celtics season surprise

[ben]

20 games in and the Celtics are the 4th seed in the east and lead the atlantic conference with wins.  (with out rondo)

Currently there are 2 teams in the entire Eastern Conference with winning records.  How often does this happen? 

Did anyone expect this and wake me up.   

[BudweiserCeltic]

I expected the Celtics to be better than people thought for sure, though I was envisioning Bass in a lesser role, and Humphries in a bigger role than he has now.

I expected us to be better defensively, in particular the perimeter, but I also expected the Celtics to be better rebounders than they've been. On that account, I was counting on Sullinger and Humphries playing more minutes than they have so far, though Sullinger in particular is now a starter.

So in all, not entirely satisfied with their performance so far, but what has happened so far has certainly not been out of the realm of possibility

The only real surprise for me though has been the overall effectiveness of Crawford at the point, though he has been up and down so far, and I'm not confident it's sustainable.

All this said, I certainly didn't expect the East to be this weak... but it's mainly been the result of injuries to key players on some under-performing teams.


Chicago, New York, and Brooklyn in particular have been devastated by injuries... but the Celtics have also suffered, but have persevered better than these guys so far.

I'm hoping New York and Chicago get it together, as well as Toronto and Cleveland... not to impede our playoffs chances, but I highly covet the implosion of Atlanta at some point in the season.

At least Detroit and Washington are finally looking like NBA teams, so that's good on that particular regard.

[Fred Roberts]

Craw really has been a surprise! don't know how he and rondo fit together though.

[Boston Garden Leprechaun]

Craw really has been a surprise! don't know how he and rondo fit together though.

yep. very surprising.

[LarBrd33]

We are overachieving.  Only 4 games below .500 without Rondo is a bit of a surprise.  The fact that only two teams in the Eastern Conference have winning records is a much bigger surprise.  This is madness.

There's thought to be a few superstars in this draft and maybe 7-8 guys who could end up all-stars.  Unfortunately, picking in the 15-20 range isn't going to help us all that much.  The value of our draft picks are dwindling.  I don't really enjoy rooting for losses.  If we're going to be a playoff team by default, Ainge might as well just dump our mid 1st round picks for an instant upgrade this season.  I'm sure we could get a nice player or two from one of the lotto teams. 

[PhoSita]

1. Eastern Conference is an epic fail so far.

2. Crawford has been a replacement-level starting point guard so far, which is a surprise.

3. Sullinger has been even better than expected, and seemingly hasn't been slowed down by recovery from his back surgery.  He looks like a legit starter NOW and perhaps on track to be a borderline All-Star.

[manl_lui]

1. Eastern Conference is an epic fail so far.

2. Crawford has been a replacement-level starting point guard so far, which is a surprise.

3. Sullinger has been even better than expected, and seemingly hasn't been slowed down by recovery from his back surgery.  He looks like a legit starter NOW and perhaps on track to be a borderline All-Star.

I agree

The entire eastern conference has been tough to watch (Unless you're MIA or IND).

Biggest surprise is NYK and BKN early struggles. I thought at worse, these two teams might start the season .500. But who would've guessed they combine for 7 wins. To make things worse, I think they are the WORST team in the East

It feels like EVERYONE is trying to tank for Wiggins/Parker/Randle

[2short]

I expected the Celtics to be better than people thought for sure, though I was envisioning Bass in a lesser role, and Humphries in a bigger role than he has now.

I expected us to be better defensively, in particular the perimeter, but I also expected the Celtics to be better rebounders than they've been. On that account, I was counting on Sullinger and Humphries playing more minutes than they have so far, though Sullinger in particular is now a starter.

So in all, not entirely satisfied with their performance so far, but what has happened so far has certainly not been out of the realm of possibility

The only real surprise for me though has been the overall effectiveness of Crawford at the point, though he has been up and down so far, and I'm not confident it's sustainable.

All this said, I certainly didn't expect the East to be this weak... but it's mainly been the result of injuries to key players on some under-performing teams.


Chicago, New York, and Brooklyn in particular have been devastated by injuries... but the Celtics have also suffered, but have persevered better than these guys so far.

I'm hoping New York and Chicago get it together, as well as Toronto and Cleveland... not to impede our playoffs chances, but I highly covet the implosion of Atlanta at some point in the season.

At least Detroit and Washington are finally looking like NBA teams, so that's good on that particular regard.

you know budweiserceltic
i could have written that , pretty much 100% my thoughts

[Birdman]

im very surprise so far on the wins but not shock by Crawford..i said last season he is a good player

[kozlodoev]

2. Crawford has been a replacement-level starting point guard so far, which is a surprise.

I'm still looking for a reasonable explanation about what exactly in Crawford's history in as an NBA player suggests this is any sort of surprise.

For his entire career, he's pretty much been Delonte West with worse shot selection and minus the crazy stuff. Or, should I say, with different crazy stuff.

[jambr380]

2. Crawford has been a replacement-level starting point guard so far, which is a surprise.

I'm still looking for a reasonable explanation about what exactly in Crawford's history in as an NBA player suggests this is any sort of surprise.

For his entire career, he's pretty much been Delonte West with worse shot selection and minus the crazy stuff. Or, should I say, with different crazy stuff.

im very surprise so far on the wins but not shock by Crawford..i said last season he is a good player

I agree with both of you. Crawford was a 13 ppg scorer in his career before the season. Given the opportunity to get solid starter minutes at the pg position, we really shouldn't be blown away. There were many here (80%, I believe) who said before the season to trade Crawford and keep Brooks. And it certainly didn't have anything to do with Crawford having more value in a trade. This is a major 'I told you so' moment for that 20%. How he responds when Rondo returns remains to be seen.

I will just sit back and watch the young guys develop and hope for whatever is best for the team (I don't know the answer to this).

[Celtics18]

We are overachieving.  Only 4 games below .500 without Rondo is a bit of a surprise.  The fact that only two teams in the Eastern Conference have winning records is a much bigger surprise.  This is madness.

There's thought to be a few superstars in this draft and maybe 7-8 guys who could end up all-stars. Unfortunately, picking in the 15-20 range isn't going to help us all that much.  The value of our draft picks are dwindling.  I don't really enjoy rooting for losses.  If we're going to be a playoff team by default, Ainge might as well just dump our mid 1st round picks for an instant upgrade this season.  I'm sure we could get a nice player or two from one of the lotto teams.

Kawhii Leonard, Jared Sullinger, Nikola Vucevic, Kenneth Faried, Eric Bledsoe, Lance Stephenson, Nikola Pekovic, Nic Batum, Serge Ibaka, Roy Hibbert, Marc Gasol, Arron Afflalo, Rajon Rondo, David Lee, Paul Millsap, Monta Ellis, Josh Smith, Al Jefferson, Kevin Martin, Anderson Varejao, Manu Ginobili, David West, Carlos Boozer, Tony Parker, Zach Randolph, Steve Nash, and Jermaine O'Neal, among others, would like to say hello.

There's an absurd notion going around that if a pick is outside of number 14, that it's impossible to get a good player.  This is just not true.  It is true that it's not as likely to land a "transcendent, franchise type player" outside the lottery, but still, if Danny can acquire a small handful of players who end up being of the caliber of the players on the above mentioned list over the course of the next few years, we'll be in good shape going forward.

That is, after all, why he traded away Pierce and Garnett.  It's because he thought those picks would end up being extremely valuable.  I think he still thinks they will be.  I would agree with that assessment.

I'm really looking forward to the next few seasons.  The choices aren't either tank for Wiggins/Parker or trade off all our future assets in one fell swoop.