Boston's three centers

["j.hironaka" <j.hironaka@unesco.org>]

Hi, I want to throw out some stats regarding the Celtics center rotation as 
it compares to that of say the Milwaukee Bucks (a similar 
perimeter-oriented team, aside from the fact they went 7-games into the 
conference finals). Anyway, the Bucks are a nice example of a donut team 
(no center) that can win.

I've actually never come down all that hard on our three-headed center 
committee, even though very clearly I haven't been a Tony Battie fan.

That has to do with the incident where he turned up the music on a black 
cop asking him to move his SUV, then shut the window and dragged the cop 
down the street. That's the worst kind of intra-racial disrespect and I 
truly hate that kind of stuff (like Asian Americans who refuse to be seen 
with other Asians). Plus there was the incident where he's in the same room 
with Pierce watching his teammate get stabbed 19 times, and he gets out 
without a scratch. It probably isn't fair, but that's not how I like to 
picture a Boston Celtic. Unless he's a great player or something. ;-)

Okay back to the original subject. Without all the caveats that go into 
comparisons of production per 48 minutes, here are the Celtics and Bucks 
centers.

Battie/Potsie/Blount 2000-2001
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959 rebounds=11.975 per 48 minutes
159 blocks= 1.985 per 48 minutes

Ervin Johnson/Scott Williams/Mark Pope 2000-2001
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1124 rebounds=12.861 per 48 minutes
155 blocks=1.77 per 48 minutes

I'm too lazy to go any further hear, but steals and assists were basically 
identical on a per minutes basis. Also I didn't include the two rookies 
(Moiso and Pryzbilla) because they were non-factors last year.

There's a lot more that can be said or further explored. Milwaukee truly 
had crap centers last year, hardly something to aspire towards. By 
comparison, Boston had two lottery picks and a legitimate 7-footer in our 
center rotation. The Bucks managed to win without shotblocking, but they 
also rebounded the ball reasonably well compared to our "Big Three" 
centers. What else is new? ;-)

One last stat, just to illustrate how mediocre the Boston and Milwaukee 
center situation is:

Nazr Mohammed 2000-2001 (28 games after trade)
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252 rebounds=16.89 per 48 minutes
28 blocks=1.877 per 48 minutes