Don't Let The Early Games Fool You, The Boston Celtics Still Need Help

 

        Just over two years ago, I posted my first article on this column. In that piece, I wrote about how the early-season Celtics still needed help despite reeling off a string of wins. Following that piece, they would go on to lose Kemba Walker and Jaylen Brown for long stretches and eventually lose in five games in the first round to the Brooklyn Nets. While they’ve since avenged that loss, It disappoints me that so much later in a season that feels so far removed from those Celtics, I have to write a piece with such a similar tone. So once again, don’t let certain games fool you, the Celtics still need help.

POST ASG BLUES

Since the All-Star break, the Celtics are 6-5 and have lost the first overall seed to the Milwaukee Bucks, something that they’re unlikely to take back. Following another gutting loss to the NBA’s second-worst team, the Houston Rockets, the Celtics are making a troubling trend of not being able to beat bad teams even more prevalent. The loss to Houston adds on to their poor run of form against the bottom of the NBA’s standings as it’s added to their three losses to Orlando, thrashings against Oklahoma City and Indiana, and their inconsistency against the Chicago Bulls. However, they won’t play these bottom-of-the-barrel teams in the postseason, so is it really a concern?

For postseason concerns, the Celtics will likely pick up a top-three seed, meaning that they won’t have to play bottom-of-the-barrel teams, but they also might have to play other teams that they’ve also struggled against. Assuming they hold at two or three in the East, they’ll probably play one of Miami, New York, or Brooklyn in the first round. How’d they do against those teams? Not great, but not too bad.

Miami

The 2022 and 2023 Miami Heat are night and day. While on paper the Celtics should dominate these Heat, it’s always close when these two teams meet. The Celtics are 2-2 against Miami this year with both of those losses coming in their most recent games against Miami. The wins, much like the Celtics' season as a whole, were determined by the Celtics’ electric three-point shooting. In the wins, the Celtics shot 46.2 percent from three on 39 attempts per game. In the losses, they shot just 32.4 percent on 38.5 attempts per game. The point of showing that statistic is that when the Celtics make threes, they win. When they don’t, they tend to lose. It will always be physical against Miami, but the Celtics should take care of business were they to see an Eastern Conference Finals rematch in round one.

New York

In a much different way, the Knicks are also night and day from last year. They’ve had a fantastic 2023, with new additions Jalen Brunson and Josh Hart having a notable impact on their success. This season, the Celtics are just 1-3 against the Knicks and have gone 0-3 in the 2023 calendar year. It’s hard to explain through numbers why the Celtics struggle so much against the Knicks, but if I had to point the finger at anything it’d be the defense. Outside of the fall-off the Celtics’ defense has had as an overall unit this year, they’ve been notably bad against New York. They surrender their fifth-worst defensive rating against the Knicks, but every team worse than fifth only has two games played against the Celtics compared to New York’s four. In the two home games against the Knicks, they’ve lost both close games in heartbreaking fashion. In the first home loss, the Celtics came all the way back from 14 down in the fourth to force overtime, score the first five points in that frame, then proceeded to blow that lead to lose by three. In the next home game, the Celtics managed to get the game to double-overtime despite being without Malcolm Brogdon and Robert Williams, but again, could not close. While injuries can be an excuse for these games, as Brogdon, Williams, Jaylen Brown, and Marcus Smart have missed at least one game against the Knicks this year, it’s still not a good excuse. They’ll probably have injuries this postseason just like last year and they have to find a way to finish and manage their bench.

Brooklyn

The relationship between the Celtics and Nets is a very unique one. While they dominated the Nets when they had a “superteam”, they’ve struggled when KD and Kyrie are not in the Nets’ lineup. Even going back to the years when the Nets weren’t that good, the Celtics could never get over the hump, but would never play them any time things mattered, so it didn’t quite matter. Out of these three teams, Boston would probably want to play Brooklyn, as the only loss was a huge blown lead in early March. They figuratively ended Brooklyn’s current era of contending last postseason right before it literally ended during this year’s trade deadline. If both teams can hang around their current seeds, we could see a first-round rematch that would look very different.

While they could play each of these three teams in the first round, the Celtics have to focus on winning out on their schedule. While it’s not likely they take back the one seed from Milwaukee, they get to play Milwaukee once more with tiebreaker rights on the line, so it’s best they sharpen up before then. Six out of their next seven games leading up to the matchup with the Bucks at the end of March are teams that are in the play-in or below, so it’s the perfect time to go on a run. What do the Celtics need to go on this run? To quickly fix the problems that are plaguing them, something that might be harder said than done.

SHOOTING, DEFENSE, AND EFFORT SHOULDN’T BE HARD FOR CONTENDERS

SHOOTING

Live by the three, die by the three. I remember seeing passing highlights of the Celtics from early in the season where the ball would pop at least five times, touch everyone, and just as someone was about to go up for an open layup, they’d find someone else for an even more open three. Looking back, when those types of shots go in, it’s awesome. However, when they aren’t, it hurts. Before the All-Star break, the Celtics were tied for fifth in three-point percentage and were second in three-point attempts per game. If the numbers stayed like this, their way of playing and tendency to die by the three would be justified. Of the top ten games of most threes attempted in Celtics history, six have come this season. This isn’t surprising based on the way the league is going, with three-point attempts only going up year to year, but it shows a tendency that isn’t great when things level out. After the All-Star break, the Celtics have remained near the top of the league in three-point attempts, at fourth, but have crashed to tenth in percentage. That rate is one that is not sustainable in the long run. As they approach the playoffs, this group has to get back to a team that barrels to the basket and forces the opponent to work on defense. The Celtics look like they just run out of gas because teams outwork them and this offensive strategy can exhaust offenses and make defense feel that much more tiring. All of their problems were caused in tandem, so they must be fixed in tandem and that starts with fewer three-point shots. Once the offense is flowing, that momentum should feed right into the defense.

DEFENSE

Last season, the Celtics' defense was historic, boasting the best defensive rating in the league by a wide margin and one of the bests ever. There was no expectation that they would live up to that defense this year, but they should’ve at least gotten close. In the current NBA where the offense has been inflated to oblivion, the Celtics have fallen from by far the best defense to just the fourth best, well behind the third-place Bucks and just ahead of the fifth-place Bulls. Since the All-Star break, they’ve ranked just 16th in defensive rating and struggled in close games. When it matters and even when it doesn’t, the Celtics haven’t been able to defend. It’s not even about team defense either, as the individual defense has taken a major step back. The Celtics’ two best regularly healthy defenders are pretty universally accepted as Jayson Tatum and the reigning DPOY, Marcus Smart. Last season, they gave up .8 and .58 points per possession, both ranking near the top of the league. This season, while Tatum has retained his defensive value at .76 points per possession, Marcus Smart has had the quietist fall-off on this roster, with his defense per possession basically being chopped in half, as he’s giving up 1.1 points per possession which is below average. On the year, Smart has been close to a negative defender and boasts a net rating of just 4.7, a far cry of the 9.3 he accumulated last season. It’s also been hard for the Celtics to hold onto leads which isn’t surprising when the same offensive sluggishness is paired with a defense that is no longer generationally elite. However, it can still be fixed. A lot of defense is just effort. On paper, there aren’t many negative defenders on the roster. A lot of the problem is effort.

EFFORT

To be fair to the players, this part of the season is not kind to the previous season’s contenders. In fact, it never has been. There’s a notorious slump that contenders hit when it’s almost the playoffs, but there’s still a lot of slack on their regular season rope. The Celtics are currently here. While the Bucks are starting to feel some pressure to get back to the Finals after last year’s failure and their aging core, the Celtics just look content. They won’t run fast breaks, they won’t get back on defense, and they’ll falter in the clutch. It’s mostly the little things, though. Missed clutch free throws, missed open layups, quick and bad shots, and tipping rebounds are just a few of the things that have cost the Celtics in recent games and in their recent disappointment in Houston. The Celtics, in my viewing opinion, are overthinking their game plan. A lot of this comes from Joe Mazzulla’s new strategy of not calling timeouts in the middle of quarters, but a lot of it is also fatigue. These players look mentally resigned right now. Nobody is currently on the same page offensively and there isn’t one player that is showing any urgency. Somebody in that locker room has to step up and lead both on and off the court. The effort to win, mainly defensively, just isn’t there and I place the burden on one player, that player being Marcus Smart. Before the break and even a little bit prior to this calendar year, he looked like a pass-first, defensive rock that he turned into last year. After the injury comeback, he seemed to revert back to the Smart of old that all of Boston almost got brain aneurysms from. He’s now chucking more threes, taking more defensive risks, and passing less. He needs to get back to playing selfish basketball. When Smart takes less than 11 shots this year, the Celtics are 21-7. When he takes more, they’re 9-9. That’s the difference between a contender and a play-in team. As shown by last season, his effort and energy are contagious. Not to be too on the nose, but as Jaylen Brown put it, the energy needs to “shift”. More specifically, once Marcus Smart’s energy shifts, I feel this team will follow suit.

So what?

My thoughts on the Celtics this year have been very up and down. As noted by my almost daily Twitter rants about this team, they’re the stupid underdog that I want to ride all the way to the top. Will it happen this year? In my opinion, probably not. While the Bucks and Sixers don’t scare me in the East, nearly every other team does. The Celtics have not proved that in this part of the season, they can win important games. It remains to be seen whether or not they can “flip the switch” and return to title form in time for a run. Now, what gives me hope is the Western Conference. Not one team out West moves me. If the Celtics or Bucks get out of the Eastern Conference, they will win the championship and you can take that for data. Even though I’m confident about the “ifs” of the Celtics, they might be too strong for me to pick them to win it all. At this point in the year, if I’m picking a champion, I’ll take the Bucks over the Suns in a 2021 rematch in six games. I hope I’m wrong. I’ll be doing another, much longer piece before the postseason and give my updated prediction then. However, right now, I’m not so optimistic about my hometown team. So, don’t let the early games fool you, the Boston Celtics still need help.

Adam Zimmerman-Diaz

IG - @adam.zd

Twitter - @TheSatBlues