Your Morning Dump... Where you could see this one coming from a mile away

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.

After Monday’s practice, Boston Celtics head coach Brad Stevens was asked about the difference between expecting to win and hoping to win.

I share his answer only because I found it interesting and wise.

“As a coach, I’ve never expected to win because winning’s really hard,” Stevens said. “It’s much more easy to lose a game than win a game. I think the first time I heard that was from coach (Bobby) Knight. Coach Knight used to say no matter what, it is hard to win a basketball game. You should always realize that when you’ve come back into a locker room after you’ve won.

MassLive, December 2013

You could see last night’s result coming. I was talking about it with my dad at our favorite lunch spot yesterday. Mike Dynon sounded a cautionary tone in yesterday morning’s dump. The Celtics were getting cocky, and they were going to get their clocks cleaned.

Rozier was part of a locker room that was subdued for good reason. The Bucks surprised the Celtics immediately in Game 3 by playing smaller lineups and switching everything, forcing the Celtics to beat them with mismatches inside and inefficient post-ups. The Celtics tried to go to the paint, particularly with Al Horford and Greg Monroe, but the Bucks helped well and forced Boston into many of the same types of turnovers Milwaukee committed in the first two games.

“They were very active, they did a lot of switching,” Rozier said. “Obviously they had a game plan to come out and play very hard. And it worked.”

MassLive

Milwaukee had a decent game plan, but they were also motivated. The Celtics–as is their habit from time to time–showed up thinking that there mere presence on the basketball court would be sufficient to beat the Bucks.

Not so.

Every guy on the Bucks is on an NBA contract. Every one of those guys is an exceptionally talented basketball player. Beating them will never be a matter of showing up and scaring them with past results.

The Bucks went into game 2 thinking that they got jobbed in game 1. Their minds weren’t in the right spot and they got hammered. Well, the same thing happened to the Celtics last night. Mentally, they seem to have already been enjoying whatever bratwurst & beer scented nightlife Milwaukee had to offer them postgame. And they got popped right in the nose.

Fortunately, the C’s will probably do alright in game 4, and hopefully this team full of newbies will chalk this up as a lesson learned.

Page 2: Profiles of the young ‘uns

Brown would not attend a single day of school that week. His physical and mental devastation over the loss prompted a discourse with his mother, who spelled out her expectations. Disappointment, she explained, is part of life, and you must use it to grow stronger. It’s fine to be passionate about basketball, but it cannot matter more than family, education, your health.

This is your mantra, Mechalle advised her teenage son: Basketball is not who you are. It’s what you do.

“It was a turning point,” Mechalle says. “Jaylen needed to understand life was going to throw a lot of things at you, but you can’t let them make or break you.”

…

Stevens stressed to Brown it wasn’t so much his errors, but the groove of the new lineup that was keeping him sidelined. He urged his young forward to stay ready for the next series. “After we were done,” Steven says, “I remember thinking, ‘Man, when this guy gets back in, he’s going to be a monster.'”

Brown knew everyone was watching to see how he reacted to his reduced role — including his ever-vigilant mom — so he channeled his disappointment into a resolve to pounce on the next opportunity.

“There was no room for any kind of negativity,” Brown explains. “No time for emotional temper tantrums. No one has tolerance for that, especially on a winning team.

ESPN

Brandy, who had Jayson when she was a freshman in college, sometimes babysat for a neighbor and received dinners in return. Jayson would knock on the door when it was time to eat, and the family would usually give him a frozen chicken pot pie to bring home. His mother would tell him to eat the filling and leave just the crust for her.

“My mom tried to not let me see how much we were struggling, but I noticed it,” Tatum said. “I think that’s what made me work harder. I saw how hard she was working, and I just wanted a better life for both of us.”

…

“They’d come over just to give him a hug,” said Tatum’s grandmother, Rose Mary Johnson, who lived nearby. “They knew he was going to cry after he lost. He’d be as red as a beet.”

When Tatum was 8, his father returned from a brief, injury-plagued pro basketball career in Holland to focus on training his son. Justin Tatum worked as a substitute teacher and eventually became the varsity basketball coach at Soldan High. Jayson started practicing with that team when he was just 9 years old.

…

“I was always chasing Brad (Bradley Beal),” Tatum said. “And he always told me to be better than him and break his records. He said he didn’t have anybody like that to encourage him or look up to, so he wanted to give that to me.”

…

Tatum was battling a severe sinus infection, and the cross-country flight made him feel worse. He went from Logan Airport to Stevens’s home in Wellesley for dinner. Tracy Stevens cooked steak and chicken, but Tatum had no appetite. He told them he was full, but the truth was that he felt awful.

“If I’d eaten something, I would’ve thrown up at the table,” he said. “I thought I might pass out while Brad was talking to me.”

As Tatum sat at dinner, one part of this draft process still had him baffled. He asked Stevens why anybody would ever trade away the No. 1 overall pick.

“He just said to me, ‘We feel like the guy we want we can still get at No. 3,’ ” Tatum said. “But he didn’t say it was me.”

…

“When he was younger, he’d tell me what the other players were going to do if basketball didn’t work out,” Brandy says. “Then he’d tell me he didn’t have a Plan B, and didn’t want one. So I’d say, ‘All right, let’s make this happen then. Let’s get it.’ ”