Herald article

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

One of the postives of going 2-2  is that it seems to have forced our 
captains to look in the mirror a little bit. In today's Herald, Pierce says 
he's not passing the ball and Walker admits he's taking too many jump shots.

Still if the Celtics were 3-1 right now, honestly I'd be considerably more 
concerned about a business-as-usual attitude from Walker (30%FG) and Pierce 
(seventh on the team in assists.) That's got to change.

The two teams that beat us last week are sitting in first place, so they 
must have wailed on other teams besides us. We made a decent 4Q run at both 
of them too, even though they were at the tail end of B2Bs.

Still, the Celtics captains don't deserve to be rewarded with unearned 
victories at this stage. Its actually helpful to see a clear causality 
between how smart your play is and whether you ultimately win or lose. It 
doesn't always work out that way (they had it a bit too easy blowing 
weaklings Chicago and Cleveland out of the water) but hopefully the message 
is loud and clear. We could have beaten those teams if the captains, 
especially bin Walker, could re-do some of their poor decision-making.

But hopefully, the positive lessons will be reinforced this week in 
practice. And, yeah, I wouldn't mind if Obie were a little less of a 
cheerleader for his captains. I'm not convinced that he's just "fronting" 
to the public on behalf of his players, while being a lot tougher on them 
behind closed doors.

BTW, there is also a nice article on Joe Johnson in the Globe.
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/310/sports/Johnson_is_the_third_man_inP.shtml

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Copyright Boston Herald
http://www.bostonherald.com/sport/basketball/cs11062001.htm

``We have to do a better job of getting the ball into other people's 
hands,'' said Pierce, averaging 28.5 points per game. ``Our ball movement 
has been a problem so far, which should improve with more practice. The 
thing is, Antoine and I both have to do a better job of trusting our 
teammates.

``I'm disappointed that I only have six assists in four games. That's not 
good. That's not helping the team win. I feel like I've only played average 
so far. There's a lot of room for improvement.''

Walker's need for improvement is mainly with his aim. He's hit just 
30-of-100 shots from the field this season, a dismal 30 percent. Walker is 
actually 10 percent better on his 3-point attempts (16-for-40, 40 percent), 
a sign he is drawing a crowd of defenders anytime he posts up or drives to 
the basket. His other numbers are solid - 11.3 rebounds and 5.5 assists per 
game.

``Obviously, I haven't shot the ball well, but I'm confident that's going 
to change,'' said Walker. ``A few easy baskets, the kind you get in 
transition for example, can turn things around. I think we've had to work 
too hard for our offense a lot of the time.

``When teams have stopped us from getting out on the break, we're in the 
halfcourt doing too much standing around. I'm shooting too many jump shots, 
as a team we're shooting too many jump shots. That's something we're 
definitely going to be working on.''