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.
The Celtics did not practice yesterday, and they will not be on the court today either. That is not by league rule; rather it is a Brad Stevens dictate.
The C’s flew back home late Wednesday night from Charlotte, N.C. — at least some of them did. Many will take advantage of the hole their coach opened in the team calendar to fast break home for the holiday.
The team charter for tomorrow’s game against the Detroit Pistons will take off at 5 p.m. today, but if players are elsewhere they simply have to be at the club’s hotel for a team dinner tonight at 8.
Between late Wednesday night and then, Stevens didn’t want the Celts to be about basketball.
“It’s a long season,” Stevens said. “Family’s important to me, and I want that to be important to all of them — and it is important to them.
“I want to give them every chance to live that and be true to talking about that.”
So this is pretty cool. Brad Stevens pretty much turned the team loose from the end of the game Wednesday until a team dinner in Detroit tonight.
As fans, we might be a bit miffed that the Celtics are not one of the NBA’s choices on what is a, let’s be honest here, ridiculous helping of basketball doled out every Christmas (Seriously: A third of the NBA plays on Christmas). Yes, it’s irritating that the NBA is happy to serve up steamed restaurant garbage to a national TV audience as long as it comes in a Lakers wrapper. But at the same time, a move like this means a lot for the guys who get paid to play. Check out Amir’s quote from the article above:
“I mean, that’s huge for guys,” said Amir Johnson, who headed to Detroit early to be with cousins last night and today. “He’s a very family-oriented guy, and, for me, I haven’t spent Christmas with my family in maybe like five years.
In the short term, this doesn’t give the Celtics much of a competitive edge, but over the long haul, goodwill like this pays dividends. And like Stevens pointed out, this is an opportunity for him to put some meaning behind all that talk about family.
(and yes, I shamelessly borrowed that pic from the Herald article. It was just too good to use only once)
Page 2: Where the more, the merrier
Boston’s ability to have multiple, high-impact scorers in every game is the key to victory.
Because, as we’ve seen this season, an over-reliance on one or two players is a roll of the dice when it comes to winning for Boston.
In the month of December, Boston has had two games in which they had three or fewer double-digit scorers.
That was against Atlanta on Dec. 18 and Cleveland three days earlier, with both games ending in a Celtics loss.
But this month, Boston has played nine games that ended with them having at least four double-digit scorers.
And their record in such games was 6-3, with the losses coming on the road at Detroit and San Antonio, in addition to a double overtime loss at home to the then-undefeated Golden State Warriors.
Sherrod Blakely’s basically quantifying something that most of us sort of already knew; that this team is much better when they get as many players involved as possible. This is, if anything, the exact opposite of the later “Big Three” years, where Rondo facilitated Pierce, KG and Allen, and everybody else–and that’s literally everybody else–just kind of stood around (I’m sure we all remember the grand total of 2 bench points from Game 7 vs. Miami in 2012–the end of the Big Three era).
Finally: A dead monkey
Next thing you know, there were about five guys in suits coming around the corner [looking for us] and they wanted the monkey.
Boston.com Part 1,Part 2,Part 3
Earlier this year, Boston.com tracked down the legendary dead monkey in the old Boston Garden. These days what with the kids and their long-form journalism, why not settle in for a lengthy read on a monkey and the guys who tore down the Garden (warning: these articles contain graphic photos of the Boston Garden demolition, and also a dead monkey)
The rest of the link:
CSNNE: Olynyk making the most of his opportunity (that’s pretty much it for today–and, fair warning, that’s a video not an article)
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