Celtics too talented not to win 50 games in the East.

[slamtheking]

DOS, why would we be worse than last year.

There is a large gulf between "The Celtics will not be worse than they were last year" and "The Celtics are too talented to win fewer than 50 games next season."

I can agree with the first statement much more easily than the second.

agreed.

the C's roster going into this season is better than last year (only because we saw Rondo and Green didn't bring it as expected).  thing is, other teams in the East are better too.
- C's won't be better than anyone who finished ahead of them last year so that's 6 teams right there.  no one took a step back -- certainly not to the degree the C's need to catch them
- Miami got healthier, Dragic for the year and added Winslow.  Will finish ahead of the C's.
- Detroit, Indy and Charlotte got better.  question is, is it enough to pass the C's.

[Celtics18]

I don't see what's so controversial about that.

Controversial is not the word I'd use, I just think we differ on how much predictive value ought to be placed on it.

That's probably true. 

Do you really think that next year's Celtics are likely to fight less hard and to look less cohesive than the one that finished up last season?

I've been accused of being overly optimistic before, but it seems to me that the expectations that this team will follow up on the positive basketball culture established last season is a fairly standard expectation. 

I guess it's possible that they could take some lumps early, leading them to give up and become fractured as a team, but I just don't see it.

A lot of things went right for us last year esp. at the end. Any of them are arguably just as likely to happen this year, but you can't just take that stretch which was basically our ceiling last year as our floor this year.

Motivation is extremely important, but is also very ephemeral. Last year we had a team with no expectations that did nothing but exceed expectations. Now they have expectations and we really haven't seen how good they are at bouncing back after a rough stretch.

A lot of that end game stuff last year were plays that took people completely by surprise. Now teams have seen that Stevens does, he must adjust.

In a similar vein, I'm not sure if teams expected the performances from Thomas and Crowder that happened with Stevens. It's possible many of them were surprised that Thomas just came off the bench and took almost half the shots, and just didn't have a plan for him.

If we do a perfect job adjusting, we can surprise people with our new frontcourt, keep the team motivated, and keep fooling teams in the last 2 minutes. But none of these are guaranteed, and achieving the level of performance we had at the end of last year is a VERY optimistic prediction.

One of the things I like most about Stevens is that he doesn't seem like a one formula type of coach.  He mixes it up a lot.  I don't feel like he lets the other team know what's coming and dares them to stop him.

He's "clever" as I remember KG putting it after an early game against the Nets. 

I don't expect Stevens and the Celtics to all of a sudden become predictable offensively. 

[crimson_stallion]

Miami has a better team
Cleveland better team
Bulls better team
Washington better team
Milwaukee better team

You need to remember a few things about those teams though:

Miami
I'm not so sure about Miami. 

For years now the Heat have struggled wit a combination of lack of depth, and health concerns for Wade/Bosh.  But up until last year they were always able to stay competitive because they had Lebron (who is typically always healthy) to fall back on. 

They no longer have that safety net, and their success now is completely dependent on the health and production of Bosh and Wade.  If those two guys struggle to stay healthy, the Heat will struggle to make the playoffs - just like this season. 

If those two guys (and Dragic) can stay healthy, then they will be tough.


Cleveland
No argument here.  As long as Lebron stays healthy (which he has consistently so far) and at least one of their other two guys (Love or Irving) also stays healthy, the Cav's are a contender and a vastly superior team to the Celtics. 

But they absolutely NEED Lebron and one of the secondary stars to stay healthy for that to be the case.  Lebron can single handed carry his team to a couple of playoff wins, but he can't single handedly carry them through an 82 game season. 

I have question marks about whether Love will be able to stay healthy (based on past history) but I think Lebron and Irving will be fine, and long as that's the case they'll be a top tier team.


Chicago
The bulls I disagree with - I think they are going to be one of the biggest declining teams in the league from last year to next year.

1) Pau Gasol and Joakhim Noah are another year older - and Noah showed major decline last year.   

2) Derek Rose's inability to stay on the court is becoming almost legendary.

3) A guy who was arguably most important piece (Coach Thibbs) is gone.
 
The Chicago Bulls were just almost zero threat in this league before Coach Thibbs came along - he transformed that team from a team who was barely making the playoffs (and seeing first round exits) to being a legitimate contender on a yearly basis.

With Thibbs gone and Butler being the only real dependable talent on the team, I expect the Bulls to struggle to make the playoffs.  I'm thinking best case scenario (if their players are at the top of their game and stay healthy) they'll be somewhere in the 6-8 seed range.  Worst case scenario (Gasol/Noah drops off, Rose misses the season) they will struggle to make the playoffs.


Washington
I agree with this - they are definitely more talented than we are and their combination of front court size (Nene, Gortat, Hump) and guard play (Wall, Beal) makes them a tough cover. 

The loss of Pierce is bigger than it looks though - his arrived pushed that team to another level, and I suspect they'll drop a bit now that he's gone too.  It'll hurt them most in the playoffs though, since Pierce's comments seem to suggest that none of their big names (Wall, Beal namely) have the desire to be 'the guy' there, or the killer instinct to take the big shots (the way guys like Smart and Thomas are happy to for us).


Milwaukee
I tend to agree here.  Milwaukee is probably a more talented team than us overall - not quite as deep (though still pretty deep) but the addition of Greg Monroe is huge - he's probably a better player than anybody on the Celtics right now. 

I don't think the gap between us and the Bucks is huge though, but I do concur that they have a slight edge.

I think the key thing that makes us different to the usual "team without stars" is that even though we don't have big name players we do have guys who live for the big moments.  Guys like Thomas, Smart, and even Turner have shown on multiple occasions they have no hesitation in taking (and making) big time shots in the clutch.  Bradley (whough very hot/cold) has done so a number of times too.  Even Rozier has shown he is fearless on offence, and may well win us a game or two if he can can earn some NBA minutes.

It's actually pretty rare to find guys with that type of killer instinct, and and it's often the difference between a good team and a great team. 

The key with teams that have those type of players is that all you don't need to have huge, dominant leads.  As long as you can keep yourself in the game, and you're giving yourself a chance.

[crimson_stallion]

This team has a better chance of losing 50 games than winning 50 games. They got a little big better but other teams got a lot better.

Like who?!?!

With the exception of the Spurs (Aldridge), Rockets (Lawson), Clippers (Pierce, Smith) and Bucks (Monroe) I can't see many (if any) teams in the NBA who have made any significant strides from last year to now.

Most of the high lottery picks went to bad teams, most of the big free agents stayed with their current teams, and there were very few big name trades.

I mean honestly, the David Lee trade for Boston was probably up there with the Ty Lawson trade as one of the biggest ones that happened.

[Celtics18]

I don't see what's so controversial about that.

Controversial is not the word I'd use, I just think we differ on how much predictive value ought to be placed on it.

That's probably true. 

Do you really think that next year's Celtics are likely to fight less hard and to look less cohesive than the one that finished up last season?

I've been accused of being overly optimistic before, but it seems to me that the expectations that this team will follow up on the positive basketball culture established last season is a fairly standard expectation. 

I guess it's possible that they could take some lumps early, leading them to give up and become fractured as a team, but I just don't see it.

A lot of things went right for us last year esp. at the end. Any of them are arguably just as likely to happen this year, but you can't just take that stretch which was basically our ceiling last year as our floor this year.

Motivation is extremely important, but is also very ephemeral. Last year we had a team with no expectations that did nothing but exceed expectations. Now they have expectations and we really haven't seen how good they are at bouncing back after a rough stretch.

A lot of that end game stuff last year were plays that took people completely by surprise. Now teams have seen that Stevens does, he must adjust.

In a similar vein, I'm not sure if teams expected the performances from Thomas and Crowder that happened with Stevens. It's possible many of them were surprised that Thomas just came off the bench and took almost half the shots, and just didn't have a plan for him.

If we do a perfect job adjusting, we can surprise people with our new frontcourt, keep the team motivated, and keep fooling teams in the last 2 minutes. But none of these are guaranteed, and achieving the level of performance we had at the end of last year is a VERY optimistic prediction.

Let me be clear.  I'm not guaranteeing that we will end up with a better record than last year. Of course there are a lot of things that can happen in either direction, but I am predicting it. 

Sure, it's an optimistic prediction, but I don't think it would be fair to say that it's an wildly optimistic one. 

It seems to me that some of the people who are making more pessimistic predictions are going with the Murphy's Law approach to the season.  They list all the things that could go wrong, and then expect that they all will. 

I'm not even saying there's anything wrong with taking a more "worst case scenario" approach to your fandom, but do we all have to look at everything through the same lens or in the same manner?

That would be boring. 

[walker834]

I'll play the Brad Stevens card here.  These next couple years we are going to see why we hired him.

[crimson_stallion]

It seems to me that some of the people who are making more pessimistic predictions are going with the Murphy's Law approach to the season.  They list all the things that could go wrong, and then expect that they all will. 

I can agree with this.

Another thing people aren't taking in to account is that (either by design or coincidence) this team has been built in such a way that the 'worse case scenario' is almost completely protected against.

For example, we have got to be one of the few teams in the league who almost have zero worry about injuries.  We have so much depth on our roster that we could have our entire starting lineup lost for the season (knock on wood) and still have enough talent in reserve to put a put a competitive roster out on the floor.

If somebody on our roster doesn't pan our, we have tons of assets we can use to make small improvements to the team via mid-season trades.

We just have a ton of versatility - so many guys who can play meaningful minutes, so many guys who can play multiple positions, numerous guys with solid NBA experience (Bradley, Lee, Johnson) combined with lots of young guys with fresh legs. 

We have a unique ability (if we really wanted to) to create three full and unique lineups with the guys we have on our roster, and to get fresh legs out there on the court every 5 minutes if we wanted to - throwing waves and waves of fresh, energized guys out there battling with the opponents tired and worn out rosters. 

It's a really unusual approach to roster building, but it gives us an ability to do some things that very few teams can.  Whether those capabilities will prove beneficial remains to be seen, but one thing I'm sure if is that this team won't be boring.

I mean really, what IS the worst case scenario? Our young guys don't get any better, our vets (Lee and Johnson) decline a bit, and we don't improve over last year (where we were a 7th seed).  That's not so bad.

[Celtics18]

It seems to me that some of the people who are making more pessimistic predictions are going with the Murphy's Law approach to the season.  They list all the things that could go wrong, and then expect that they all will. 

I can agree with this.

Another thing people aren't taking in to account is that (either by design or coincidence) this team has been built in such a way that the 'worse case scenario' is almost completely protected against.

For example, we have got to be one of the few teams in the league who almost have zero worry about injuries.  We have so much depth on our roster that we could have our entire starting lineup lost for the season (knock on wood) and still have enough talent in reserve to put a put a competitive roster out on the floor.

If somebody on our roster doesn't pan our, we have tons of assets we can use to make small improvements to the team via mid-season trades.

We just have a ton of versatility - so many guys who can play meaningful minutes, so many guys who can play multiple positions, numerous guys with solid NBA experience (Bradley, Lee, Johnson) combined with lots of young guys with fresh legs. 

We have a unique ability (if we really wanted to) to create three full and unique lineups with the guys we have on our roster, and to get fresh legs out there on the court every 5 minutes if we wanted to - throwing waves and waves of fresh, energized guys out there battling with the opponents tired and worn out rosters. 

It's a really unusual approach to roster building, but it gives us an ability to do some things that very few teams can.  Whether those capabilities will prove beneficial remains to be seen, but one thing I'm sure if is that this team won't be boring.

I mean really, what IS the worst case scenario? Our young guys don't get any better, our vets (Lee and Johnson) decline a bit, and we don't improve over last year (where we were a 7th seed).  That's not so bad.

Nice post.  I too am looking forward to next season.  It should be fun.

We don't have top end talent, but I do like the depth and versatility that this team can bring to the table.

Coach Stevens is going to have a good time with this roster. 

[littleteapot]

IMO the worst case scenario (besides everyone dying of the plague) is that we can't get a cohesive rotation together and can't match our opponent's lineups with our own that can shoot, handle and defend. I don't think this will happen, but if it does we could end up like the Pistons last year.

I definitely think that there's almost no chance of the injury bug completely destroying our team given how deep we are.

Last year we had 1 player who could really compete at center and 3 players who could handle the basketball. Both of these situations are very precarious IMO even though we've added a bit.

Turner is not a good ball handler at all, and does it because he can't play away from the basketball and we don't have many other options. We have only one guy who can handle and is a proven shooter (Thomas) but he can't defend. What ever we do, we will still be playing whack-a-mole with our backcourt.

Amir Johnson has been a capable backup center in Toronto when they used him, but we don't know that he can do it with this team in I would assume many more minutes. Lee is an upgrade over Sully and Olynyk, but he is more of the same for the most part IMO.

I think given these fundamental talent issues, if we aren't coached near perfectly and don't outwork every other team, we will have some bad stretches. Overall I would predict that we're either the 8th seed or just miss the playoffs. I don't think we will fall into every pitfall, but there are enough that we will have a tough time exceeding our performance from last year.

[86MaxwellSmart]

I'll play the Brad Stevens card here.  These next couple years we are going to see why we hired him.

Funny, cause I was thinking that this team is built perfectly for Tommy Heinsohn to coach...Run til you drop, and next man up.

[CelticsFanFromNYC]

Based on other EC teams, I think we will finish somewhere around 40-45 wins. We got better but so did other teams which kinda cancels out "some" of the upgrades we made this offseason.    Only 4 teams in the East last year reached 50 (Toronto missed by a game)

NOW IF Rozier and Hunter play in the top 10 rookie realm, I can see us reaching 50 wins. Now some you guys say big trades can  play a factor. Other teams can make big trades to and hurt our record as well. I still think well make the playofffs though. other then CB's coaching schemes, our depth chart is our biggest asset. At the same time, 3 mid tier  players isnt equivalent to having a superstar.

After watching the Pistons I believe a premature superstar guard with a depth chart like ours can make noise (Hence what Billups was to the Pistons)

[BornReady]

Doubt we win 50
some teams had major injuries last season and some other teams had major improvements this season
So I'd say between 38- 42 wins

[sawick48]

the only side of the column the number 50 is appearing for us is the right side.  lol 50 wins? cmon. what teams are absolutely, without question, 100% not as talented as Boston right now? by my count:

Philly
Detroit (arguable but feel the majority would agree so fine)
Orlando (same boat as Detroit)
Lakers
Denver

5 teams.  there's plenty of teams we are ARGUABLY better than (Brooklyn, Dallas, etc) but by no means is it hands down, without question, us over them.  do you know how many breaks we would need to even sniff 50 wins?  we needed luck, health, AND help last year and we managed 38!  this team as constructed is 12 wins better than last season?!?! cmon. 

all the positivity and rah-rahing definitely has a place, and there is no question there is talent on this roster.  but man are some of you that think we can compete in for a rude awakening once the games actually tip.  as i've said all offseason, i hope i'm wrong, i just don't think i am (and really haven't been yet)

[86MaxwellSmart]

the only side of the column the number 50 is appearing for us is the right side.  lol 50 wins? cmon. what teams are absolutely, without question, 100% not as talented as Boston right now? by my count:

Philly
Detroit (arguable but feel the majority would agree so fine)
Orlando (same boat as Detroit)
Lakers
Denver

5 teams.  there's plenty of teams we are ARGUABLY better than (Brooklyn, Dallas, etc) but by no means is it hands down, without question, us over them.  do you know how many breaks we would need to even sniff 50 wins?  we needed luck, health, AND help last year and we managed 38!  this team as constructed is 12 wins better than last season?!?! cmon. 

all the positivity and rah-rahing definitely has a place, and there is no question there is talent on this roster.  but man are some of you that think we can compete in for a rude awakening once the games actually tip.  as i've said all offseason, i hope i'm wrong, i just don't think i am (and really haven't been yet)

we won 40 games...and had the 2nd best record after the all star game...50 might be a stretch---but I say 45-47 for sure.

[MBunge]

Boston goes into next season basically tied with a few other teams for the 7th youngest roster in the league.  It's hard to see a team this young and without superstar talent winning 50 games.  But with Stevens and the talent they have, it's hard not seeing them being somewhere close to .500.

Mike