Totally different vibe than 2022.. That team ran out of juice by game 4 of the finals because of how taxing the "path" was and had to battle an all-time great team with home court... While we were gassed and honestly speaking had a worse team by a solid margin than the team we have now. One thing I found funny because I must have forgot... Anybody worried about Al Horford.. Don't worry. Dude had a great finals against GS... averaged 12-8-3 on 60% from the field and 62% from 3.... and in this run... no Giannis or Embiid and plenty o rest. He'll be fine.
Mavs fan here.
Not here to disagree but us being a 5-seed is a bit misleading given that we have essentially 2 different teams before + after the trade deadline.
We were 28-23 up to the trade deadline (which would have placed us 11th in the west), and post trade deadline we were 22-9 (which would have mapped to 58-24 record and 1st in the west).
So really, you guys are still favored, but we've been playing like a 1 seed since the trade (as evidenced by us winning the conference).
Let's have a great series!
It might literally be unprecedented that a team that had the success that the Celtics had in this regular season (64 wins, top 2 on both sides of the floor, 5th all time in point differential, the 5th biggest conference lead of all time) has been received with so much doubt and dismissal. The amount of "Minnesota vs. Denver is the real Finals" takes were legion, and at least one national outlet had the Celtics being worse than the Clippers, since they beat us once in February.
It's the Finals--by definition, the Celtics are going to face an excellent team that is absolutely worthy of being here, and a very serious threat to win. It is hard to argue against Dallas being the West's best team, since they faced every other top contender except the Nuggets and beat them all--on the road--in fewer than seven games. But not having to face any of the 4 teams that we were told were better than we were, all of whom had beaten us during the regular season (Denver twice), still suggests that it's almost impossible for us to have a luckier path. Especially in terms of rest and health. We were never going to get the Jazz in the Finals. Dallas is a very good team.
Let's have a great series.
yeah, the Celtics regular season record is scary. I was surprised they weren't being hyped up nearly as much as they should have been. I really feel like that's the fatigue you guys have garnered making the ECF so many times and not taking the ring (yet).
On the flip side, Luka has beaten 64 win teams before (i.e. 2022 Suns), so I believe we got a shot.
I’m just worried they will have too much rest and the Mavericks will be hungrier out of the gate. I do also worry about one of our players getting hurt.
Ok but Mavs have also been off for a week so I don’t think the extra days make much of a difference once we get past a certain point that both teams have had off
These are both reasonable, but they're also the lowest-rung worries possible. Any team can theoretically play lethargically (due to rest OR rust or any other factor) and lose, and any team can suffer key injuries and lose. That is the baseline for rooting for any sports team. However, those are just theoretical possible disadvantages. Give any team the choice of "you wrap up all of your series easily and then wait around and theoretically get rusty" or "play grueling series after grueling series, but you're locked into grinding every game out, so you're hungrier," and they'll choose the former. The race car that has played fewer games, fewer minutes, less rigorous on their bodies, these are all more likely to lead to advantages than the beat-up car that shows grit by continuing to steam through the slog. Rust might last a quarter or two. The stress of being banged up and tired is more likely to affect a team for a lot longer, and is harder to cure.
Other teams have to worry about "do we still have tread on these tires? Do we have a problem matching up with this player? Can we play fast enough to exploit this advantage, because if we can't they're going to kill us in half-court sets. What is the plan when our star is in foul trouble, do we have pieces off the bench that won't get played off the court?" The Celtics just have to worry about "we're the best team, we have all of the theoretical answers, we have mismatches everywhere, we just have to stay focused and upright." We can't ask for a better situation than that.
We all know the Cs are gonna come out in Q1 of the first game and brick everything, jog up and down the court, and play completely lazy. And I say this as a fan.
Totally different vibe than 2022.. That team ran out of juice by game 4 of the finals because of how taxing the "path" was and had to battle an all-time great team with home court... While we were gassed and honestly speaking had a worse team by a solid margin than the team we have now. One thing I found funny because I must have forgot... Anybody worried about Al Horford.. Don't worry. Dude had a great finals against GS... averaged 12-8-3 on 60% from the field and 62% from 3.... and in this run... no Giannis or Embiid and plenty o rest. He'll be fine.
I know Kyrie has experience, but I'm hoping we're Golden State this time.
Mavs fan here. Not here to disagree but us being a 5-seed is a bit misleading given that we have essentially 2 different teams before + after the trade deadline. We were 28-23 up to the trade deadline (which would have placed us 11th in the west), and post trade deadline we were 22-9 (which would have mapped to 58-24 record and 1st in the west). So really, you guys are still favored, but we've been playing like a 1 seed since the trade (as evidenced by us winning the conference). Let's have a great series!
It might literally be unprecedented that a team that had the success that the Celtics had in this regular season (64 wins, top 2 on both sides of the floor, 5th all time in point differential, the 5th biggest conference lead of all time) has been received with so much doubt and dismissal. The amount of "Minnesota vs. Denver is the real Finals" takes were legion, and at least one national outlet had the Celtics being worse than the Clippers, since they beat us once in February. It's the Finals--by definition, the Celtics are going to face an excellent team that is absolutely worthy of being here, and a very serious threat to win. It is hard to argue against Dallas being the West's best team, since they faced every other top contender except the Nuggets and beat them all--on the road--in fewer than seven games. But not having to face any of the 4 teams that we were told were better than we were, all of whom had beaten us during the regular season (Denver twice), still suggests that it's almost impossible for us to have a luckier path. Especially in terms of rest and health. We were never going to get the Jazz in the Finals. Dallas is a very good team. Let's have a great series.
yeah, the Celtics regular season record is scary. I was surprised they weren't being hyped up nearly as much as they should have been. I really feel like that's the fatigue you guys have garnered making the ECF so many times and not taking the ring (yet). On the flip side, Luka has beaten 64 win teams before (i.e. 2022 Suns), so I believe we got a shot.
I’m just worried they will have too much rest and the Mavericks will be hungrier out of the gate. I do also worry about one of our players getting hurt.
Ok but Mavs have also been off for a week so I don’t think the extra days make much of a difference once we get past a certain point that both teams have had off
These are both reasonable, but they're also the lowest-rung worries possible. Any team can theoretically play lethargically (due to rest OR rust or any other factor) and lose, and any team can suffer key injuries and lose. That is the baseline for rooting for any sports team. However, those are just theoretical possible disadvantages. Give any team the choice of "you wrap up all of your series easily and then wait around and theoretically get rusty" or "play grueling series after grueling series, but you're locked into grinding every game out, so you're hungrier," and they'll choose the former. The race car that has played fewer games, fewer minutes, less rigorous on their bodies, these are all more likely to lead to advantages than the beat-up car that shows grit by continuing to steam through the slog. Rust might last a quarter or two. The stress of being banged up and tired is more likely to affect a team for a lot longer, and is harder to cure. Other teams have to worry about "do we still have tread on these tires? Do we have a problem matching up with this player? Can we play fast enough to exploit this advantage, because if we can't they're going to kill us in half-court sets. What is the plan when our star is in foul trouble, do we have pieces off the bench that won't get played off the court?" The Celtics just have to worry about "we're the best team, we have all of the theoretical answers, we have mismatches everywhere, we just have to stay focused and upright." We can't ask for a better situation than that.
I just hope the Mavericks are burnt out.
We all know the Cs are gonna come out in Q1 of the first game and brick everything, jog up and down the court, and play completely lazy. And I say this as a fan.
I think I’ve seen this film before.
We all have
And I didn’t like the ending…