This entertaining email-turned-post comes from loyal Red's Army reader and infrequent contributor – Rob G. Enjoy!
Even
though I have very little respect for Orlando as a team (relative to
the other top notch teams in the NBA) and I am positive that the
Celtics would have mopped the floor with the Magic if they had been
healthy, I think I could have accepted a 5 game mauling or a decisive 6
game loss better than what ended up happening. Like everyone else, I
can recognize that they were running on fumes, but that is a poor
excuse for blowing a double digit 4th quarter lead in a close-out game
and then putting together a Game 7 stinker of such historic proportions
that only the 2005 Celtics could appreciate it. (As I'm sure you
remember, they were the ones who put together an inspiring 27 point
loss at home in a Game 7.)
in 14 games, Pierce and Allen never put together one game in which they
both brought so much as a B+ performance. That's unacceptable. Without
Baby bailing their asses out by more than doubling his scoring average
and going from "nice role player off the bench" to "damn good NBA
starter" in a matter of a few days and Rondo becoming a superstar in
the same period of time, they probably would have been steamrolled by
the Bulls.
saw with the "6 and two halfs" (as opposed to 7 or 8) player rotation
that we saw. On a smaller scale, he did the same thing with Patrick
O'Bryant that he did with Scal a few years ago. "Sure, this guy has
done next to nothing in the NBA (Scal had done a little bit), but I'm
going to sign him. And not only am I going to sign him, I'm going to
give him good money because, dammit, I am smarter than actual, ya know, results."
I think we all agree that Joe Smith was the guy to get, but I don't
blame Danny too much for that. He was playing a tough game of chicken
and lost. I don't really blame him for the Steph disaster (yes, I wrote
"disaster") either. It was definitely a gamble worth taking. Who could
have known that an arrogant former superstar would not only have
understandable physical rust, but he would have the confidence of the
smallest, most uncoordinated kid on a Little League team? Plus, there
were no better (and realistic) options that I know of.
problem is nothing chronic and that they can muster up one more run
next year, lest they be relegated to the same pile of fairly irrelevant
one-title-and-bust teams as the 2006 Miami Heat. With Baby showing
that he should be a terrific first guy off the bench next year, if they
can find a few bench pieces, they should have a shot. But if any of
those things does not happen (specifically KG's knee healing), it could
be a quick return to NBA purgatory. Or was that hell?
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