How good is this team?

[max215]

NBA.com just ranked them 6th overall today on their power rankings

http://www.nba.com/2015/news/powerrankings/11/16/week3/

Seems a little high...

And ESPN had us 9th. I think 6th and 9th are a bit too high, but 10-12th might be pretty accurate. We are 4th in DRTG and 5th in Pace though; that's outstanding. And the thing is that it kind of makes sense: we're outstanding defensively and play with a ton of pace, but are utterly mediocre offensively (18th in ORTG).

[fairweatherfan]

I'm sticking with "modestly better than last year's squad".  Which means not as good as the tear we finished the year on, but a better % overall.  I'd say 44-48 wins and the 4-6 seed in the East.  Hopefully a good enough matchup to have a chance to get a series win. 

[j804]

NBA.com just ranked them 6th overall today on their power rankings

http://www.nba.com/2015/news/powerrankings/11/16/week3/

Seems a little high...

And ESPN had us 9th. I think 6th and 9th are a bit too high, but 10-12th might be pretty accurate. We are 4th in DRTG and 5th in Pace though; that's outstanding. And the thing is that it kind of makes sense: we're outstanding defensively and play with a ton of pace, but are utterly mediocre offensively (18th in ORTG).

Imagine if we had a legitimate scoring SF this team can be really good. I love Jae but we need a sf badly that is at least average offensively.

[Celtics18]

According to Basketball Reference's SRS system, which combines margin of victory with strength of schedule, we are ranked fourth in the league right now. 

Our defensive numbers are off the charts.  The teams we've played, Oklahoma, Atlanta, Toronto, San Antonio, Washington, and Milwaukee, aren't exactly scrub teams offensively. 

It remains to be seen if we can continue to force turnovers and get out and run the way we've been doing over the course of the last five games.

I see 50 wins as an attainable goal. 

[max215]

NBA.com just ranked them 6th overall today on their power rankings

http://www.nba.com/2015/news/powerrankings/11/16/week3/

Seems a little high...

And ESPN had us 9th. I think 6th and 9th are a bit too high, but 10-12th might be pretty accurate. We are 4th in DRTG and 5th in Pace though; that's outstanding. And the thing is that it kind of makes sense: we're outstanding defensively and play with a ton of pace, but are utterly mediocre offensively (18th in ORTG).

Imagine if we had a legitimate scoring SF this team can be really good. I love Jae but we need a sf badly that is at least average offensively.

Yep. Add Paul George and this team is terrifying.

[Evantime34]

According to Basketball Reference's SRS system, which combines margin of victory with strength of schedule, we are ranked fourth in the league right now. 

Our defensive numbers are off the charts.  The teams we've played, Oklahoma, Atlanta, Toronto, San Antonio, Washington, and Milwaukee, aren't exactly scrub teams offensively. 

It remains to be seen if we can continue to force turnovers and get out and run the way we've been doing over the course of the last five games.

I see 50 wins as an attainable goal.

Couldn't have said it better myself. TP

On one hand I think that there has to be mean reversion when it comes to turnovers. Then I backtrack on the mean reversion idea when I think about how many turnovers we will force playing the Sixers

[GreenFaith1819]

Very.

Looking forward to the rest of this season, AND the next few seasons - with our draft picks, FA and all.

[crimson_stallion]

According to Basketball Reference's SRS system, which combines margin of victory with strength of schedule, we are ranked fourth in the league right now. 

Our defensive numbers are off the charts.  The teams we've played, Oklahoma, Atlanta, Toronto, San Antonio, Washington, and Milwaukee, aren't exactly scrub teams offensively. 

It remains to be seen if we can continue to force turnovers and get out and run the way we've been doing over the course of the last five games.

I see 50 wins as an attainable goal.

Nice work on that stat!

I've been doing a bit of analysis myself and I had also noticed that our level of success (relative to the difficulty of our schedule) was extremely impressive.

Honestly I can't remember the last time  saw a Celtics team that started the season blowing out good teams (in the 4th quarters, none the less!) the way we have been this year.

It seems almost every game we start the third in a tight game, then end up finishing the game up by 15.  Our 4th quarter execution against good teams (except the Pacers, who seem to be our Achillies heel for some reason) has been unbelievable.

[Edgar]

I thought they were going to be as good as theyre now

Overperforming some games and underperfoming others

This team can be pretty good with one or two ads and no substraction
Specially an all around more ofensive player on the uper 6´8.....

[crimson_stallion]

I thought they were going to be as good as theyre now

Overperforming some games and underperfoming others

This team can be pretty good with one or two ads and no substraction
Specially an all around more ofensive player on the uper 6´8.....

You know we haven't really under-performed in any games though, right?

Every loss we've had has been against a top 6 team with a winning record, which is perfectly reasonable. 

Every bad team we've played (Sixers, Wizards, Bucks) we have blown out by > 15 points.

[mctyson]

I'm trying not to over react but after getting the rotation set over the last 5 games the C's have been really good. Beating 4 probably playoff teams by an average of 15.75 points.

The Celtics currently have the 6th best point differential in the NBA, while having played the 10th most difficult schedule. They are 4th in the NBA in defense, 5th in effective field goal percentage against and first in turnovers forced.

While the defense has been excellent the offense has struggled due to some really poor shooting. Despite this the offense has kept its head above water by getting the 5th highest percent of offensive rebounds in the NBA.

I expect some mean reversion with the turnovers and offensive rebounding, however I expect the same mean reversion to occur with our 3 point shooting since everyone on the C's (besides Sully and Jerebko) is shooting under their career average from 3.

Honestly, at this point this team looks like every bit the squad that projection models predicted to win in the high 40's/low 50's.

Please let me know how you feel about the team at this point and if your opinion has changed since before the season.

I predicted prior to the season that this team would be the 4th seed in the East and 45-48 wins, more to the high side. 

I believe their run from the All-Star break to the end of the season last year was not a fluke, it was a product of a major upgrade in team and role-based talent (Crowder, Jerebko, and IT) and a coach getting said talent to buy into his methods.

They only added more team and role-based talent this offseason (Johnson, Lee, Hunter, Rozier) while - MOST IMPORTANTLY - adding what appears to be a monster chip-on-his-shoulder Jared Sullinger, who was the best player on the team last year prior to getting injured/benched.

So, you have to take a 41 win team and at least give them 4 more wins.  There's 45.  High-side is 48 for me and a 4 seed.  We will be very happy with that as this team can make some noise in the playoffs.