Celtics Center 12-1

["Ozersky, Joshua A" <OzerskyJA@corning.com>]

Through Many Dangers, Toils and Snares...


Sometimes it's not easy being a Boston Celtics fan.   Consider this past week.  Oh, by the 
time you read this the narrative will have changed, and the Celtics will have either battened 
on a Hardaway-less Miami team and an Iverson-less Sixers, or will be bearing the shame of 
losing to either of these crippled conference rivals.  But my mind is still fixated on the 
events of the last week, and struck by how emblematic they are of the NBA season's 
vicissitudes, particularly for a young and growing team.


The Celtics, with a surprising winning record and a number of quality wins under their belt, 
looked at the week coming up with a sense of urgency.  There would be home games 
against Indiana (whom they had never beaten in their young careers), San Antonio (the 
champs), Milwaukee (a young team everyone said was better than them), and Atlanta (who
 beat them twice in the preseason).  Adding to the urgency was the fact that December 
loomed as a nightmare of scheduling, and that two of the four four games were chockablock
 with the always inescapable Celtics backstory - the living legend being the coach of the Pacers, and San Antonio having as its featured focus the very man the Celtics organization 
infamously demeaned itself for a year in order to get.  (Beat writer Michael Holley even indulged in an entire morning-after column cursing the fates and their proxy pingpong balls.)  To win two out of four would be good; to win none was unthinkable.  In the first game, the team went out and beat the Pacers with a furious fourth quarter stance by the much maligned bench, and Celtics fans  everywhere breathed easier.


But lo!  Up next was the San Antonio spurs, and they inflicted an asswhipping so cruel that
 even devoted dish owners such as myself could not bear to watch.  Two nights later, the Green seemingly made up for it by executing as well offensively as they had all season, and taking the hotshot bucks down into the green torture chamber, leading them by 20 in the second half.  And then they gave up the lead and lost the game!  Holy shit!  How such a thing could happen, and how the very next night against Atlanta it could happen again, is a 
problem that defies analysis.  As I write this, the team has five days off before its next game,
 so the cruel psychological breakdown can not be exorcised except on the practice floor - 
where the celtics will be spending a lot of $%*&@ing time if I know Rick Pitino.

The team ended November at an uninspiring .500, when it could easily have been ten and 
four, second in the conference.  (A giveaway win against the Chicago Bulls, of all people, 
is the other blown opportunity.)  I didn't see either of the comeback losses.  I 
returned from a Thanksgiving holiday to three straight losses and little to be 
thankful for,  in basketball terms anyway.

The players are not injured.  I hear about their defensive liabilities in man to man situations,
 but when we win, I hear how that is a strength.  Likewise our bench, which is supposedly a 
game breaker for us when we win but now has earned the reputation as  dead-end kids, 
has been derided for their lack of effort and selfish play.  The team knows they have to pass the ball; they know they have to take good shots; they know  they have to push the break whenever possible; so why don't they?  To be a fan of a young team like the Celtics means asking these baffling, frustrating questions.   Much of the ill will attributed to Celtics boobirds no doubt derives from this strange new situation.
  
For the Celtics were always the team that was smarter, mentally tougher, more sound, the 
team that, whatever the age or physical disabilities of its members, had as its bedrock the 
fundamentals of team play.  Let the Atlanta Hawks build a team loaded with fast strong 
spectacular athletes.  Let the Lakers have a bench as long as the great wall of China, and the
 only two men in the league who could stop Bird and McHale.  We would still win or at least
 be in a position to win because we were already there mentally.  Now WE are the ones with 
the athletes and the talent, but with the mental battle already half lost every time we go to 
war.  Danny Fortson's return should help this a lot, is my prediction:  his aggressiveness 
and selflessness will set a good tone for the starting unit, and the demotion of Adrian 
Griffin to the second unit should provide the glue and mental stability it seems to need so 
badly.  Of course, over the next weeks, the team could play so well that Fortson will himself 
come off the bench; or Pitino may decide to send Paul Pierce down in Griffin's stead, or to 
lose the whole concept of a pressing unit entirely.  As long as we win, it doesn't matter.  
Winning gets us closer to the playoffs, and winning builds the confidence and chemistry 
which keeps the Atlantas and Milwaukees of the world slapped down into the outer 
darkness where they belong.

Practice hard, Celtics!  Just one month to go of .500 ball and Fortson will be back, and the 
bad opponents with him.  The next month is a trial indeed.

 <<celtics12-1.doc>>

celtics12-1.doc