new Hoopsworld column: The Return of Obieball

["Josh Ozersky" <jozersky1@xxxxxxxxxx>]

New column up...


I should apologize in advance, I suppose, for writing yet again about Jim
O'Brien and his perceived deficiencies.  Berating O'Brien has become almost
reflexive; and God knows I've done it often enough in this space.  Moreover,
O'Brien doesn't seem to deserve it.  Mike Gorman calls O'Brien "one of the top
five coaches in the NBA" and his players swear by him, a true rarity in the
NBA.  Indeed, O'Brien is an admirable leader in many ways.   But his strengths
lead to crippling weaknesses, and the paradox that is O'Brien has never been
more dangerous than it is now.
Call it the Return of Obieball.

You remember Obieball.  An unwavering committment to team defense, both in
practice and in games, and a mechanical afterthought of an offense, based on
stationary three-point shooters and isolations.  It was an ugly style, but it
played to the strengths of the team's best players, and it won games too.
O'Brien had been left by the Pitino regime with a number of square pegs and
positionless players, and these overpriced but hard-working functionaries were
only too happy to get minutes through effort and obedience.

But that wasn't good enough.  That team could only score 85 points a game; and
its defense was negated by its inability to ever get an easy basket.  So
Antoine was shipped out, and almost immediately the Celtics were transformed
into a fluid, fast-breaking unit who could out-score their opponents as well
as defend them.   They had a legitimate low-post threat in Vin Baker, and were
getting him the ball.  The addition last month of an explosive scorer to
relieve Pierce, and a legitimate rebounding center along with him, should have
cemented the new era.  But it hasn't.

Exhibit A:  starting at center, Walter McCarty.  Obie just loves Walter.
Can't get enough of the guy.  Why?  Because he's a very effective blitz
defender, and on offense can be counted upon to do one thing.  You guessed it.
Shoot stand-still three pointers.  Obie is all about focus and Sticking to the
Plan.  That's why he's uneasy with the running game, and hates turnovers worse
than kidney stones.   The stationary offense, run from set plays, makes sense
to him, or he wouldn't have been able to live with it so long.  Walter has
taken over Antoine's role as the big man who stands 23 feet from the basket
while his opposite number has free play at retrieving the ball -- which
happens a lot, since the 3 is a low-percentage shot.  That's OK with Obie,
because his comfort zone is based on outside shooting and blitzing defense,
rather than rebounding and passing.  Obie knows what Walter is going to do,
and that's good enough for him.  But it's not good enough for the Celtics.

Exhibit B:  One consequence of playing Walter so much (nearly 30 minutes per
in recent games) is that the Celtics are getting killed on the boards -- by an
average of nearly 14 a game over the last four games.   When Mark Blount,
another Obie favorite, plays alongside him, the Celtics basically cede the
rebounding advantage to their opponent.  It doesn't matter if it's a team of
midgets; Blount and McCarty are non-rebounders.  Period.  Meanwhile, Chris
Mihm, the Celtics most skilled center and rebounder, can't get minutes.  Just
look at the last two games:  McCarty and Mihm both got 21 minutes.  Walter
produced 1 rebound and an 0-8 shooting line; Mihm went 4-5 and picked up 5
rebounds.  So in the next game, Walter gets the starting nod, 30 minutes, and
Mihm a DNP-CD.

But that's not the worst of it.  The Celtics have been struggling with
rebounding, toughness, and toughness issues for the entire season.  Wasting
Mihm, amazingly, hasn't been Obie's biggest failing.  Because as we all know,
far and away Obie's biggest weakness is his inability to develop young
players.  Would the average fan even believe that a team as anemic as these
Celtics have an aggressive and  soft-handed 280-pound center and the NCAA
rebounding champion sitting on the bench this entire time?  Shaq tossed Walter
and Blount around rag dolls; and Perkins and Hunter stayed glued to the bench,
even in garbage time.  Even Danny Ainge couldn't forebear to express his
frustration in the media.  ``I'd be lying if I didn't say I wonder what
Kendrick Perkins and Brandon Hunter could do out there in fighting these guys
a little more with their bodies," he told the Globe. They have wider bodies
than our other players. But that's Jim's call."  Indeed it is.  More's the
pity!  The Celtics have had a top-ten offense and a top-ten defense for most
of the season.  But they're a 15-15 team going into today's game with the
Hornets.  And if you need a reason, all you have to do is look at the
rebounding numbers.

Exhibit C:   The Celtics newfound reliance on three pointers (27 in the dismal
Atlanta game) has been doubly horriffic.  Aside from its effect on our
rebounding and passing, it's an almost criminal misuse of the team's offensive
talent.  It took Obie something like five games to station Ricky Davis in the
corner waiting for a kickout.  Davis is the best example of this:  he should
be the focus of the offense while Pierce rests, and the number 2 option at any
other time.  Instead, he's only getting crumbs.  Aside from the awful waste of
his talent, it's also bad medicine for a player like Davis, who will start
feeling wasted soon.  Then we'll hear about what a bad guy he is and he'll end
up getting traded to Minnesota for cap garbage.

Even worse has been the exile of Vin Baker from the Celtics' offense.  Early
in the season, Baker was, miraculously, one of the most unstoppable low-post
scorers in basketball.  It's true!  You can look it up.  Of course, the team
was getting him the ball regularly.  But that isn't really part of Obie's game
plan; over the last ten games or so, Baker's production has declined
dramatically.  In some games, Baker looked really bad, so much so that some
fans were wondering if he had started hittting the bottle again.  He hasn't,
but he will if the Celtics' coaching staff keeps wasting him.  Seeing Baker
get three shots in the first five minutes and then never going back to him
(while the likes of Walter McCarty have a green light) makes me want to reach
for the ripple.  Who knows what Baker must be feeling?

Baker, Mihm, Perkins, Hunter:  that's four players who could be making MAJOR
contributions, but who don't fit into Obie's comfort zone and are wasted.  Add
in Ricky Davis (only the second most talented player on the team) and you have
almost half the roster being utterly misused.  Danny Ainge was perhaps trying
to break Obie out of his rigid routine by moving Eric Williams and Tony Battie
and Walter; but Cleveland insisted on Kedrick instead, and so Obie has
alifeline to his old way of doing things.  But for the Celtics, it's more of a
noose.  If Obie doesn't see that soon, Ainge will.




Thanks to Mark Berry my borrowing of his observation about Ricky
Davis's new place on the baseline.