No thanks waiter, I’m all set. I realize I haven’t finished my meal yet but trust me, I’m good. Feeling a little nauseas, actually.
Truthfully, I am looking forward to watching the Celtics ... this offseason. As in, how will they fix this mess they created? Make no mistake, they created it. Nothing worse than organizational friendly fire and right now, with a Game 3 NBA Playoff game staring at me on Friday night, I’ll be watching something else. The Red Sox, a movie or perhaps a kid’s show with my boys - all of which project to be far more appealing than prolonging this everlasting root canal that is the 2021 Boston Celtics season. Arthur? Peppa Pig? Bring it on.
As for Friday night Celtics? No mas por favor. No mas!
I’m a lifelong green-teamer. I love the Celtics to my core and have since I first laid eyes on them live at the Garden in 1980 but this season just needs to go away. Even the thought of sticking it just once to the self-important, misguided, phony, droning, gutless, front-running, fraudulent, dry-heave inducing Kyrie Irving isn’t enough to make me want to prolong this thing. I’m confident he’ll get his during an upcoming playoff round when Brooklyn faces some real competition like Philly or Milwaukee but that’s the problem isn’t it? The 2021 Celtics haven’t been truly in this thing since January when the season hardly mattered. I chronicled this as soon as the flaws to this roster construction really started to show, much to the chagrin of many green teamers hanging onto false hope: What's wrong with the Celtics? Watch the Bruins.
That column pointed the finger directly at chief decision-maker Danny Ainge for not properly fortifying a roster that was well positioned to make a level jump with a few strategic tweaks. Acquiring Myles Turner and Dougie McDermott for a player you couldn’t keep (Gordon Hayward) comes to mind. That was a blatant miss.
At the close of last season, the Celtics core was young, improving and had enjoyed well documented postseason success as its base of young talent developed. Sitting pretty, things were teed up very well for this team to continue to progress and make a run at the NBA Finals for years to come. However, the version of Ainge that built this core with a string of both bold and savvy moves from 2013-18 has become a distant memory. The supporting cast is weaker than it’s been since before they appeared in their first of three Eastern Conference finals contests.
In what is truly head-scratching; instead of watching this core mature in the presence of much needed veteran help, this roster is now somehow younger at the precise time they needn’t be. Bottom line? Results are worse. Once a contender just one season ago, the Celtics are now suddenly a .500 team, lucky to be an early round castoff. That’s a serious regression.
Since calling out Ainge for his roster negligence from this past offseason, matters are worse.
Head coach Brad Stevens has had a rough season to be kind. Confidence in him and his coaching style being the right fit to make the next jump has never been lower. His position as the Celtics coach, once as steady as his even tempered demeanor, has come under serious scrutiny.
Have his players tuned him out? Fair question. Just look at the record and the diminishing performance as the season wore on.
Is he the right man to help young stars Jayson Tatum and Jalen Brown get to the next level? Though each has improved significantly under Stevens’ lead the last few years, this is another fair question as the sum of the parts in the presence of all three is far worse than anyone expected. In a results business, the 2021 results aren’t good.
Now, even more questions have surfaced. Is the makeup of the roster so flawed that you need to break up their dynamic young duo of Tatum and Brown? If so, who do you move? What can you get back in return? Can Tatum and Brown coexist? Can they coexist and flourish under Stevens? Do you trust Ainge to make those decisions?
Sorry Celtics fans, as difficult as it may be to swallow all of these questions are valid. Every single one.
For me, despite my calling out of Ainge for his approach to the 2021 season, I do believe he has the skill and the will to right the ship. He’s always been a results driven, championship driven guy and his basketball IQ isn’t something I would question. His passive, rookie hoarding approach since losing Kyrie I’ll question all day, but I have faith and belief that he can correct his path.
To do so, I’m not in the blow it up camp. As I wrote above, I thought Ainge’s moves from 2013-18 were smart and I liked the team he built. Kyrie didn’t work out but the move to acquire him was a brilliant stroke; his personality aside. I’m in the camp of building around Tatum and Brown and never revisiting the hibernation approach to 2021 again. The Celtics brass would be wise to get a blood oath from Ainge on that.
As for Stevens, I’m not sure. He’s certainly earned another shot based on his previous success in developing this team and his acumen is obvious. However, my confidence in him to lead this Celtics ship after the rough seas of 2021 isn’t exactly high. Put it this way, I wouldn’t miss him.
This season has not been fun for all the reasons above and more. Marcus Smart, an athlete I have long admired, seriously regressed and was wildly inconsistent ...more so than his often errant and ill-timed shooting. The game-winning plays that were his hallmark became fleeting. How about the team defense? Where did it go? Where’s the consistency? Where’s the effort?
So with all this said not only has this season been frustrating but equally exhausting to watch and think through. As for Celtics Playoffs Friday night? I think it’s time for an Irish exit