Your Morning Dump... Where trust *THIS* process.

Every morning, we compile the links of the day and dump them here… highlighting the big story line. Because there’s nothing quite as satisfying as a good morning dump.

Embiid had just given Philly a 106-104 lead with two free throws with 28.1 seconds left. The Celtics came out of a timeout, got good movement, and capitalized when Kelly Olynyk found an open Horford in the right corner for a 3-pointer and a 107-106 Celtics lead with 17.2 seconds left.

Down the other end the Celtics pressured Philly into a frantic possession that ended with an Ersan Ilyasova miss, which Amir Johnson rebounded.

Boston Herald

One of our new ink-stained wretches provided the recap of last night’s game. I’m here to talk big picture, wherein last night’s “game” counts only as a W.

A game where you may have heard an assortment of Sixers fans chanting ‘Trust the process’

"Trust The Process" chants in Boston! pic.twitter.com/DFwEGfc8ea

— max (@MaxOnTwitter) January 7, 2017

“Trust the process” is, basically, Joel Embiid’s nickname, by this point in time.

And a few people have written about how the Sixers might be poised to ‘break out’ behind Embiid. At least one popular Celtics blogger has advocated a Sixers-style demolition of the current team.

Well. How has that worked out for Philly? Are they closer to contention than the Celtics are? No. Do they have more assets to trade than the Celtics? No. Are they a better free agent destination? No.

Folks, this is a nine win team that is looking up only because last year’s version was a ten win team. They have had a pile of lottery picks and have used three of them to draft three centers, and all together, they have drafted five players to fill two positions (Noel/Saric/Embiid/Okafor/Simmons).

Boston had more wins last season than Philadelphia had in the last three.

Yes, it’s fun to have an Embiid (or a Giannis, or a Porzingis) on your team. It’s fun to watch the highlights and dream about imagined future dominance–when a whole series of vaguely defined circumstances align themselves just right. But all you have to do is look at New Orleans or Sacramento to see just how little one transcendent player does for a team composed of poor personnel decisions and over-hyped lottery picks (remember: Golden State has Klay Thompson because Sacramento picked Jimmer Fredette).

Hype around other teams’ marquee players and unreasonable expectations lead to this idea that maybe the Celtics’ strategy isn’t ideal: After all, Milwaukee picked Giannis, and Boston traded UP in order to NOT pick him. But one draft pick doesn’t change a team’s fortunes. The Spurs wouldn’t be The Spurs if they paired Tim Duncan with, say, Rick Pitino, instead of Gregg Popovich. And as for the Cavs? Remember that the Cavs got LeBron back after they mysteriously drew three number one picks in five years (and whiffed on one of them, big time).

No, the “Process” hasn’t changed since Red Auerbach traded Easy Ed to St. Louis in order to land Bill Russell. Yes, you can get all sorts of attention by claiming that someone-or-another is ‘disrupting’ the way things work–like how Mike D’Antoni + Super Steve Nash = Revolutionary New Basketball and not “Enjoyable regular season play that almost but not quite gets it done in the playoffs” just like when he was coaching the Suns. You can also get clicks by arguing the popular/contrarian take that Sam Hinkie was right all along, and that a very good rookie on a truly awful team ‘proves’ that the ‘process’ worked. But in the end, the way you build a winning team hasn’t changed much: Keep your options open, don’t make lateral moves, don’t listen to the fans, and take advantage of any opportunities that come along.

Anyway, sorry for the rant. It was a slow news day for the Celtics apart from the game.

Page 2: Heh

IT had fun with Embiid: "He said he was going to guard me on a switch. I said, ‘Nobody stops me on a switch, especially not your big ass.’"

— Mark Murphy (@Murf56) January 7, 2017

Page 3: Where Concord’s own Matt Bonner is retiring

I made a video. pic.twitter.com/NQSvvCnhD5

— Matt Bonner (@mattbonner_15) January 6, 2017

Finally: The story of the “Aw Jeez” dude from yesterday’s dump.

It was a time when information didn’t fly around the world in a nanosecond; when images were captured on film, not computer chips; when television commercials were performed live; when product advertising supplied newspapers and magazines with a rich and steady lifeblood.

It was also a time when it was still possible to be a famous face without a famous name. In fact, Jim Horne may have been asked more often than anyone else, “Don’t I know you from somewhere?”

…

He learned the lesson of how evanescent celebrity could be without a famous name. Few, if any, of his photographs still strike a familiar chord. Well, maybe one does: a jokey shot taken in 1953 (whose rights he signed away), showing him with a sour, headachey expression of generic woe; it has been used dozens of times, even in the last decade, in ads for aspirin, tax services, hangover remedies and other stress relievers. His wife said it didn’t bother him that this was the image that survived.

“To him it was a job you did,” Mrs. Horne said. “And then you went fishing.”

New York Times

Click through to read the story of Jim Horne–who passed away in December, 2009, having survived long enough to both become a meme and have a sense of perspective about it.

(hey, like I said, it was a slow news day).