It's doable, but it'd be tough. More than likely we'll go 7-3 or 6-4 the rest of the way, as long as Jae comes back around the Clippers game and we have no more serious injuries or rest games for players.
I agree. I thought using the comic sans with large print along with phrases such as on paper and in theory would reveal my post as satire. No one knows. 6-4 or 7-3 sounds much more reasonable than 10-2.
I think the last several games have shown that Brad isn't caving in. He is fighting for wins. Otherwise, he wouldn't be starting Turner and trying Rozier. He wouldn't be so stubborn with Zeller and would be playing Mickey like he tried with RJ earlier in the season. Coty would be getting minutes before Crowder gets back.
Brad Stevens is circling the wagon. He is biting the bullet. He is not experimenting like he did when we had Jameer Nelson and Brandan Wright. I don't think Brad likes to experiment but does so because there is no other way to know what the true ceiling is for a team.
I think Brad looks at each season as its own story. In this respect, trading for David Lee had to be the worst trade imaginable. It set us back. Brad doesn't like to bench good players or decent players running past their prime. He did play Humphries in year one. It took a while, but he put him into the rotation and we became decent for a poor team.
The only teams I am afraid of are Cleveland and Toronto. I am not completely afraid of them, however, including LeBron, if we are healthy by the time we face them. That of course is dependent of some major ifs. We can't lose any more players to injury. Crowder has to come back without some lingering high ankle problem like Isaiah wasn't the same after he fell on his lower back. Kelly has to get back to where he was before his injury. Most importantly for this season, Amir has to consistently play like he did last night. He needs to be our anchor in the paint. Sully, Kelly, and Zeller are decent, but without Jordan emerging, it looks like he will not play much this year, those other three are incapable of beating top teams. Sully is not conditioned to carry us despite being a natural. Kelly is still a year or two away from being a finished product. And Zeller, let's face it, he is a solid bench guy at the end of a rotation.
We knew this from year one. Sully and Olynyk together were good for offense, but they are an unlikely tandem to count on for protecting the paint.
Now throw in one rim protecting center who is decent on offense and guys like Sully and Kelly fall into their natural positions. This is why I wanted Dwight Howard. Amir is basically PJ Brown. You can count on him for 15 minutes. But we are missing KG, Perk or Shaq.
We are dominant for the little guys (Tommy's phrase), so that is why we are still one of the better teams, and it does look like Brad Stevens deserves Coach of the Year. The Golden State team didn't have the same coach all year. Toronto is where they are supposed to be. I guess Popovich could win it. The C's definitely need to finish strong for him to have a chance.
As long as we don't slip to the 7th or 8th seed, we should be okay and competitive.
