Grantland: Lockout's Effect on Older Teams

[PosImpos]

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/6827621/nba-lockout-lessons

Under section "How does a shortened season affect older teams?"

Now: The 2011-12 Boston Celtics could be devastated by a prolonged lockout. It's perfectly reasonable for someone to make the argument that Boston can rebound after last season when they were unsettled by the Kendrick Perkins trade and Shaquille O'Neal's will-he-or-won't-he-play drama. It's harder to see Boston's veteran legs outlasting teams in a shortened season in which games would be played on a tighter schedule. Additionally, if a whole season is missed and the contracts of 2011-12 never come into play, Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett will become free agents and Boston will likely be denied ever having a last run with the core of the 2007-08 championship team. Only Rajon Rondo, Paul Pierce, and Avery Bradley are currently under contract for the 2012-13 season.

Many people have floated the idea that a shortened season would be better for an older teams that tends to run out of energy / get derailed by injuries after a long season.  This is the rebuttal to that idea; the fate of the locked-out Jazz provides compelling example of the author's point.

[BballTim]

  The Spurs won the title after the strike-shortened season. 7 of their top 8 players (in minutes played) were in their 30s, 5 of them 33 or older.

[GreenFaith1819]

IF we have season, I still couldn't count us out, even based on the article.

Sure - Rondo's elbow has to heal, Glen (or another backup PF) has to be available to spell KG, Jeff Green has to contribute enough to help, and KG, Paul and Ray have to stay healthy, among other things.

IF those factors can be met, I still like our opportunity for Banner 18 next season, if there's a season. I'd like to see how it all plays out.

[BASS_THUMPER]

i dont wanna see our team win it all cause of a shorter season...

that will always be over the head of the celtics's..


"they only won because the old dudes played less"