Rajon Rondo told DeMarcus Cousins to stand in an empty corner on a game-deciding

[NHHillbilly]

http://www.businessinsider.com/rajon-rondo-correctly-guesses-hawks-final-play-2016-1

Yahoo pointed out this link to me.
The bewildered look on Cousins face was priceless, but maybe now he will trust Rondo more.  Rondo definitely knew the Atlanta play.  Despite the talent, Cousins basketball IQ looks pretty low:  he was so shocked when Milsap ran over that he was almost late guarding him.

I am glad the Celtics moved on from Rondo, but you have to give him credit for leadership and basketball brains like this. 

[DefenseWinsChamps]

Nice. TP.

[BudweiserCeltic]

I think that play is being made out to more than it actually is. I think that was Cousins' assignment all along, he just got a bit lost when WCS took his place in the formation. Prior to Rondo aggressively telling Cousins to go to the corner, it seemed to me that another player was already telling Cousins to get to that corner. That player being Collison.

I'll add though good for Rondo for aggressively making sure everyone is set in the right place because even when Collison points to Cousins to go to the corner, he still seemed lost on what to actually do.

[2short]

Rondo, not just for this mind you, his bb iq is bird like

[LarBrd33]

I miss rondo.  Can't he opt out of his contract at the end of the year and become a free agent ?

[max215]

I miss rondo.  Can't he opt out of his contract at the end of the year and become a free agent ?

If I'm not mistaken, Rondo's deal is only 1 year in the first place.

[greece66]

I like the madness of the team that Divac has put together.

He put around Cousins a good but really random assembly of FAs from last summer and an eccentric veteran coach. Many ppl were laughing at the Kings in the summer (IMO there was also a tad of racism there given that Vlade is a Serbian), but I do hope they make the playoffs and silence the critics.

[CroCorvus]

You can question Rondo's behaviour but you can not question his bball IQ and passion for the game.

[LarBrd33]

I miss rondo.  Can't he opt out of his contract at the end of the year and become a free agent ?

If I'm not mistaken, Rondo's deal is only 1 year in the first place.

I said last year I was fine with bringing Rondo back in the Summer.  Trading him was a total no-brainer.  First, he obviously didn't fit in Brad's system.  Our team was adapting to him instead of him adapting to the team.  We clearly played better without him.   Also, he was going to be an unrestricted free agent and reportedly wanted max money.   Seemed to me Rondo was going to leave us high and dry in free agency.   That said, if he really loved Boston and was desperate to sign here, Boston would still have plenty of cap space to offer him in the Summer and I doubted a couple month Dallas vacation would have killed his undying love for this team   Seemed to me we could just snag him after he inevitably failed on the Mavs.  It was a no brainer to get assets out of him while we could.

I honestly would have been ok with us signing him this Summer after he had been exposed in Dallas and his money demands would have been more reasonable.   But there's still that pesky problem of him not fitting into Brad's system and the team playing better without him.  Anyone who tries to run some variation of a pace-and-space offense should stay far away from Rondo.  Rondo is too much of an offensive liability to have him play off the ball.  With Rondo, you need to be prepared to give him complete control of the offense.  So while I'd support bringing him back, it still wouldn't make any sense as long as Brad's building a modern offense.  I do miss Rajon, though. 

[Eddie20]

It was kind of obvious though. The Hawks needed a 3 to tie, so Cousins defending the basket with as little time as it was, was actually kind of pointless. Not sure if Rondo actually knew the play or put Cousins to take away the strong side corner 3.

[walker834]

It just looks like they are in a 3-2 switching zone.  With one player covering the inbounds at the top.   Cousins didn't know where to go.  They weren't going to pass it to the big cutting down low.  Rondo still did a nice job directing traffic.

They were confused at first who was going to cover the inbounds and Demarcus got lost. Went up to Rondo and asked him where the hell do I go?

Rondo was playing the point from a low post spot on defense which was pretty cool to see.

[Ogaju]

What I noticed from the video is DMC's willingness to accept direction.

Funny thing is that he may have had the right position to begin with and Rondo despite his conductor role missed his own assignment and the cutter had a wide open shot if the inbound passer had just found him.

Watch the video.

[GetLucky]

What I noticed from the video is DMC's willingness to accept direction.

Funny thing is that he may have had the right position to begin with and Rondo despite his conductor role missed his own assignment and the cutter had a wide open shot if the inbound passer had just found him.

Watch the video.

That was Collison's fault. He bit hard on the ball-fake by Sefalosha and left his guy.

Rondo also told Casspi to play Korver tighter, whcih made him have to take an elongated path around the screen, making the switch between Casspi and Collison easier.