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

On a night where Marcus Smart and Avery Bradley combined for 36 minutes and five points, we can look to the John Wall & Bradley Beal backcourt as something to aspire towards becoming. Wall–in his fifth year–may look light years ahead of Smart, but when Wall joined the league his struggles often mimicked what Smart is going through now. High turnover rates and inefficient scoring are the reality for Smart and Bradley, and neither is as naturally gifted as their Washington counterparts. Still, if they remain in the starting lineup together over the long haul, they have the potential to be a top-tier defensive backcourt. Though the offense will remain a question mark until we know what Smart brings to the table, we can look at Wall and Beal as players who compliment each other well and don’t dominate the ball. Chemistry, trial and error, and learning the NBA game will be taking place this season. But there’s progress to be made.

Page 2: Sully says people think C’s are sweet and soft

For Jared Sullinger, there was no need to sugarcoat Boston’s 101-88 loss at Washington, a game that was far more lopsided than the final score would indicate.

“Teams are just coming out smashing us in the mouth,” Sullinger said. “We just have to be prepared for that. People feel like we’re sweet, we’re soft. We just have to play tougher.”

CSNNE – Sullinger: ‘People think we’re sweet, soft’

A fairly ironic quote coming from Sully, though he is right in his assessment. Without an obvious leader on the roster, there will be times where nobody steps up and it’ll look a lot like last night’s loss to Washington. We’ve seen certain guys handle leadership duties in spurts, but without a head, the Celtics can expect to be viewed as sweet and soft moving forward.

Danny chose to draft Marcus Smart in part due to his leadership ability and winner’s mentality. Those traits are nice to have, but the reality is that you can’t lead a team until you’ve been able to lead yourself. Smart is struggling (as are most rookies), and he’s not really in a spot to act as a consistent leader until he figures out his own game on the NBA level.

And finally, here’s a guy smelling Lavoy Allen

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Make of it what you will.

The rest of the links:

Grantland – Your burning Josh Smith questions answered

ESPN – KG pulls a Stevenson, blows in West’s ear

CelticsBlog – Relive how Bird and Johnson first met as NBA rookies