It's way too early to write a team off… unless you're Oklahoma City. But no one can help but expect the NBA to come out and match their… well… expectations. We wanted to see Philly and Toronto fighting it out at 9-3 or 8-4 right now so we could point to the standings and say "see… we knew this would be a tough division."
But they didn't oblige, so their punishment is getting branded with the early "disappointment" label. There's no doubt Toronto fans are disappointed with their team's early performance… and they'll be even more disappointed when the Celtics thrash them today. The Raps won't have Jermaine O'Neal, who was on 5 game double double streak (and they weren't cheap, either) before getting hurt against the Nets. He's probably going to be replaced by Andrea Bargnani. That's going to be a mismatch in the Celtics favor, since Bargnani will either be muscled by Perk or mentally destroyed by KG.
The real reason, however, that the Raptors will continue to be disappointing will be their bench. Jason Kapono is still hitting 3's, but Jamario Moon is coming back down to earth. No one else is stepping up. That's going to be a problem against the Celtics. Get ready for another bench-led blowout. Does anyone think Sam Mitchell will last until the All Star break if this keeps up? Me neither… especially now that the head coach firings have begun.
The links today are all about Rondo… with Scott Souza, the Herald and the Globe all checking in with similar pieces on Rajon Rondo's scoring and his recent struggles. We here at Red's Army would like to welcome everyone to that storyline.
After the jump, the rest of the links, Sam Cassell's "unfurnished basement", Charles Barkley's new T-Mobile ad, and why huge Celtics fan Donnie Wahlberg is dead to me.
Herald: No need for Celtics to cease control | Globe: Brand fairly bland so far | T&G: Allen keeps making his points from the line
Here's the new Barkley-DWade T-Mobile ad… featuring Yao Ming (via Awful Announcing)
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdPdKKUbD9M]Sam Cassell is one free-wheelin' dude:
Kevin McHale came over and he was sitting with us and Cassell comes in and he (Cassell) always practiced in sweatpants. And McHale looks at Danny and I and he says, "Watch this." He says, "Sam, you wearing underwear?"
And Sam Cassell says, "Nope."
(insert terrified shudder here)
The Sacramento Kings have added Kevin Martin's agent to the front office.
And finally… Donnie Wahlberg is a Boston guy… and Boston guy's don't pull crap like this. I don't care that your concert was in New York. I wholly encourage boos or chants of "traitor" (set to the cadence of "Tray-ter"… kinda like "Darryl…. Darryl") the next time he shows up at a C's game.
Why would I turn on such a huge Celtics fan? Because of this:
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