The problem is the C's bench, not Big Three

[anthony83]

It's reality, we have a terrible and horrific bench, Ray Allen, KG and PP can not play 35-40 minutes per night.
Do you think Bradley Moore, Dooling, Pavlovic, Daniels are players for the C's?

These players would not play anything on the other teams in the league, I'm sure. I think Ainge has failed in free agency, there were more interesting players, the team with the Big Three and some pieces may still be a great team.

I know that the contracts of KG, Pierce, we have little margin salarial.

For me, the Big Three is untouchable, next year I would resign to Ray Allen and KG for less money and add some better players to have a great roster.

I still think there are players in free agency better than Bradley, Dooling ...

  Gilbert Arenas, Allen Iverson, Eddie House ... I do not understand, these players would bring more, we need score.

The future and most important is the return of Big Al Jefferson, Big Al is great.

 The problem of this team is the bench, Dooling, Moore, Daniels, Pavlovic can not play in the Celtics.

 Nate Robinson, Delonte...I do not understand Ainge.

[mr. dee]

Sorry to burst your bubble but I disagree. We have a pretty solid  bench. Did you see them last game? They did more effort than the starters. Dooling hits 3's and is a decent defender. Bradley is a great defender and just starting to get good on the offense. You forgot that Pietrus and Bass can be a candidate for 6th man. Steamer and  JJJ needs more playing time.

Gilbert Arenas? For real? Did you see him play for the Magics last year? He looked horrible.

Iverson? I'd consider but do you think he is still in shape after a long layoff? Even if he is in shape, I don't like  the idea of signing him unless he plays for a vet minimum.

Eddie House? Dooling is better at this point.

[Who]

The bench hasn't been in full force yet this season.

Mickael Pietrus was out injured for quite awhile to start the season. Dooling was out for a bunch of games recently Wilcox hasn't been fit since the start and has picked up a couple of injuries here and there. And then you have Marquis who may or may not be able to improve considerably as the year goes as he recovers to full health following his long spell on the sidelines last year.

Once they get all their bench pieces healthy, I think the Celtics have a pretty solid bench.

Of course, they haven't been healthy so far and hence the contributions the Celtics have gotten out of them has been very weak. Certainly a bottom 10 bench in the league to date. But they can pick it back up as they get healthy.

[jc3celticsphan]

I agree also I think its doc's rotations kg and pp get out of rythym realy quick when takin out early its like getting into foul trouble you get no flow to your game. That suns game we kept PP in most of the second half and we almost won.

Another thing is ray allen should not be with the second unit because theres 3 things we dont have on that bench. Slashers rebounders and defense. only way ray can score is off screen or in transition also second chance rebounds which we are the worst at so ray is pretty much suffering out there.

[mr. dee]

I'll disagree about having no defense with the bench. Pietrus, Dooling and Bradley are pretty solid on defense. Rebounding? Maybe but we haven't see the full potentials of JJJ and Steamer yet. Slashers is what we lack. Daniels used to be but since that freak incident, he became horrible.

The problem with that lineup is offense. No one will set screens for Ray. Also, no one can make their own shots.

[clover]

It doesn't matter what kind of bench you have if 4 of your 5 starters have aged to the point of being very limited players. All those 14 or 15 point first quarters haven't been the work of the bench.

[clover]

It doesn't matter what kind of bench you have if 4 of your 5 starters have aged to the point of being very limited players. All those 14 or 15 point first quarters haven't been the work of the bench.

[lepoooo]

What a lie...

The problem is the Big 3, they are too old, period. Danny did his best to shop for FA with a very limited room to negotiate (MLE and vet mins). He was close to land West (hopefully he couldn't, imo), he made the BBD/Bass swap (which was great) and found Dooling, Wilcox, Steamer, Daniels which is not that bad.

Anyway, even with the best bench in the league, if your starters can't make it, you are not gonna win in this league. So just stop making excuses for the weak conditionning and play of the big 3.

One more thing: BIG AL IS NOT GREAT. An undersized center who can't defend is not great, I don't want to see him around this team again. You ppl need to realize, it's gonna take time to rebuild and you don't want to spend big money on mediocre to average player.

[Celtics4ever]

I disagree with the premise of this post.   Are you aware that JO had a 4 pts. and 4 rebounds the other night?  Have you not noticed the decline in KG's game?   I think our bench unit is better in comparison to the rest of the league than our starters.

I wish I lived in fantasy land and could think everything is hunky dory but our record doesn't reflect that.

[Sketch5]

It doesn't matter what kind of bench you have if 4 of your 5 starters have aged to the point of being very limited players. All those 14 or 15 point first quarters haven't been the work of the bench.

Yeah that has been the biggest problem so far. Along with rebounds, especially offensive. NO second chance points in a game in a half! Wont win many games that way.

So when they score 15 in the first and have to use the third to get back into it, they are tanked by the 4th because they played almost the whole third quarter.

I would love to see a young body in the 4 or 5 spot to open the game to get things moving and rebound, just don't see that happening till next year unless Danny has some thing up his sleeves...

[CelticsFanNC]

It doesn't matter what kind of bench you have if 4 of your 5 starters have aged to the point of being very limited players. All those 14 or 15 point first quarters haven't been the work of the bench.

ding, ding ding......we have a winner!

  The bench has nothing to do with the fact we are getting killed in the first quarter.

  The bench has nothing to do with the fact that four of our five starters are working at a speed, strength, quickness deficit in almost every single game.

  The bench has nothing to do with the fact that the "old four" are missing wide open shots they have hit their entire careers.

  The bench has nothing to do with the fact that we have exactly one guy who can create offense for others(those open shots they're missing) and one one guy capable of blowing past his man and getting into the paint.

  This is not to say the "old four" are useless because they aren't.  You could probably get away with working at an athletic deficit with 2 of your 5 starters and still be very successful but trying to do so with four of five starters in today's NBA just will not work.

  Blaming the bench is ludicrous.

 

[feckless]

My vote is that it is the bench.  think about the bench we had the year we won--the clutch scoring ability of House and Posey just to start. Pietrus is not Posey. Danny has assembled a bench that other than Bass screams of mediocrity, and Bass merely replaces Big Baby.  Dooling is okay but we should have kept Delonte.  The youngs are not even close to being ready.  We have no starting or back-up center.  JO is not a starter he should be on the bench. Supported by talent at the level we had when they won the championship we would be in a far different place this year.  I see this as on Danny not bringing in the talent, with some forgiveness due to the Green situation.

[lepoooo]

My vote is that it is the bench.  think about the bench we had the year we won--the clutch scoring ability of House and Posey just to start. Pietrus is not Posey. Danny has assembled a bench that other than Bass screams of mediocrity, and Bass merely replaces Big Baby.  Dooling is okay but we should have kept Delonte.  The youngs are not even close to being ready.  We have no starting or back-up center.  JO is not a starter he should be on the bench. Supported by talent at the level we had when they won the championship we would be in a far different place this year.  I see this as on Danny not bringing in the talent, with some forgiveness due to the Green situation.

You are idealising the old Celtics benches and refusing to see the decline of the starters, although some fans have perfectly explained it in this thread (see the posts on top of yours).

It's crazy how blind fans may be. The bench is not great but is not worst than most NBA bench. According to that link (http://www.hoopsstats.com/basketball/fantasy/nba/teamstats/12/7/diffeff/1-1), Boston has the 9th best bench in the league. Stop lying to yourself, seriously.

[toine83]

This bench players are good in defense, but can't create their own shot and can't pass the ball and create for the others.
We need a backup PG that is going to pass the ball first and allow Bradley to play the 2.
Also Stiemsma should play over Wilcox and I would trade him for another 7 footer.

[green7]

no it's the big 3