5 Reasons for the Celtics' bewilderment

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    Ian Thomsen >  
INSIDE THE NBA
 (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/writers/ian_thomsen/archive/) 

     
Weekly Countdown: Sorting out the Celtics' main playoff  concerns
 
Story Highlights 
    *   Ray Allen is frustrated by a lack of offensive rhythm  
    *   Readers weigh in with views on LeBron James and more  
    *   No player is more nitpicked than Kobe Bryant  


     
 





 
 



 




Celtics Shot Attempts       Player Regular Season Playoffs  Kevin Garnett 
13.9 16.5  Paul Pierce 13.7 13.9  Ray Allen 13.5 12.3  Rajon Rondo 9.3 11.0
5 Reasons for the Celtics' bewilderment
The dominant team of the regular season and the No. 1 seed  overall enters 
Game 6 on Friday in Cleveland as the only survivor yet to  win a playoff game on 
the road. The Celtics' 0-5 record away from home --  versus opponents who had 
fewer victories at home than the Celtics had on  the road this season -- is 
symptomatic of larger issues listed here. If  the Celtics prevail in this 
conference semifinal and go on to beat the  Pistons in the next round, then they'll 
have overcome these postseason  concerns; if they lose, then here are some of 
the reasons why. 
5. Ray Allen's diminished role. Allen is shooting a  lowly 39.5 percent and 
averaging 13.8 points in the playoffs, and he isn't  getting enough shots -- 
only 12.3 per game -- to shoot his way back into  rhythm. When I asked last 
weekend how he has adjusted to taking fewer  shots, he admitted: "I don't think I 
really have just yet. It's just  trying to find where my shot is going to come 
from on a continuous basis.  In years past, I've known certain plays, 
transition with certain guys --  we've run in transition and you take a quick shot, 
you develop a rhythm.  But now we don't run. And then when you've got a defense 
that's not really  helping off me, the result is me not shooting the ball for 
quarters at a  time.'' 
Boston coach Doc Rivers has spoken repeatedly of  trying to find more shots 
for Allen while encouraging him to be more  aggressive with his touches. 
Allen's response is that the postseason  defenses are so well-prepared that they see 
the plays developing for  him. 
"I end up passing the ball every time,'' he said, "because  they know, He's 
coming up to do this, deny him. And then somebody's open  and I always pass it. 
"It can be frustrating out there at times, because I know  I can help the 
team and I know I can take a little bit of pressure off  Paul [Pierce] and KG 
[Kevin Garnett]. It's just a  matter of the offense flowing in my direction so I 
can make it easier on  them. It's a fine line because you don't want to be too 
aggressive if it's  not there, but you've got to be aggressive every time on 
the floor. It's  just the way our offense is run -- it just hasn't been 
there.'' 
4. Garnett's changing role. Garnett has become the  Celtics' go-to scorer for 
much of this postseason. Notice how the  allocation of shots has shifted 
during the playoffs (chart,  right). 
But the issue isn't so much the number of field-goal  attempts, but rather 
the way the Celtics have played. It came into focus  during the second half of 
their Game 5 victory over the Cavs when Pierce  (29 points overall) took on a 
larger and more meaningful role than in  previous games as he aggressively went 
to the basket and ate up points at  the free-throw line. Point guard Rajon 
Rondo (20 points and 13  assists) was taking on a bigger role, too, essentially 
seizing  opportunities that might have gone to Allen -- which in this case was 
OK  as Rondo became the third scorer the Celtics have needed for much of the  
playoffs. 
Garnett finished with 26 points while playing off Pierce  and Rondo, which 
was a welcome renewal of KG's role. There has been some  grousing that Garnett 
has not been enough of a go-to presence in the  playoffs, but that's not who he 
is. He is a complementary star who is more  useful as a creator than he is as 
a finisher, and his strengths should be  valued. It's much harder to find 
someone who does the defensive work and  makes the high-post passes as he loves 
to do than it is to find an  out-and-out finisher. 
One of the problems for the Celtics is that their offense  has stagnated so 
badly -- with Pierce (41.3 percent in the playoffs) and  Allen struggling -- 
that Garnett has been needed to finish in the post  more than during the regular 
season, when Boston was flowing offensively  to the strengths of its three 
stars. There was a stretch during Game 3 at  Cleveland when the Celtics ran a 
series of excellent possessions through  Garnett in the post. Instead of milking 
him and forcing the defense to  react, however, Garnett then went several 
possessions without touching the  ball, ultimately forcing Rivers to call timeout 
to emphasize Garnett's  role in the offense. 
The Spurs are an example of a team that feeds the hot  scorer -- resulting in 
a big scoring night for Tim Duncan, Tony  Parker or Manu Ginobili -- but 
their feel for the game is based  in no small part on the years they've spent 
playing together. The key  Celtics are still growing used to developing each 
other. 
3. Point guard leadership. Rondo gave the Celtics  an exceptional Game 5, and 
in future years he may provide that kind of  leadership more consistently. 
But for now he is a second-year point guard  who cannot take command of the 
offense every night. The Celtics have  needed someone to boss them around, to 
create plays for the three stars,  and Rondo is still learning to do that. He'll 
have a much better chance of  doing it if their defense creates the urgent 
tempo in which he and his  teammates excelled in Game 5. 
2. Rivers is learning too. If the Celtics falter in  these playoffs, there 
will undoubtedly be questions about whether Rivers  is the right coach to win a 
championship during the small window of  opportunity for Garnett, Pierce and 
Allen, who are trying to become the  first trio of thirtysomethings to lead a 
team to the NBA title. (No  champion has ever had three leading scorers over 
the age of  30.) 
If Rivers isn't the right coach for the Celtics, then who  would replace him? 
There are only three active coaches who have shown they  can win a 
championship: Phil Jackson, who has always won with the  league's dominant player 
(Michael Jordan, Shaquille O'Neal  and now -- he hopes -- MVP Kobe Bryant); Gregg 
Popovich, who  has always had Tim Duncan with former MVP David Robinson or  
Parker and Ginobili; and Larry Brown, whom Rivers tried to hire as  his lead 
assistant last summer. 
There are no other proven winners. There are a lot of  coaches like Rivers 
who are trying to create the right formula on the fly.  Mike D'Antoni and Avery 
Johnson were still learning how to  win a championship when they lost the 
confidence of their franchises this  season. Byron Scott was castigated as a coach 
who was in over his  head after taking the Nets to successive NBA Finals 
(that was before he  was named Coach of the Year this season in New Orleans). 
The bottom line for these Celtics is that no overhauled  NBA team has ever 
won the championship in its first season  together. 
"You're talking about different guys, different  personalities from different 
places, different philosophies, coming  together for a month's period to get 
together and win a championship,''  Allen said. "It is hard.'' 
What has become clear during these playoffs is that the  Celtics are still 
learning to play with each other while trying to win a  championship. Some may 
say that winning 66 games should have provided  enough group experience. The 
bad thing about the regular season is that  everything went their way. They 
never were forced to overcome any major  issues as a group. They kept winning even 
when Garnett was injured in  midseason. 
Now there are times when their three main players revert  uncomfortably to 
their old ways, when each starts forcing shots like he's  the only star on the 
court instead of playing off the strengths of each  other. In Rivers' case, he 
went away from his regular-season rotation  before returning in Game 5 to 
high-energy rookie Glen (Big Baby)  Davis and Eddie House, who would have played a 
bigger role  if not for Rondo's standout performance.  
"We know what we want, I will say that,'' Rivers said. "We  believe we're 
going to do what we want to do this year, I'll put it that  way. We have no 
history. Going into it as a group, we understand that this  is a process for us and 
the key is for us to be successful through the  process. A lot of teams use 
it to get to something later; we're using it  to get to it now. And that's the 
challenge.'' 
1. They know they can't win a title playing this  way. But as bad as the 
Celtics have looked at times this postseason,  they can still figure it out. 
"That's the beautiful thing,'' Allen said.  Obviously, we can go to another level. 
It just seems like we can be so  much better." 
Can they improve quickly? "Oh, yeah, it's just a matter of  one game getting 
it done and then you see, OK, this is what we got. Roll  with it.'' 
We'll soon see if the second half of Game 5 was a sign of  better things ... 
or a short-lived half of inspiration. 
4 Questions rescued from the spam
4. Do you think an international coach with a decent  team with no superstars 
and good players could win in the NBA? I've been  reading about some of the 
international coaches and how they stress team  over the superstar and they win 
that way. Will the NBA ever go to  that?
-- B. Holt, Roosevelt, N.Y. 
European coaches have a few big advantages over their NBA  peers: Teams in 
the Old World are built to win rather than to make money,  players are paid 
based on their winning records rather than on their  individual stats, and players 
don't receive long-term, guaranteed  contracts and therefore can be replaced 
or fired if viewed as losers or  selfish. (The same principles apply to 
coaches in Europe as well, which is  why they are fired at a much higher rate than 
coaches in the  NBA.) 
Plug a Euroleague champion like CSKA Moscow into the NBA  schedule and it 
could finish ahead of some rebuilding teams that aren't  nearly as experienced, 
versatile or organized. But no team can win in the  NBA without stars. This is 
a talent-based league. As mentioned above, it's  no coincidence that the 
Lakers' Jackson has won nine NBA championships  with the world's dominant player, 
and if he adds to his treasure, then  thanks will go to Kobe. The franchises 
that take a European approach are  the Spurs and Pistons, whose level of 
teamwork is unparalleled in the NBA.  But neither team would have a prayer if not for 
the three or four  All-Stars on its roster. 
3. Do you think they will ever eliminate hack-a-Shaq  and make all 
off-the-ball fouls intentional and award two shots and the  ball throughout the entire 
game?
-- Paul Gaines, Menifee,  Calif. 
I wish they would eliminate the rule, but why would they?  They would be 
voting out a loophole that benefits most of the teams in the  league in opposing 
Shaq, Ben Wallace and potentially  Dwight Howard. 
2. I'm sure that I'm not alone in being frustrated with  the excessive 
flopping that has become the norm the past few years. While  I can only bear to 
watch the Celtics-Cavs series in short bursts (it's  just plain terrible), 
whenever I tune in it seems that LeBron goes to the  hoop, gets hit on the arm and 
goes down clutching his face. When will the  league crack down on this acting? I 
don't want to single out LeBron, but  he seems to be a chief culprit. In 
soccer, if a referee determines that a  player is overacting to draw a foul, the 
ref can give that player a yellow  card. What would you think of a similar rule 
in the NBA, but perhaps with  technicals?
-- Stefan van den Abeelen, San Luis Obsipo,  Calif. 
Referees have enough to do already; to force another  controversial judgment 
call upon them doesn't seem practical. One rule  change that might respond to 
your concerns would provide officials with  instant replay to analyze all 
potential flagrant fouls. This enhancement  may be considered after the season, 
NBA executive VP of basketball  operations Stu Jackson told me last week, and in 
those settings I  can imagine that replay eventually could be used to punish 
the flopping  actors as well as the aggressors. 
1. Why is it that winners of the Coach of the Year are  those who have turned 
teams around rather than coaches who, year in and  year out, have done great 
things for their teams? Coaches like Jerry  Sloan, Gregg Popovich and Phil 
Jackson never seem to be considered for the  Coach of the Year. Is it because 
some people don't see consistency as a  basis for good coaching?
-- Raul Tanchoco, Manila,  Philippines 
Excellent point there. The award usually goes to someone  who turns a loser 
into a winner -- it's almost like a most improved award.  In fact, the best 
performances are usually by successful coaches like  Popovich, who uses the 
regular season to build a championship foundation,  or Jackson, who integrated Pau 
Gasol while holding the Lakers  together after their summer of malcontent. The 
fact that Sloan has never  won the award further diminishes its credibility. 
3 Things the O.J. Mayo scandal says about college basketball
3. The system is corrupted. The best college  players see millions of dollars 
waiting for them in the NBA, while in the  meantime they earn millions more 
for their schools and coaches -- and yet  they aren't allowed to receive a 
penny on top of their scholarships. And  then everyone gets upset that a few 
thousand dollars were reportedly  funneled to Mayo. 
Compare the thick rule books of the two biggest basketball  leagues in our 
country. The NBA rule book, otherwise known as the  collective bargaining 
agreement, exists as a vehicle to funnel the  majority of basketball income to the 
players. The NCAA rule book exists to  prevent money from going to the players, 
so that its rule makers can keep  it for themselves. 
Star players who take money are not criminals. Rather, the  system is 
criminal. 
2. Agents pay players? Mayo's agency, Bill  Duffy Associates, insists it did 
not offer money to Mayo or his  handlers before he turned pro. But it has long 
been rumored that agents do  so to procure players. It would be a natural 
response to the hypocritical  madness created by the gross financial success of 
the NCAA  tournament. 
1. The NBA won't intercede. Commissioner David  Stern has been working with 
NCAA president Myles Brand on a  plan to keep players in college for two years 
before they can turn pro. I  asked Stern last week if he ever scolded Brand 
for refusing to share  income with players. 
"No, we never reached that, that was never part of our  discussion,'' Stern 
said. "That's for some other body to consider. I know  their argument is that 
the scholarship and all the other benefits are a  payment of type. That's 
something I specifically have chosen not to  involve myself in. I'm looking for 
things not to be involved in, and this  is No. 1 on that list,  OK?''



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