After acquiring Kristaps Porzingis and Jrue Holiday this offseason, the Boston Celtics have the best top six players in the NBA. Boston’s top six, consisting of Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, Porzingis, Holiday, Derrick White, and Al Horford, have combined for 3,707 career starts including the postseason.
With only five men on the court, roles will look a little different this season.
“Our guys are open-minded,” head coach Joe Mazzulla said following Boston’s preseason opener Sunday. “They’re ready to play together, they’re ready to sacrifice. They’re ready to do whatever it takes to win.”
With the regular season less than two weeks away, Mazzulla is yet to officially announce a starting lineup. The second-year bench boss has continuously preached the importance of being flexible regarding the lineup.
“There is going to be a bunch of different lineups, especially during the preseason, and we’ll be able to keep that open mind and that flexibility throughout the year,” the Mazzulla said. “We’ll see a bunch of different lineups during the year.”
The Celtics will likely use a matchup-based lineup this season, switching between White and Horford in the starting five depending on whether they want to play big or small on that given night.
No matter who is coming off the bench, it’s going to be an adjustment. Horford has started 1,168 games out of the 1,180 he has played in, and the 16-year vet has never come off the bench for the Celtics.
As for White, Mazzulla announced him as the starting point guard over the summer after he started in all but 16 games last year. However, Mazzulla named White the starter prior to the team acquiring Holiday.
When asked about the changing roles on Friday, Horford said, “We’re a very versatile group here. We have a lot of guys that can do different things. It’s a strength of our group, and I think I can say we’re all pretty comfortable with that.”
A matchup-based lineup isn’t necessarily common in the NBA. But as Mazzulla has noted the Celtics have “We have eight or nine starters.”
While the starting and closing five will be a topic of conversation each night, Mazzulla isn’t too concerned about who the first five on the court are. “It’s a 48-minute game,” Mazzulla said. “If we get so worked up about the first five minutes of the game, what are we going to do the other 43 minutes?”
“At the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter. What matters is we have to play hard and we have to execute,” the head coach added.
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