terrific,” said Rivers. “You know, Baby has his days, but overall he’s had very few of them. He’s been terrific all year.

“He’s had a tremendous attitude — a team attitude in a contract year, which is very difficult. I don’t think he gets enough credit for that part of it.

“The only time he gets himself in trouble is when he forgets that he’s Glen Davis,” added the coach. “You know, I don’t know how you can forget something that big personally.

“But he’s just been fantastic. Our record is where it’s at because Glen Davis is on our basketball team. The minutes, playing him at four, playing him at five — he’s just turned into a terrific player for us.”

When the defensive attention gets focused a little too much on Paul Pierce [stats] and Ray Allen, Davis seems to slide into the frame as he did so well last night.

“He’s given us a big spark filling in for Kevin, especially,” said Pierce. “The things he does coming off the bench being a great sixth man — probably the best sixth man in basketball right now if you ask me.

“He’s doing a lovely job at that. I mean, we’re asking him to do so many things that Kevin does.”

Davis was good rolling to the hoop, and he also found the mid-range jumper to be quite available.

“I just shot the ball,” he said. “They were kind of like playing off me. I kind of was shocked. I was like, “Oh my gosh, they don’t want to check me.’ They just want to let me shoot. So I just kept shooting and got into a rhythm. I hit some good shots.”

Davis admitted he thinks about his financial future at times, “but you try to still stay within yourself and the team,” he said. “You’ve just got to keep pushing and don’t worry about it.”

http://www.bostonherald.com/sports/basketball/celtics/view/20110106bringing_up_older_baby_but_doc_rivers_likes_what_hes_seeing/

[Roy H.]

Baby played a great game last night.  Beyond his jump shots, he scored some in the post, made one great pass to Marquis, and took a big charge.

I would still like to see BBD swing the ball more -- he's too much of a black hole in my opinion -- but he came up very big last night, especially in the second half.

[CelticsWhat35]

Baby played a great game last night.  Beyond his jump shots, he scored some in the post, made one great pass to Marquis, and took a big charge.

I would still like to see BBD swing the ball more -- he's too much of a black hole in my opinion -- but he came up very big last night, especially in the second half.

I agree.  He made some big shots in the second half, but he was really getting on my nerves in the first half with some of his shots.  It's one thing if the ball swings to him with the shot clock winding down, but an 18-20 ft jumper from Baby should never be the 1st or 2nd option on offense, and that's what it seemed like in the 1st half.  In the 2nd half, he took it to the basket more, and it paid off.

[nba is the worst]

Davis shooting with confidence is a good thing, but he needs to realize that he doesn't shoot well outside of about 17 feet.

He should never think he's the right guy from behind the arc on this team

[Assassin70]

Baby played a great game last night.  Beyond his jump shots, he scored some in the post, made one great pass to Marquis, and took a big charge.

I would still like to see BBD swing the ball more -- he's too much of a black hole in my opinion -- but he came up very big last night, especially in the second half.

I agree.  He made some big shots in the second half, but he was really getting on my nerves in the first half with some of his shots.  It's one thing if the ball swings to him with the shot clock winding down, but an 18-20 ft jumper from Baby should never be the 1st or 2nd option on offense, and that's what it seemed like in the 1st half.  In the 2nd half, he took it to the basket more, and it paid off.

Yes and no.  I prefer him to take his 8-10ft jumper when he is open.  It is not like he is bringing the ball up and ball hogging someone is giving him the ball in or near his sweet spot all the time.

Most of the time he is left with plenty of room to get off a good look.  But having said that I don't like when he is the 1st option when he is not hot with that jumper.  And I also don't like when he doesn't take that near money jumper these days and tries to do much which results in a turnover or a blocked shot.

I think for the most part he is making good decisions.  Sometimes he gets off track...but we all can agree he has continued to grow as a player.

I would like to see him rebound better though.

[Fafnir]

Tell that to the haters to start a thread after every bad game he has.

He also gets a thread every good game he has.

[Fafnir]

Baby played a great game last night.  Beyond his jump shots, he scored some in the post, made one great pass to Marquis, and took a big charge.

I would still like to see BBD swing the ball more -- he's too much of a black hole in my opinion -- but he came up very big last night, especially in the second half.

I just want him to get some rebounds. As a starter his already poor rebounding has taken a nose dive. He's pulling down 4.5 in 34 minutes as a starter, compared to 5.7 in 30 minutes off the bench.

With KG out I'll live with his shooting a lot more, especially if he mixes post ups in with the jumpers.

[Bankshot]

Tell that to the haters to start a thread after every bad game he has.

He also gets a thread every good game he has.

I don't think that's true.  There would a lot more Baby threads, because he's been great most of the year.

[nickagneta]

I said before the season started I thought he had a shot at Sixth Man of the Year Award and I stand by that. He had a bad stretch of shooting the last five games of December, but other than that he's been pretty trustworthy in hitting just about everything from 18 feet in at a 48-50% clip, which is pretty dang good give just how much he does shoot for the mid range.

I think we can complain about his rebounding til the cows come home but I don't think it's going to matter much. He's just not a good rebounding PF. Luckily his defense and ability to create offensive fouls helps to mitigate that some and still makes him a very valuable role player for a championship caliber team.

[mmbaby]

I was thinking the same thing last night. BBD rebounding doesn't really matter since he does so many other things. When rebounding is needed he's able to do it as he showed a few games ago. Not only that, I believe he's our team's 3rd best rebounder!!!!!in the nba stats.

[jasail]

Way back when I was a Davis hater.  His immaturity and ego, reluctance to pass out of the post, and ability to get stuffed seemingly every time he put the ball up really irritated me.  When Powe got injured I begrudgingly accepted the fact that BBD was the C's 3rd big. He did an admirably job in that Orlando series the C's eventually lost, thought after that he was a starter in this league, acted the fool and saw his role reduced by Sheed. Since I think it lit a fire under his rear.  

To the point though, I am a fan now.  Gotta give it to the guy, he has worked on his body and his game.  He slimmed down can and can jump better now, which helps him underneath; he has developed a post game, a fade away, a mid-range jumpshot and can still drive; not to mention the guy has incredible footwork on defense.  

All that said I think throughout his pro-career he has had trouble finding the line between confidence and self-serving.  As RR said after the game last night, they want him to take his shots and build confidence, because when he has it he hits them.  But at the same time as a fan (and a fan of his game), in the back of my mind I worry that if they start falling for him he won't know when to make the pass for a better % shot.  

[Spilling Green Dye]

Glass Half Full:

-He scored 23 points (and against my hated Spurs )
-Davis has continued superb health and durability, which are very important to this team now.
-Davis took a big time charge on one of the final plays.


Glass Half Empty:

-Davis had the lowest fg% of the starters, yet still took the MOST shots.
-In the past 2 games Davis has a total of THREE (3) rebounds.  (Shaq has the same total too   )
-Davis cheated (for no reason) off of Duncan, which gave Duncan a wide open jumper as Davis tried to get back.. but thankfully Duncan missed it off the glass.  SA got the offensive rebound, which led to the Davis charge.  Great charge, but as usual he made a bad defensive move before that.

[Snakehead]

Baby played a great game last night.  Beyond his jump shots, he scored some in the post, made one great pass to Marquis, and took a big charge.

I would still like to see BBD swing the ball more -- he's too much of a black hole in my opinion -- but he came up very big last night, especially in the second half.

I just want him to get some rebounds. As a starter his already poor rebounding has taken a nose dive. He's pulling down 4.5 in 34 minutes as a starter, compared to 5.7 in 30 minutes off the bench.

With KG out I'll live with his shooting a lot more, especially if he mixes post ups in with the jumpers.

Very much agreed on the rebounding, 2 boards is not enough last night and I think he had that in the Minny game too when his matchup, Love, was killing us on the glass. I do have to give him a lot of credit for his scoring though.  

I was very critical in a recent thread of him taking jumpers too far out and taking fadeaways and step backs from medium-long range and it's almost like he read that and stopped.  I think Doc thought the same thing, in the post game press conference last night he praised him for stepping into shots and taking them within his range.  He did take some fadaways in the last couple games but they were all within the paint or just outside it and that's great, I have no problem with that.  And last night you saw them kind of daring him to shoot and he stepped up in clutch situations and hit two big J's.

Much props to Baby.