The Celtics Issues Are Easy To Explain And It's Not Why You Think
With every Celtics loss there’s a certain degree of a sky is falling mentality. Granted it’s usually because this Celtics team loses to someone they have no business losing to, but all season it’s been the same story. Lose a game, suddenly this team is broken and has no shot come the playoffs. Obviously after back to back loses to LA team in which you blew and 18 point lead and a 28 point lead that only enhanced the hot takes. I certainly won’t defend that Clippers loss, I feel like my thoughts on that are pretty clearly known, and I do feel like after a performance like that the Celtics deserve every bit of scrutiny they get. Here’s the thing though, immediately following that loss, I kept seeing the same old hot takes be recycled. That this team is struggling because of the young guys and their inability to sacrifice. Things like this
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I get that it makes for headlines and is fun to talk about on Twitter and on hot take TV shows, but anyone who is really paying attention knows the issues plaguing this team are not due to the young players not wanting to sacrifice. Their struggles are not because there is some split down the middle between the vets and the young players. Again, that’s fun to talk about but it does nothing in terms of addressing the real issue as to why this team is having issues. The young guys were 100% a problem to start the year, there’s no denying that, but since that first month we’ve seen Jaylen accept and play much better in his role, we’ve seen Tatum cut out those long twos and ill advised shots to get back to similar production we saw during his breakout year, we’ve seen Terry be the same up and down player he always has been but one that has actually shown life on the defensive end. It’s lazy to just lump everything back on the shoulders of the young players when really that’s not what’s happening here.
You go through and look at some actual reasons why the Celts are dealing with this bullshit and it’s pretty simple. They aren’t defending. Let’s just look at how they’ve looked since that Warriors loss on 1/26, because it’s been since that game where these issues have really started to show.
Over those 8 games the Celtics are allowing 111.1 points a night, more than 5 points more than their season average. That’s the 16th lowest total of any team in the league over that span. They also have a 109 Drtg, which is 4 full points higher than their season average and is good for 14th during this timeframe. Look up and down the schedule and you see a common theme, 115 points to GS, 134 to OKC, 129 to the Lakers, and 123 to the Clippers. Over these last 8 games the Celtics have the 25th best opponent 3P% while giving up the 27th fewest 3PM. It’s pretty clear, the Celtics issues are not because the team hates each other, it’s because they hate playing defense. I know it’s more juicy to talk about locker room drama, but it’s honestly as simple as that. This team is too inconsistent offensively to have defensive lapses like this, and when they aren’t engaged on that end more often than not they lose. That’s no different from any previous rough stretch they’ve experienced this season.
The thing is, where early in the year you could get on the young guys for slacking, recently that’s not the case. See for yourself
Kyrie, Horford, Mook, and Smart have been way under their season Drtg averages during this stretch. You could argue that they are the ones who are having the biggest negative impact, yet they are some of the guys you always hear talking to the media. That’s probably the annoying part. I get it, Drtg isn’t the end all be all and it shouldn’t be treated that way, but it does give you an indication as to how certain guys are playing. Brad even talked about it himself, calling out the second and third quarter defenses as their biggest problems. The advanced numbers in those quarters tell a pretty interesting story. If you look at the regular rotation players, Mook/Smart have the worst ratings on the team in their second quarter minutes. Both of them have negative net ratings overall. That tells me that it’s not the young guys or the bench that is having a tough time, it’s that second shift from the starters. Then you move to the third quarter and it’s a very similar story. Kyrie Irving has a ridiculous 139.6 Drtg in third quarters over these last 8 games, and him and Mook both have over a -23 net rating.
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So you see, it’s not some off the court bullshit that’s negatively impacting this team, they simply aren’t getting the defensive production from guys who have been solid on that end all season. You don’t have to always overthink things, just look at what’s actually happening on the court. Sure it’s less sexy, but it’s also correctable. It wouldn’t shock me one bit if Brad went to adjusting his lineups and his rotations to combat the lack of production from certain guys. Maybe it’s inserting Hayward back into the starting lineup so that Morris can have a better matchup against second unit players. Maybe the key to their stagnant offense at times to start third quarters would be helped by having another facilitator in that group. The point is, we’ve seen this team have defensive lapses like this before, make adjustments and then boom they’re back to normal. Why should this situation be any different?
That’s why all this talking and drama falls on deaf ears to me. That is not the Celtics problem. Once they wake up and start defending like they have all season, this team will right the ship. It’s not about playing as individuals, or the young guys refusing to sacrifice, it honestly just boils down to everyone on this team carrying their weight on the defensive end. It’s up to Brad to figure out what combinations and rotations will work best, but it’s eventually up to the players to not just talk about being better, but actually ya know, doing it.