SportsGuy latest on the C's (i feel the same way)

[Kevin Lok <kevin.lok@lycosmail.com>]

http://home.digitalcity.com/boston/sportsguy/main.dci?page=3celts00

1/11 EDITION: What's wrong with the Celts? Is the
season going in the tank? And is Big Poppa ready
to turn on the Rick-tator?

Before we try to figure out why the Celtics
Bandwagon went careening into a highway divider,
here's a statistical comparison that will numb you
to your very core:
Record of the 1997-98 Celts after 33 games: 15-18
Record of the 1999-00 Celts after 33 games: 14-19
That wasn't a misprint. As it stands right now,
the Celtics have actually regressed over the past
two seasons.
How is that possible, you ask? When you break
things down on paper, it seems to be an
impossiblity. Consider the following facts:
--1. Antoine Walker is two years older.
--2. Paul Pierce in his sophomore season is a much
better all-around player than Ron Mercer was in
his rookie season (not to mention a bonafide
crunch-time guy).
--3. The center combo of Vitaly Potapenko and Tony
Battie is infinitely more accomplished and
flexible than the '98 center combo of Andrew
DeClercq and Travis Knight.
--4. Struggling rookie Chauncey Billups wasn't
even in the same stratosphere as a healthy Kenny
Anderson.
--5. Adrian Griffin is playing more minutes at the
3-spot as Walter McCarty did during the '98 season
(32.3 to 28.9) and he's a much better all-around
player.
--6. The '98 team didn't have anything remotely
approaching Danny Fortson's rebounding off the
bench.
--7. The Eric Williams/Cal Cheaney combo is
averaging just about the same minutes off the
bench than the less accomplished combo of Greg
Minor and Bruce Bowen averaged in '98 (39.3 to
37.9)... and they're both better ballplayers.
--8. During the first 33 games of the '98 season,
nobody had defined roles. For instance, four
people were playing point guard (Billups, Dee
Brown, Dana Barros and Tyus Edney) and McCarty,
Mercer, Walker and Minor were all sharing the
3-spot. This year's team doesn't have that same
problem -- everyone knows their role.
--9. The '98 team had serious defensive problems,
most notably at center, where any team with a
low-scoring big man had a field day. On paper,
this year's group seems like it can match up with
anybody. The '98 team also got killed on the
boards, especially by teams with good low-post
players. This year's group is one of the better
all-around rebounding teams in the league.
--10. The '98 team was still figuring out Rick
Pitino's system... this year's team knows exactly
where it's supposed to be at all times.
And yet if the '98 team (after 33 games) played
the '00 team (after 33 games), my money would be
on the '98 team. Why?
They played their hearts out.
Anyone who attended those games that season
remembers how hard that team played -- they were
undermanned and undersized, but they never gave an
inch and they always kept fighting. The '98 C's
had balls and swagger, even with Chauncey
directing the half-court offense with all the
precision of an 87-year-old man backing into a
parking space. They were precocious as hell. They
knew they weren't that talented and they knew they
were undersized, but they also knew that they
could break their opponents' will and steal a few
wins here and there.
With the '98 team, you always got your money's
worth. With this year's team, you don't. And
that's been the season in a nutshell.
***** ***** ***** ***** *****
But are the Y2K Celts salvagable?
First, a disclaimer: the logo for this year's team
should be a black cat, because every time you
think they're about to make a run, something
terrible happens: Fortson fracturing his foot
before the first preseason game; Pierce spraining
his ankle right before a pivotal road swing; then
Griffin spraining his ankle during the only easy
break in the schedule for two solid months.
Even seven days ago, I was convinced that the
Celts could make a legitimate run at a playoff
spot. It just seemed like the pieces were finally
coming together: the starting five was developing
a nice little chemistry with Pierce returning to
the lineup; Walker was finally playing to his
potential; and the bench was rounding into shape
as Fortson rounded himself into shape after his
foot healed. Best of all, the C's were playing
good basketball for prolonged periods of time --
for instance, when they lost in New York last
week, they might have played their best half of
the season in the first half, staying close even
though the Knicks were shooting the lights out.
For the first time, I actually thought they could
potentially contend in the East. Swear to God.
Then the wheels came off last weekend, starting
with Griffin's sprained ankle in Chicago and
ending with shocking back-to-back losses to the
Bulls and Grizzlies, two games which probably sent
the season into such a tailspin that only Maverick
and Goose could pull us out of it. With the
exception of Pierce, the unselfish Griffin is
Boston's most indispensable player; you almost
have to play basketball to see all the things AG
does for his team. To have him snatched from the
lineup for three weeks -- with a painful
Williams/McCarty/Cheaney trifecta shoved in his
place, no less -- makes me want to start slamming
my head against my desk. In fact, I think I will.
(THWACK!)
(SLAM!)
Ouch.
(POW!!)
(SPLACK!)
Anyway, as tough as Griffin's loss was to digest,
it pales in comparison to four other problems
nagging this year's team. So here they are -- aka,
"The Four Major Problems" -- in order of
least-pressing priority to most-pressing priority:

Problem #1: The Antoine Dilemna
The saga rages on. Although Employee #8 has played
much harder since his infamous "little kid" game
against Miami last month -- which prompted me to
finally turn on him after three years of defending
him -- he still seems like a guy in search of an
identity.
Blame Rick Pitino for this one. Some nights,
Walker is posting up down low, hitting the boards,
running the floor and playing like a true power
forward; other nights he's running the half-court
offense and playing on the perimeter, which
doesn't cater to his strengths at all. To make
matters worse, I think Twan's too young and
immature to balance two roles at the same time and
vacillate back and forth from game to game. If he
could pull it off, it would be a godsend... but he
hasn't shown any semblance of consistency.
The coaching staff needs to nip this experiment in
the bud, pronto. Nobody wants to see Walker's
career turn out like Dee Brown's career, when Dee
shuttled back and forth between point guard and
shooting guard for the first four years of his
career and never ended up being good at either
position (thanks to then-coach Chris Ford, who
never received enough blame for the way he ruined
the fledgling careers if Brown, Brian Shaw and
Rick Fox, but that's another story).
As for Walker, he seems to have shelved much of
his on-court emotion from two seasons ago, and I
wonder if all the browbeating he's taken for his
outlandish behavior -- from the press, from
Pitino, from the home fans -- has affected his
play (to borrow an Austin Powers phrase, he's lost
his mojo). To his credit, he finally improved his
shot selection and started driving to the basket
-- remember, few NBA players work the baseline
better than Twan -- and his stats improved across
the board. Unfortunately, word spreads in the NBA,
and the new book on Walker reads like this:
"Always tries to take it to the hole ... give him
the outside shot because's he's afraid to take it,
especially at home ... loves to go baseline, so
don't let him ... loves to turn his body and then
go to the jump-hook ... force him towards the
middle of the paint ... when he goes to the hole,
you can block his shot because he plays under the
basket ... if you block a few of his shots early,
he loses all of his confidence ... on the other
end, post him up and make him work defensively and
everything else will take care of itself."
And that's all it takes. Over the past four games,
Walker shot 25-for-73 from the field, with 18
turnovers, all while playing within the "team
concept." We've gone from one extreme to the
other.
One more thing on the Twan: He's become a
different player on the road and at home. At home
he rebounds, beats his man down the court, attacks
the hoop, looks for teammates, avoids dumb threes
and so on. On the road, he settles for jumpers,
gets technicals, doesn't rebound and generally
acts like a butthead (maybe because he isn't
afraid of being booed by his own fans). In the
last 17 games -- since the Miami game, which was
probably the worst game he played all year -- he's
played eight home games and nine road games. The
numbers tell the story.
* Home -- 68-for-141 from the field; 41-48 from
the line; 7-for-23 from 3-pt land; 9.3 rpg; 4.9
apg; 23.0 ppg.
* Road -- 61-for-165 from the field; 41-for-58
from the line; 10-for-46 from 3-pt land; 6.2 rpg,
1.7 apg; 19.3ppg.
Does that sound like a player who's improving in
his fourth season? If anything, I'd rather have
the Walker from two years ago -- he was maddening
and infuriating at times, but he never backed down
from anyone and his teammates fed off his energy.
He needs to find his mojo again... and it probably
won't happen in Boston. Too bad.
Problem #2: Paul Pierce is still hurt
The Truth was just putting together a run at the
All-Star team in early-December, playing the best
all-around basketball of any Celtic since Reggie
Lewis was alive and kicking. Then he injured his
ankle and he hasn't been the same since. Although
his numbers haven't declined, sometimes Pierce's
ankle just gives out on him, especially on drives
to the basket, and he's just not the same guy
defensively anymore (Pitino is afraid to press
defensively with Pierce's bad wheel, which hurts
the team because Pierce needs to play 35-40
minutes a game).
There's not much else to say here: Pierce was
right in the thick of that second-tier group of
All-Star 2-guards, along Ray Allen, Michael Finley
and Eddie Jones and one notch below Kobe and
Vince. Now? He's gutting it out from game to game.
It's a damned shame.
Problem #3: This team has no identity
With all its faults, the '98 team embraced that
"balls-to-the-wall/young legs" persona from the
get-go, with Antoine, Mercer and McCarty leading
the way. Teams hated to play them. You could see
it in their faces.
Now? I'm not sure what this team is supposed to
be. Pitino has apparently abandoned the press
because many of his players -- Potapenko, Fortson,
Walker, Anderson and (the still-injured) Pierce --
just aren't fit for that style. Sometimes he
messes around with a second unit press featuring
Battie, Williams, Cheaney, McCarty and Barros, but
the results just haven't been there for that
group. It's like PitinoBall rolled over and died.
Which brings us to the main problem...
Problem #4: Rick Pitino needs to start coaching
When you've won two road games all season and
you're losing at home to the Grizzlies,
something's obviously missing. Could the players
be tuning out their coach? During the last two
games, it sure seemed that way. I had the
misfortune of attending the Vancouver debacle, the
first home game all season where the players
really stopped fighting until the bitter end. We
could hear Pitino yelling at his players to
contain Mike Bibby and keep him from getting in
the paint... they never did. We could hear him
yelling at his players to move the ball around...
they settled for jumpers and never made the extra
pass. We could hear him urging the guys to
rebound... and Shareef Abdur-Rahim and Othella
Harrington kept killing them on the boards. The
Celts looked like zombies out there. All the
swagger was gone.
Before the season completely falls apart, Coach P
needs to stop blaming injuries and misfortune and
make the following decisions, pronto:
* Find a set rotation and stick with it, dammit.
We've been arguing on my old Celtics message board
on AOL about the set rotation for this team; in my
opinion, good teams have a set-in-stone starting
five and 3-to-4 additional players contributing
off the bench. More on this later.
* Decide whether to use the press or junk it
entirely. You can't have it both ways.
* Find a way to get Barros going because he's the
only guy on the second unit who can score. Even if
you have to play him with Kenny Anderson for 5-10
minutes a game, then do it -- Barros and Anderson
actually play well together, even if their lack of
size hurts the team defensively.
* Stop jerking Antoine around. Either put him down
low or put him on the perimeter. He can't handle
both roles. It's obvious.
* Work Fortson into the lineup, preferably
alongside Potapenko, and play him into shape. He's
the only guy on the team who can rebound AND
defend low-post scorers at the 4-spot like
Harrington (who lit Walker up for 27 points last
night) and Larry Johnson (who killed the C's in
both games in New York this year). And don't feed
me this baloney about Fortson getting into foul
trouble because he's "having trouble adjusting to
the new rules." Just play him.
* Stop giving so many minutes to McCarty, Williams
and Cheaney, three guys who are all 10th men at
best. There's no rational reason why Williams and
Cheaney should be averaging more than 39 combined
minutes a game this season when the Fort and
Battman both need more playing time.
And that's that.
If I were the head coach -- a frightening thought
because I'd probably drink on the bench -- I would
immediately move Fortson into the starting lineup
and push Walker over to Griffin's old 3-spot. When
Griffin comes back, I'd bring him off the bench
specifically to spell Walker and Pierce --
usurping the Wiliams/Cheaney combo and I'd use
Battie and McCarty to spell Potapenko and Fortson.
I'd also try to get Dana Barros at least 15
minutes a game, even if it meant playing him and
Anderson at the same time. I would make sure that
Walker or Pierce were on the court at all times.
And I'd order a hit on Pervis Ellison, which could
probably be done by someone in the North End for
ten grand, tops.
That would mean the minutes would be distributed
like this when everyone's healthy:
Walker -- 35
Fortson -- 27
Potapenko 29
Pierce -- 35
Anderson -- 33
Battie -- 25
Griffin -- 25
Barros -- 15
McCarty -- 9
Williams -- 6
Compare that to the box score from the best team
in the league -- the Lakers -- when they won in
Seattle this weekend:
Green -- 23
Rice -- 27
O'Neal -- 40
Bryant -- 43
Harper -- 24
Fox -- 21
Fisher -- 21
Horry -- 22
George -- 9
Shaw -- 8
Hey, it's not rocket science. It's a pretty simple
formula.
--Keep your best players on the court for as long
as possible.
--Use your bench to rest players and provide
different looks.
--Don't play your weaker players any more than you
have to play them.
Phil Jackson knows these three things. Rick Pitino
has yet to figure them out. Maybe that's why
Jackson makes such a great NBA coach and Pitino
probably belongs coaching the college game. There
IS a difference, after all.
Have the Y2K Celts suffered some bad breaks?
Absolutely. But the worst break of all may have
happened three years ago, when the owners
committed eight years and more than $50 million
for a coach who seems to be more of a hustler than
a savior. Great coaches adjust their systems
depending on the talent in place. Great coaches
get the most out of their players. Great coaches
don't make excuses. And when everything else falls
apart, great coaches just coach, the way Parcells
did with the Jets this year.
As things stand right now, Rick Pitino's Celtics
won't just miss the playoffs, they might finish
with a worse record than they did two seasons ago
-- when they were a team with less talent, less
size, less scoring, less experience, better
coaching, more swagger and much more heart.
I can't believe I'm saying this, but I miss those
guys.
****E-mail me at SPTGUY33****
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GUY
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 SOUND OFF
shaggy writes - "Trade Walker for Chicago's second
round draft pick if the Bulls are stupid enough to
go for it. Clas..." read more
(quotes are random)
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