He starts doing step back 3s when he drives and gets hacked with no call. Honestly it's hard to blame him. Any player is going to miss when their arm is whacked, so it's like...he can waste a possession by trying to score driving and getting fouled with no call, or try and hit a 3.
If he got to the line more and got a better whistle we would see him driving the entire game.
Brown is better at hanging in the air. He uses his jumping ability to create space. Tatum has a quicker release and doesn’t hang in the air as long, he creates space with his feet and with his wingspan. Just different types of shooters
Tatum is a guy who is big enough, fast enough, and strong enough, to where if he aggressively attacks the basket its a bucket or a foul near every time. Not comparing the two, just the situation, but it's like watching LeBron in Miami take step backs and turn around 3s when every time he even looked at the basket and took a step forward It was a foul or bucket or assist.
you either lean the defense to brown or tatum. you try to stop tatum? browns gonna destroy you. same way the other time. btw also have jrue holiday, derrick white and KP in theory.
what an absurd team brad
I think JT is still a better scorer than JB because of his finishing, perimeter, and semi-consistent midrange play. But everyone’s gonna hear a lot more of Jaylen Brown as a superstar if the Celtics finish strong.
Go watch Tatum’s highlights from G7 of the Philly series. He had some acrobatic, twisting, bending layups. Also, people see Brown dunking everything, but Tatum is still the posterizer and had two pretty nasty contact dunks tonight.
good point. i recall a lot of stats over the last few seasons about mid range scoring and efficiency and he has always been near the top, for a stretch the leader. i would argue sgas role as a number 1 and his volume are more impressive than browns and would rank him higher. nothing wrong with being worse than a top 5 player at a skill if only slightly
He looks a lot more confident handling the ball and has translated that regular season explosion into the playoffs were games are tighter and the defense is physical
I love when idiots post shit halfway through a game just for their idiotic take to curdle in the sun before the game even ends. Like that halftime tweet from some idiot during ECF game 3 talking about us taking our 3rd loss and it being 3 losses too many. Eat shit Seth Partnow, you fucking hack
Made the mistake of looking at the Celtics game thread during that 20-2 run by the Mavs. There were comments saying the team should be blown up in the off-season
The team is also ridiculously stacked with proven veterans and great players in their primes. They have length, all play defense, all can shoot. They don’t even need Porsingis to make it even more unfair. They are dynastic.
Well, Boston was 1 game away from their 3rd finals appearance last year if it wasn’t for Caleb Martin and Gabe Vincent becoming better 3 point shooters than Steph Curry and Prime Klay and in the 2022 finals our coach was using his position as coach to have sex with a staffer during the finals (Udoka).
Still have to win and win again.
Gordon Hayward, Irving, and Horford still is a what if…
Brown and Tatum were still developing and that team with an injured Hayward and Irving the whole playoffs were 1 game off. Damn.
You can point to Kidd taking that dumbass TO too
When I saw that I literally felt like we had a chance to not blow the lead lmao. Youre on a 20 to something run and YOU turn the kill switch? Incredibly stupid and im surprised nobodies really brought it up
Tbf the momentum was kind of killed before that timeout. Granted the Celtics weren’t scoring but the Mavericks offense was just as chaotic the few possessions before the timeout. Think he wanted to just give his team a moment to collect themselves and rest, especially Luka and Kyrie
This is also arguably the 4th different iteration of it. They never got stagnant and kept pushing to improve even when they were a perennial contender. Most teams wouldn't do that.
They also did super ballsy things like trading fan-favorite players like IT and Smart. Also, I'll never figure out how tf Brad managed to offload Kemba to bring Al back.
Tbf they had to give up a decent 1st to do it (pick #16 in 2021 which became Alperen Sengun)
But absolutely you do that, and a player like Sengun isn’t always available that deep
It feels like that, but GSW took 6 years and until Curry was 26 to really become what we know them as. Tatum has been in the league for 7, but he's 25. The parallels are pretty crazy when you look at it.
Hell yeah. So awesome to grow with these guys over the last 7 years. I had a major life change happen that coincided with the start of Tatum's first season, so it's been very easy to view this phase of my life and the Jays era of Celtics as a sort of mutual parallel progression. I really love the guys on this team.
It feels longer than Curry because They were one win away from the finals in Tatum rookie year. to me as I was tired of lebron in the finals the only thing I knew is that Lebron had lost again then next season they are gunning for the beast team of all time. I think for non basketball fans the warriors came out of nowhere
People will hate on us and call it a cupcake run for the next couple of years. But when Tatum's and Brown's careers are over everyone will look back and realize how ridiculously talented this squad actually was.
2:1 was a *gross* underestimate of the talent disparity, that implies it's like basically a tossup on a game by game basis which was definitely not the case. No statistical model gave you better than like a 20% chance to win with some giving you as little as 6-8%.
The sharps were extremely off too. Or do you think the Mavs actually had a 33% chance of winning this series (an enormous overestimate of their chances according to literally every statistical model I'm aware of)?
Yeah people call it a superteam to denigrate Tatum but I haven't seen anyone saying this is an all time great team. I think it will be regarded that way when people look back on what Tatum and Brown achieved and say (for example) "actually Tatum was a top 5 player that season." It won't happen for a while because success doesn't change people's minds as quickly as stats.
Like even if it was a cupcake run, if you blast through everyone losing like two games for the whole playoff run then that should just be viewed as "You play who's in front of you." Haters gonna hate but I don't know how you can in good faith discredit this run.
Two things can be
- This Celtics team is great and would compete for a chip every year
- This Celtics team probably had the easiest finals run in history due to injuries
It’s still the best guy to go after cs the rest of the team is elite defenders. Maybe you cpuor argue tatum
At least they went after Pritchard when he was in.
Pritchard clamped Luka on multiple posessions though. The weakest defender to attack is hauser and even he has high defensive BB IQ to make it hard for anyone
I said it in the Celtics sub but Hauser is tougher than people think
For the most part he doesn’t bite on fakes and forces guys to shoot over the top. Luka and Kyrie can make those shots but they are still tough shots.
Obviously as a Celtics fan I don’t wish for the Al Luka matchup. But Horford biggest weakness is quick and fast guys since he’s slower in his old age
Luka is great but he’s not fast.. Al may give up points but he still can do ok for a big against Luka
So many defensive possessions are ending in shots that make you say "we'll let them take that all day" even when they go in. Been a really great showing from the squad.
And yet as a Celtics fan I'm not sure what happens in a series against Denver. Minnesota is always good for an assist. Grateful to them for KG to get us the banner in 08 and they came up big for us again this year.
True, but damn I want to see us face off in the Finals at least once. Jokic is so damn good that it would almost be a shame if the Jays don't get to face him at least once.
I think Nuggets (and Bucks) had the potential to knock off the Celtics if healthy. But the Nuggets in these playoffs would've lost to the Celtics in 4 or 5 as well. There was something wrong with Murray. And Jokic can't beat the Celtics himself even if he drops 35/15/8.
Yup kcp, and Reggie were also injured and mpj was a non factor for the entire twolves series idk if he just got cold or if it was all the family issues. They were just crazy inconsistent, could see them getting crushed or being competitive. Plus they looked gassed at the end of the twolves series not sure they even beat Dallas.
Tho if they did and got a 9 day rest like the Mavs that would have been massive the games Murray did play in were usually after a few days of rest. If Murray could sort of recover from his calf strain they might stand a chance, also should be said that it would be a much easier match up for jokic then ad and Minnesota were.
Dame would get hunted on defense the way Luka's been. The Bucks paint defense is really good with Brook and Giannis but it's the same problem the Mavs are having, 5 out doesn't let them sit in the paint. And our net rating is like 3-4x higher. I don't see this Celtics team losing four out of seven to the Bucks.
Jokic just constantly feasts against us. We’ve never been able to match up well with him and it looked even worse this season. I know it’s the regular season but still.
realistically it still was pretty weak, hobbled heat and cavs teams are not good but it wasnt like the celtics even had a chance to lose against any of the teams in the east
It became weak because pretty much every team got injured…I am confused as to why people on here thought all 7 of the teams behind Boston were weak when actually healthy…a couple of the teams were short, sure, but still…and it’s not a knock on Boston, as they were a great team
I feel like the West actually might have been a little overrated (by the pundits) with how things played out
It wasn’t weak at the start of the year but it was weak due to injuries and upheaval. Haliburton played hurt a lot of the year (Pacers) and they lost Mathurin, Bucks coaching change cooked them and then Giannis got hurt at the actual worst time, Knicks were a force all year but dealt with injuries throughout the season and then had everything crumble at once, Heat got hit with the Jimmy injury at the worst time, Cavs got hit with DMitch and Allen injuries at a bad time, Sixers lost Embiid for half the year and then when he came back he clearly still had multiple things wrong with him (although to some extent that’s who Embiid is as an athlete unfortunately).
Orlando was healthy, and Boston was incredibly healthy until Porzingis’ injuries. Six of the eight best Eastern teams had major injuries either throughout the season or at the worst conceivable time in the playoffs (in some cases right as they were about to play Boston or while playing Boston). That doesn’t change the fact that Boston is **better** but it also just makes it hard to determine how much better because they faced a weakened field.
Meanwhile, the West was a bloodbath that feasted on itself all year and was far healthier overall. Nuggets were healthy outside of Murray for a bit, Wolves were mostly healthy, Lakers top talent was healthy even if their supporting cast (Vincent and Vando in particular) missed a ton of time, Warriors were largely healthy, Clippers were mostly healthy until the playoffs which for them to even make it that far was a miracle, Suns had tumultuous stuff primarily with Beal, Mavs were healthy until the playoffs when Luka started playing hurt but never to the extent that he had to miss games. Generally, they were a healthier conference and they’ve had more top talent overall for a couple decades now even if the top 2-3 teams are relatively equal.
right, that was kind of my point about it becoming weak due to the injuries...the conference fully healthy (as it pertains to the playoff field) would have had a pretty interesting postseason...and right, not taking anything away from Boston's talent level and depth, but the injuries elsewhere completely negated needing KP
a fully healthy Bucks team (yes, even with Doc ha) and Knicks could have seriously challenged the Celtics imo...the Cavs might have been interesting as well with their length, but not sure...including with KP in the mix...maybe we will get a chance to see it in the playoffs next season
Yeah especially with pacers playing Boston way better despite losing Hali n the brain fart game 1. N Hali heakth in general . East had lots of injuries but I think a heskth ish Knicks or sixers or pacers ( which we saw desoite talent gap ) put up more fight then Dallas. I think minny honestly had the best chance vs Boston going off regular season matches in the west . Denver won but there was a huge gap in 3pt % in those games Boston shot absolutely outkier bad. Minnesota , pacers , bucks , sixers honestly if heskthy do better then the west does imo. East was just injured so people pretend it’s bad .
Yup…you touched on it and I’m admittedly a little biased ha, but in the East, I certainly think a healthy Knicks team puts up a major fight in the ECF…but yeah, staying healthy is also a bear at times
It was also always a ridiculous take that the east was so much worse than the west. If you look at regular season records for all the east playoff teams including the play in teams, only 2 have a losing record against the west (both play in teams) and they were both 14-16. Most were 15-15 and 4 had winning records (2 being the other play in teams). So overall the playoff contending teams in the east were better than the west.
I think we might have seen a similar series to this one tbh--throw elite defensive guards at Dame to hound him on offense, and then hunt him with switches on defense.
Don't think you can call the East competition weak when you shit the bed like that in the Finals. I genuinely think the Pacers would be up 2-1 against the Mavericks.
That’s part of winning championships, closing out games. Something the Celtics have consistently done better than their opponents in the clutch all off-season long. It’s part of why experience matters. Also if we’re gonna whip out hypotheticals let’s do a healthy Celtics team vs the pacers.
Playing the Celtics sucks, you get close and then they just hit a couple 3s to stretch the lead again, maybe get a nice easy bucket to the rim and you're down 10-15 again. GGs celtics
They can get lazy and complacent though. And start hitting bricks.
Luka brought the fire too late. Not sure why he cant play harder D like that earlier in the game.
I don’t think it was defensive intensity as much as Boston always starts playing this run out the clock offense when up big
Pritchard was forced to take multiple shots with the shot clock running out because they waited too long to run anything
It’s been an issue for years but they finally fought through and then recalibrated themselves
Lmao yeah, ive been on that side of things. A lot of posts on r/nba just become "were downvoting anything this team says and upvoting what that team says" very tribal
Yeah best to just stay out of here right now lol. Can’t back up our team or anything. I got crucified for saying that we’ve been together for 4 months and we’ll grow
Idk if it's the weird amount of love that Luka gets here or the less weird amount of hate for Boston, but people really don't see him do anything wrong. It's crazy.
It's both. The Golden boy is getting exposed defensively in these playoffs against the most hated team. Anyone calling those fouls soft or nitpicky are just homers/Luka stans or Boston haters.
>Anyone calling those fouls soft or nitpicky are just homers/Luka stans or Boston haters.
I may be a Celtics fan, but I can acknowledge if there's any group of people as annoying as a players Stans its Boston Sports fans.
So truly, fair play.
Luka is also a bit of a polarizing guy on this sub (understandably so). Which started once at he stopped being its favorite player. Now that we’ve pretty much lost the series there will definitely be a more massive swing on the negative side of things.
Luka fits into a similar mold to me as Jimmy Butler.
You can appreciate everything they do when you're not playing them, but the way they play the game makes them really easy to hate when you're the opposition.
Straight up, you've definitely seen more of his games than me, maybe you've got an answer.
The guy has unbelievable offensive talent. He's a walking bucket.
Why the hell does he give up on shots to draw fouls? If he just took the shots, they'd probably go in. Does he not know he's Luka Doncic?
Quite honestly, he has looked way more passive in these playoffs than ever. He’s always had the multi-fake game when he picks up his dribble but the C’s aren’t biting on it. Usually when he recognizes that he just shoots over but he hasn’t done that much at all.
Not sure if he’s just looking to get a breather on the line or trying to rest his knee. But this game was especially bad on that front.
Mavs in 5 years? Terrible playing and coaching decisions ruined any chance of winning against a well rounded Celtics. I'm sad that my Mavs are on the brink, but I'm just glad it's the Celtics and not the Pacers or Wolves.
Mavs are 3-0 in moral victories and going to sweep the Celtics.
1-0 because they lost game 1 to the clippers in the same fashion, so obviously they will win the series.
2-0 because if Kyrie just steps up they would have won the game.
3-0 because they were down 21 and brought it back within 2 just to lose.
What a dominant team. The East is really weak and the real playoffs start playing these west teams.
Boston dominating with a 3 guard starting lineup, 6’8 Tatum at PF and 6’9 Horford at center. A lot of NBA fans (like 95% of Lakers fans) think this sort of thing is either idiotic or suicidal, but the league has passed them by and they’re just wrong.
Mavs centers have gotten a lob or two but against most teams it’s a successful strategy
Jokic would be eating in the post for denver but aside from him? Luka is the best post player the mavs have… gafford and lively posting up isn’t winning anyone games
Even the wolves have size but KAT isn’t a low post player
feels like the ONLY teams that could have "damaged" boston on this run would have been:
-a healthy Bucks team IF Dame played like his Blazers days.
A fully healthy Knicks team with Brunson, Randle, OG, Divenzzino, Hart, Hartensteing, Mitchell
and even then, probably beating them too. Boston isn't super dominating but they're just clicking and doing very well.
I don’t think you can just say “if Dame was playing like his prime then Bucks would be a challenge.” That’s too much of a what-if for it to be a realistic scenario.
Specially with Tingus being injured bigger teams could’ve done more in the paint against you guys, the fact that Tatum is able to switch on to Mavs centers cause they can only score off lobs is huge for you guys.
>Boston isn't super dominating but they're just clicking and doing very well.
Winning multiple games by 20 and only losing 2 playoff games isn't dominating?
So people shitting on Herro but he played the biggest part (with Bam) in one of the only two losses Boston got handed this postseason?
Sooo... according to how this sub works... do we now say Herro > Doncic> DMitch > Young?
/s don't @ me
So people shitting on Herro but he played the biggest part (with Bam) in one of the only two losses Boston got handed this postseason?
Sooo... according to how this sub works... do we now say Herro > Doncic> DMitch > Young?
/s don't @ me
I know post game interviews are usually whatever, but Jaylen Brown’s interview shows how great his mentality is going into these games. He’s playing like a champ and his mind is already on the next game.
jaylen finally getting the respect he deserves
He’s been a killer all year and even nastier in the playoffs.
he might be the most dangerous scorer in the east now, teams better come in with a good game plan for him
Idk about that but he’s up there in terms of playoff scoring He just has such a reliable offensive arsenal
I want him to teach Tatum how to hit his midranges. They are beautiful (those turnarounds) and Tatums just aren’t as consistent
He’s also just much more aggressive attacking the paint and with better body control
Every time Tatum attacks the paint, it's a bucket. My guy just loves his questionable 3s, though.
He started to go cold when he spammed his stepback 3s. When will he ever learn..
I mean they're about to win a title, so probably never lmao
He starts doing step back 3s when he drives and gets hacked with no call. Honestly it's hard to blame him. Any player is going to miss when their arm is whacked, so it's like...he can waste a possession by trying to score driving and getting fouled with no call, or try and hit a 3. If he got to the line more and got a better whistle we would see him driving the entire game.
Brown is better at hanging in the air. He uses his jumping ability to create space. Tatum has a quicker release and doesn’t hang in the air as long, he creates space with his feet and with his wingspan. Just different types of shooters
naw, tatum needs to ditch the fadeaway and go straight up. he's too big to be falling back every damn time.
Tatum is a guy who is big enough, fast enough, and strong enough, to where if he aggressively attacks the basket its a bucket or a foul near every time. Not comparing the two, just the situation, but it's like watching LeBron in Miami take step backs and turn around 3s when every time he even looked at the basket and took a step forward It was a foul or bucket or assist.
And layups And how to dunk everything
you either lean the defense to brown or tatum. you try to stop tatum? browns gonna destroy you. same way the other time. btw also have jrue holiday, derrick white and KP in theory. what an absurd team brad
I think JT is still a better scorer than JB because of his finishing, perimeter, and semi-consistent midrange play. But everyone’s gonna hear a lot more of Jaylen Brown as a superstar if the Celtics finish strong.
I think JB is a better finisher, JT is a better all around player with his passing though
Go watch Tatum’s highlights from G7 of the Philly series. He had some acrobatic, twisting, bending layups. Also, people see Brown dunking everything, but Tatum is still the posterizer and had two pretty nasty contact dunks tonight.
jaylen is a top 5 midrange player in the nba, maybe just behind booker/kd
Not in front of SGA
good point. i recall a lot of stats over the last few seasons about mid range scoring and efficiency and he has always been near the top, for a stretch the leader. i would argue sgas role as a number 1 and his volume are more impressive than browns and would rank him higher. nothing wrong with being worse than a top 5 player at a skill if only slightly
He looks a lot more confident handling the ball and has translated that regular season explosion into the playoffs were games are tighter and the defense is physical
…nah. Giannis and Embiid and Brunson are all better scorers off the top of my head.
Giannis? Embiid? Lillard? Brunson?
BUT HE CANT GO LEFT!!!
He’s always been a stud but the improvement he’s made the last couple years has been amazing. The defensive leap this year especially
Heavy on the finally
Could you imagine how good he'd be with a left hand?
Finally.
The Celtics are very well coached, this discipline from the players is not a coincidence. Mazzulla deserves his props after this run
Tell that to a bunch of dopes we got in our subreddit who will be calling for his job if we lose game 4.
I’m calling for his job even if the Celtics win game 4. He lost the in season tourney, he deserves it.
IST = I Suggest Termination
There were comments yesterday like, "UNPRECEDENTED CHOKEJOB" and I'm like, dude even if we lose this game we are still up in the series.
I love when idiots post shit halfway through a game just for their idiotic take to curdle in the sun before the game even ends. Like that halftime tweet from some idiot during ECF game 3 talking about us taking our 3rd loss and it being 3 losses too many. Eat shit Seth Partnow, you fucking hack
Made the mistake of looking at the Celtics game thread during that 20-2 run by the Mavs. There were comments saying the team should be blown up in the off-season
Your sub is the most dramatic. I stopped going. It’s like hottest take after hottest take every second of a game.
Thats all of reddit, you just dont agree with what theyre saying
The team is also ridiculously stacked with proven veterans and great players in their primes. They have length, all play defense, all can shoot. They don’t even need Porsingis to make it even more unfair. They are dynastic.
Well, Boston was 1 game away from their 3rd finals appearance last year if it wasn’t for Caleb Martin and Gabe Vincent becoming better 3 point shooters than Steph Curry and Prime Klay and in the 2022 finals our coach was using his position as coach to have sex with a staffer during the finals (Udoka). Still have to win and win again.
And that's not even counting all the other fake super team rosters that haters make up that we had for the years before that!
Gordon Hayward, Irving, and Horford still is a what if… Brown and Tatum were still developing and that team with an injured Hayward and Irving the whole playoffs were 1 game off. Damn.
Those Luka fouls were when the momentum completely stopped Just something you absolutely cannot do as the leader of the team
You can point to Kidd taking that dumbass TO too When I saw that I literally felt like we had a chance to not blow the lead lmao. Youre on a 20 to something run and YOU turn the kill switch? Incredibly stupid and im surprised nobodies really brought it up
You could see Luka was pissed when he called that timeout. Strange decision for sure.
Don’t worry, we are all screaming about it over on the mavs sub
Tbf the momentum was kind of killed before that timeout. Granted the Celtics weren’t scoring but the Mavericks offense was just as chaotic the few possessions before the timeout. Think he wanted to just give his team a moment to collect themselves and rest, especially Luka and Kyrie
one of those was to Tyler herro dropping 14 assists just so you know
Historic shooting which killed the vibes for 48 hours.
Felt like another inevitable 7 game series against the Heat after that tbh
Just an all time run by the Celtics this postseason. Like this is pretty undeniable shit
Agreed. No one can really hurt them at all. They've been the best team all season. Even without Big Tingus.
Credit to Brad and we better send a ring to Danny Ainge too. They put together a stupidly talented roster from top to bottom.
It took a long time to build this team. It was incredible to watch.
This is also arguably the 4th different iteration of it. They never got stagnant and kept pushing to improve even when they were a perennial contender. Most teams wouldn't do that.
Yes. They kept resisting the calls to break up Tatum and Brown.
They also did super ballsy things like trading fan-favorite players like IT and Smart. Also, I'll never figure out how tf Brad managed to offload Kemba to bring Al back.
Tbf they had to give up a decent 1st to do it (pick #16 in 2021 which became Alperen Sengun) But absolutely you do that, and a player like Sengun isn’t always available that deep
That war chest was well spent
It feels like that, but GSW took 6 years and until Curry was 26 to really become what we know them as. Tatum has been in the league for 7, but he's 25. The parallels are pretty crazy when you look at it.
Patience and belief. It doesn’t always work, but it’s wonderful when it does.
Hell yeah. So awesome to grow with these guys over the last 7 years. I had a major life change happen that coincided with the start of Tatum's first season, so it's been very easy to view this phase of my life and the Jays era of Celtics as a sort of mutual parallel progression. I really love the guys on this team.
It feels longer than Curry because They were one win away from the finals in Tatum rookie year. to me as I was tired of lebron in the finals the only thing I knew is that Lebron had lost again then next season they are gunning for the beast team of all time. I think for non basketball fans the warriors came out of nowhere
Tingus Pingus makes them unstoppable. Best overall team since the 2017 warriors
People will hate on us and call it a cupcake run for the next couple of years. But when Tatum's and Brown's careers are over everyone will look back and realize how ridiculously talented this squad actually was.
Realize lol? Everybody knows it’s a ridiculously talented squad…
Yet everyone was so sure that the Mavs had this series easy.
you watch too much espn
And consume too much reddit.
My guy that was the narrative everywhere
? Celtics were 2:1 favorites going into the series
Yeah vegas odds favored them but most in the media and basketball fans were picking the mavs.
Most of the media had the Mavs
Either engagement bait or Laker fans. The celtics are stacked, it was always theirs to lose.
2:1 was a *gross* underestimate of the talent disparity, that implies it's like basically a tossup on a game by game basis which was definitely not the case. No statistical model gave you better than like a 20% chance to win with some giving you as little as 6-8%.
That was only on r/NBA where Celtics hate reigns supreme. Every book had the Celtics as a pretty solid favorite. edit: downvotes only prove my point
Sharp money was on the Celtics. Problem is when discussing r/NBA, ESPN and American national media in general, there’s nothing ‘sharp’ about them.
The sharps were extremely off too. Or do you think the Mavs actually had a 33% chance of winning this series (an enormous overestimate of their chances according to literally every statistical model I'm aware of)?
Yeah people call it a superteam to denigrate Tatum but I haven't seen anyone saying this is an all time great team. I think it will be regarded that way when people look back on what Tatum and Brown achieved and say (for example) "actually Tatum was a top 5 player that season." It won't happen for a while because success doesn't change people's minds as quickly as stats.
Like even if it was a cupcake run, if you blast through everyone losing like two games for the whole playoff run then that should just be viewed as "You play who's in front of you." Haters gonna hate but I don't know how you can in good faith discredit this run.
Yeah but wait until they play a real team!
Two things can be - This Celtics team is great and would compete for a chip every year - This Celtics team probably had the easiest finals run in history due to injuries
If mazzulla wanted the actions to get Doncic on brown and get he fouls it’s genius. Meanwhile kidd only started trying to attack Horford today.
Horford has been generally successful in defending Luka and Kyrie the whole series
Al definitely gets cooked sometimes, but damn I love how much he moves his feet. He is really active and you can tell he wants that damn chip.
Most important thing about celtics defense is they *mostly* dont bite on pumpfakes. Horford definitely doesnt on Luka
It’s still the best guy to go after cs the rest of the team is elite defenders. Maybe you cpuor argue tatum At least they went after Pritchard when he was in.
Pritchard clamped Luka on multiple posessions though. The weakest defender to attack is hauser and even he has high defensive BB IQ to make it hard for anyone
I said it in the Celtics sub but Hauser is tougher than people think For the most part he doesn’t bite on fakes and forces guys to shoot over the top. Luka and Kyrie can make those shots but they are still tough shots. Obviously as a Celtics fan I don’t wish for the Al Luka matchup. But Horford biggest weakness is quick and fast guys since he’s slower in his old age Luka is great but he’s not fast.. Al may give up points but he still can do ok for a big against Luka
So many defensive possessions are ending in shots that make you say "we'll let them take that all day" even when they go in. Been a really great showing from the squad.
Yes the east competition was weak, but they have proven all season that they are clearly above everyone in the league.
It wasn’t weak for any of the other teams, it just looked weak compared to the Celtics.
Turns out Boston isn't a big fish swimming in a small pond, but a fucking Blue Whale
And yet as a Celtics fan I'm not sure what happens in a series against Denver. Minnesota is always good for an assist. Grateful to them for KG to get us the banner in 08 and they came up big for us again this year.
We can enjoy what ifs in our mind, and simulate it in 2k, but this is your year so better stick the landing
True, but damn I want to see us face off in the Finals at least once. Jokic is so damn good that it would almost be a shame if the Jays don't get to face him at least once.
Celtics will be in good position to repeat next year. Hopefully the Nuggets can make it out of the tough west
Would have loved to see that finals.
I think Nuggets (and Bucks) had the potential to knock off the Celtics if healthy. But the Nuggets in these playoffs would've lost to the Celtics in 4 or 5 as well. There was something wrong with Murray. And Jokic can't beat the Celtics himself even if he drops 35/15/8.
Yup kcp, and Reggie were also injured and mpj was a non factor for the entire twolves series idk if he just got cold or if it was all the family issues. They were just crazy inconsistent, could see them getting crushed or being competitive. Plus they looked gassed at the end of the twolves series not sure they even beat Dallas. Tho if they did and got a 9 day rest like the Mavs that would have been massive the games Murray did play in were usually after a few days of rest. If Murray could sort of recover from his calf strain they might stand a chance, also should be said that it would be a much easier match up for jokic then ad and Minnesota were.
Dame would get hunted on defense the way Luka's been. The Bucks paint defense is really good with Brook and Giannis but it's the same problem the Mavs are having, 5 out doesn't let them sit in the paint. And our net rating is like 3-4x higher. I don't see this Celtics team losing four out of seven to the Bucks.
I think we'd win in 7. It would be a crazy series. Hope it happens next year.
7 games against 0 depth and murray playing cte ball with an 11.6net rtg team seems incredibly unlikely
Jokic just constantly feasts against us. We’ve never been able to match up well with him and it looked even worse this season. I know it’s the regular season but still.
We matched up decently when we had Williams x2 but this season it was definitely bad
We witnessin a baby whale kid!
Celtics were by far better but I think every other east team having their best player injured might have made the conference look a little shittier
We can acknowledge that the east is weak while also acknowledging that the Celtics are the best team in the league regardless of conference
The pacers without Hali even put up the most close games tho
realistically it still was pretty weak, hobbled heat and cavs teams are not good but it wasnt like the celtics even had a chance to lose against any of the teams in the east
I mean, there wasn't a single team whose best player wasn't injured by the time they were eliminated. Weak in that sense.
Celtics was looking sus against the pacers tho until the last minute of every game, except one.
Pacers 2nd best team in the league this season, cannot be disproven!
It became weak because pretty much every team got injured…I am confused as to why people on here thought all 7 of the teams behind Boston were weak when actually healthy…a couple of the teams were short, sure, but still…and it’s not a knock on Boston, as they were a great team I feel like the West actually might have been a little overrated (by the pundits) with how things played out
It wasn’t weak at the start of the year but it was weak due to injuries and upheaval. Haliburton played hurt a lot of the year (Pacers) and they lost Mathurin, Bucks coaching change cooked them and then Giannis got hurt at the actual worst time, Knicks were a force all year but dealt with injuries throughout the season and then had everything crumble at once, Heat got hit with the Jimmy injury at the worst time, Cavs got hit with DMitch and Allen injuries at a bad time, Sixers lost Embiid for half the year and then when he came back he clearly still had multiple things wrong with him (although to some extent that’s who Embiid is as an athlete unfortunately). Orlando was healthy, and Boston was incredibly healthy until Porzingis’ injuries. Six of the eight best Eastern teams had major injuries either throughout the season or at the worst conceivable time in the playoffs (in some cases right as they were about to play Boston or while playing Boston). That doesn’t change the fact that Boston is **better** but it also just makes it hard to determine how much better because they faced a weakened field. Meanwhile, the West was a bloodbath that feasted on itself all year and was far healthier overall. Nuggets were healthy outside of Murray for a bit, Wolves were mostly healthy, Lakers top talent was healthy even if their supporting cast (Vincent and Vando in particular) missed a ton of time, Warriors were largely healthy, Clippers were mostly healthy until the playoffs which for them to even make it that far was a miracle, Suns had tumultuous stuff primarily with Beal, Mavs were healthy until the playoffs when Luka started playing hurt but never to the extent that he had to miss games. Generally, they were a healthier conference and they’ve had more top talent overall for a couple decades now even if the top 2-3 teams are relatively equal.
right, that was kind of my point about it becoming weak due to the injuries...the conference fully healthy (as it pertains to the playoff field) would have had a pretty interesting postseason...and right, not taking anything away from Boston's talent level and depth, but the injuries elsewhere completely negated needing KP a fully healthy Bucks team (yes, even with Doc ha) and Knicks could have seriously challenged the Celtics imo...the Cavs might have been interesting as well with their length, but not sure...including with KP in the mix...maybe we will get a chance to see it in the playoffs next season
Begging silver to shorten the season
Yeah especially with pacers playing Boston way better despite losing Hali n the brain fart game 1. N Hali heakth in general . East had lots of injuries but I think a heskth ish Knicks or sixers or pacers ( which we saw desoite talent gap ) put up more fight then Dallas. I think minny honestly had the best chance vs Boston going off regular season matches in the west . Denver won but there was a huge gap in 3pt % in those games Boston shot absolutely outkier bad. Minnesota , pacers , bucks , sixers honestly if heskthy do better then the west does imo. East was just injured so people pretend it’s bad .
Yup…you touched on it and I’m admittedly a little biased ha, but in the East, I certainly think a healthy Knicks team puts up a major fight in the ECF…but yeah, staying healthy is also a bear at times
I feel like the Knicks would have put up a great fight if they had OG, meech and Hart healthy
It was also always a ridiculous take that the east was so much worse than the west. If you look at regular season records for all the east playoff teams including the play in teams, only 2 have a losing record against the west (both play in teams) and they were both 14-16. Most were 15-15 and 4 had winning records (2 being the other play in teams). So overall the playoff contending teams in the east were better than the west.
I really wish we got to see the Celtics vs a healthy Giannis and Dame. I think that would've been the best series of the playoffs.
I think we might have seen a similar series to this one tbh--throw elite defensive guards at Dame to hound him on offense, and then hunt him with switches on defense.
Me too man, me too…
No thank you. Giannis would have intentionally injured one of our players with his flops when he saw he was losing. Gulliver's Travels ass MF.
Don't think you can call the East competition weak when you shit the bed like that in the Finals. I genuinely think the Pacers would be up 2-1 against the Mavericks.
I mean, if the Pacers could finish games, they woulda been up 3-1 on the Celts lol.
That’s part of winning championships, closing out games. Something the Celtics have consistently done better than their opponents in the clutch all off-season long. It’s part of why experience matters. Also if we’re gonna whip out hypotheticals let’s do a healthy Celtics team vs the pacers.
Seems the best the West had to offer is pretty weak too. I mean, having watched both teams, the Pacers are clearly better than the Mavs
Playing the Celtics sucks, you get close and then they just hit a couple 3s to stretch the lead again, maybe get a nice easy bucket to the rim and you're down 10-15 again. GGs celtics
They can get lazy and complacent though. And start hitting bricks. Luka brought the fire too late. Not sure why he cant play harder D like that earlier in the game.
Nothing lazy or complacent about it, just missing shots. The defensive pressure was there all night.
I don’t think it was defensive intensity as much as Boston always starts playing this run out the clock offense when up big Pritchard was forced to take multiple shots with the shot clock running out because they waited too long to run anything It’s been an issue for years but they finally fought through and then recalibrated themselves
Those missed 3s in Boston found their way to Dallas
You acting like Mavs were making 3s before lol, we were shooting worse than Boston
Almost like you have worse shooters
That's... what I said. No shit Kenny.
Idk why youre getting downvoted, its literally what you said lmao
I'm so confused lmao, people here just default downvoting Mavs flairs atm
Lmao yeah, ive been on that side of things. A lot of posts on r/nba just become "were downvoting anything this team says and upvoting what that team says" very tribal
Yeah best to just stay out of here right now lol. Can’t back up our team or anything. I got crucified for saying that we’ve been together for 4 months and we’ll grow
Luka's strategy of "just tackle the guy with ball" was certainly an interesting one.
And he didn't get called for it. Yet people want to whine about refball on the charge.
Idk if it's the weird amount of love that Luka gets here or the less weird amount of hate for Boston, but people really don't see him do anything wrong. It's crazy.
It's both. The Golden boy is getting exposed defensively in these playoffs against the most hated team. Anyone calling those fouls soft or nitpicky are just homers/Luka stans or Boston haters.
>Anyone calling those fouls soft or nitpicky are just homers/Luka stans or Boston haters. I may be a Celtics fan, but I can acknowledge if there's any group of people as annoying as a players Stans its Boston Sports fans. So truly, fair play.
I love that C's fans have been hated on reddit for so long that we're really good at it
It’s more Mavs fans coming out during the finals + Boston hate.
Honestly, both are fair.
Luka is also a bit of a polarizing guy on this sub (understandably so). Which started once at he stopped being its favorite player. Now that we’ve pretty much lost the series there will definitely be a more massive swing on the negative side of things.
Luka fits into a similar mold to me as Jimmy Butler. You can appreciate everything they do when you're not playing them, but the way they play the game makes them really easy to hate when you're the opposition.
Luka is pretty frustrating for me to watch as a Mavs fan so it’s no surprise to me that fans of other teams don’t like watching him either.
Straight up, you've definitely seen more of his games than me, maybe you've got an answer. The guy has unbelievable offensive talent. He's a walking bucket. Why the hell does he give up on shots to draw fouls? If he just took the shots, they'd probably go in. Does he not know he's Luka Doncic?
Quite honestly, he has looked way more passive in these playoffs than ever. He’s always had the multi-fake game when he picks up his dribble but the C’s aren’t biting on it. Usually when he recognizes that he just shoots over but he hasn’t done that much at all. Not sure if he’s just looking to get a breather on the line or trying to rest his knee. But this game was especially bad on that front.
hes too fat to move out of the way in time
The east doesn't count so we have only played 3 games this playoffs
undefeated baby!!
Classic Celtics make it as hard as possible but IDGAF 3-0 baby!!!
The west was the cupcake conference all along
The West is lucky they didn’t have the Celtics.
Or indiana. ECF was the real finals
The East didn’t do any better.
No western conference team has won a game against an eastern conference team this postseason!
East got 2 west
Where all the "Mavs in 5" homies at?
Mavs in 5 years? Terrible playing and coaching decisions ruined any chance of winning against a well rounded Celtics. I'm sad that my Mavs are on the brink, but I'm just glad it's the Celtics and not the Pacers or Wolves.
Mavs up 1-0 on moral victory finals
Why is this a moral victory? The attempted comeback?
They can say they'd have won if Luka didn't foul out and they can blame the refs.
Lol, that's a low bar. It probably should have been 7 on Luka. I don't know any coach that wants his star taking a charge with 5 fouls.
The blamed the refs for the last loss too so they up 2-1 rn
Well ifs don’t count lol and blaming the refs not gonna make em feel better either 😂
Tbf, I don’t see any Mavs fans saying it was the refs fault. I see them blaming Kidd. Stupid timeout and substitutions.
Mavs are 3-0 in moral victories and going to sweep the Celtics. 1-0 because they lost game 1 to the clippers in the same fashion, so obviously they will win the series. 2-0 because if Kyrie just steps up they would have won the game. 3-0 because they were down 21 and brought it back within 2 just to lose. What a dominant team. The East is really weak and the real playoffs start playing these west teams.
No no no, game 2 was the ref missing Jaylen's push on that late game dunk attempt. Of course a C's fan doesn't understand (moral) winning basketball!
I wouldn't say brown went at Luka. He just made two incredibly stupid fouls. A 10/10 on the Karl Anthony towns scale
He was on tilt for a long time
It was a soft foul on Luka, but JB with the Marcus Smart Galaxy brain move of fouling him out
3s OP
Jaylen TRUCK Brown Smart guy Cut off their legs
Boston dominating with a 3 guard starting lineup, 6’8 Tatum at PF and 6’9 Horford at center. A lot of NBA fans (like 95% of Lakers fans) think this sort of thing is either idiotic or suicidal, but the league has passed them by and they’re just wrong.
I mean, it largely works because the guards are big, switchable, and fantastic defenders. Brown is also more of a wing than a guard.
Mavs centers have gotten a lob or two but against most teams it’s a successful strategy Jokic would be eating in the post for denver but aside from him? Luka is the best post player the mavs have… gafford and lively posting up isn’t winning anyone games Even the wolves have size but KAT isn’t a low post player
I'm not even a celtics fan but I think this year nuggets with Murray, MPJ, and Gordon bein no shows they would have faced the same fate as the mavs
mavs really about to win the same amount of finals games as us lmaoo
Jaylen Brown is Luka Doncic father
feels like the ONLY teams that could have "damaged" boston on this run would have been: -a healthy Bucks team IF Dame played like his Blazers days. A fully healthy Knicks team with Brunson, Randle, OG, Divenzzino, Hart, Hartensteing, Mitchell and even then, probably beating them too. Boston isn't super dominating but they're just clicking and doing very well.
I don’t think you can just say “if Dame was playing like his prime then Bucks would be a challenge.” That’s too much of a what-if for it to be a realistic scenario.
Bucks/Nuggets/Wolves were their worst matchups imo I was confident against anyone else
Specially with Tingus being injured bigger teams could’ve done more in the paint against you guys, the fact that Tatum is able to switch on to Mavs centers cause they can only score off lobs is huge for you guys.
Boston is pretty super dominating though... they're 15-2...
Nuggets
yeah, thinking about the eastern run. but nuggets would have been formidable.
>Boston isn't super dominating but they're just clicking and doing very well. Winning multiple games by 20 and only losing 2 playoff games isn't dominating?
One of the most dominating teams of all times what are you talking about?!
That 4th quarter was wild. If only they had completed the comeback.
So people shitting on Herro but he played the biggest part (with Bam) in one of the only two losses Boston got handed this postseason? Sooo... according to how this sub works... do we now say Herro > Doncic> DMitch > Young? /s don't @ me
So people shitting on Herro but he played the biggest part (with Bam) in one of the only two losses Boston got handed this postseason? Sooo... according to how this sub works... do we now say Herro > Doncic> DMitch > Young? /s don't @ me
I know post game interviews are usually whatever, but Jaylen Brown’s interview shows how great his mentality is going into these games. He’s playing like a champ and his mind is already on the next game.