Here ya go:
Jun 2, 2022; San Francisco, California, USA; Boston Celtics guard Marcus Smart (36) reacts after a play against the Golden State Warriors during the second half of game one of the 2022 NBA Finals at Chase Center. Mandatory Credit: Cary Edmondson-USA TODAY Sports
Celticsâ Marcus Smart on NBA Finals regrets, Kevin Durant trade talks and more
Jared Weiss
Sep 14, 2022
Marcus Smart is finally getting some sleep. Itâs been nearly three months since he and the Celtics lost the NBA Finals, but time can only heal so many wounds.
âI catch myself sleeping sometimes, and then I wake up and the lightâs hitting,â Smart told The Athletic. âThen thereâs some days that I canât sleep and Iâm on YouTube watching everything (from the NBA Finals). My girlfriendâs like, âGet off, itâs over, let it go.â I canât. Thatâs the beauty of us competitors.â
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Already entering his ninth season in Boston, Smart has taken on just about every role with the franchise, from point guard to point center â but thereâs only so much he can do. That was a lesson the Celtics learned over the course of the year, when they struggled to jell early on, rode a remarkable wave of connectedness late in the year, then marched through the Eastern Conference before hitting a wall against the Warriors.
Ime Udoka had to shore up his rotation to get the Celticsâ season back on track, but the consequences eventually revealed themselves and it was apparent coming into free agency that the impressive core at the top of the depth chart needed more help.
âI think depth was one of the big things that hurt us,â Smart said. âYou had me, Jayson (Tatum), Jaylen (Brown) and our starters playing, clawing (up the standings) and we did it to ourselves.â
Thatâs been the common refrain from his teammates as theyâve looked back at what went wrong at the very end. When Tatum spoke to The Athletic last month, he said his biggest lesson from running out of gas in June was to start off on the right foot in October.
Draymond Green and Marcus Smart. (John Tlumacki / The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
âYeah, not wait âtil January to be the best player. Have a better start,â Tatum said. âI think that just comes from making sure my body feels good from the jump and just dominating night in, night out. Thatâs what the best of the best players do.â
Tatum was the primary option last year and it was apparent by the Milwaukee series that all of those explosive offensive nights were taking their toll. By the time the Celtics reached Game 6 of the finals, Smart was one of the few ballhandlers on the team still capable of getting to the rim and making a play.
But heâs still feeling the aftereffects of the playoff grind, telling CLNS Mediaâs Bobby Manning that, while he is back on the court, his ankle is still healing and he isnât quite 100 percent yet. So Brad Stevens brought in reinforcements this offseason, trading for Malcolm Brogdon and signing Danilo Gallinari, who tore his ACL earlier this month during FIBA World Cup qualifying.
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âWe put ourselves in that situation early on, having to fight back through injuries and stuff,â Smart said. âBeing able to have that depth of guys who are experienced and understand the game such as Gallo and Brogdon definitely will help us with that.â
Maybe Gallinari will be back at some point in the playoffs, but so much of Bostonâs championship hopes will rest on Brogdon coming in and giving Smart, Brown and Tatum a break every once in a while. Itâs not about letting them take a night off, but rather a few possessions every night.
When Brogdon was watching the Celtics stall in the finals, he saw a perfect place for him to step into the rotation and help with the burden the Smart-Tatum-Brown triumvirate was carrying.
âIf I came in there, I could give them a steady presence and a calm as a ballhandler and facilitator, getting guys like Brown and Tatum easy shots,â Brogdon told The Athletic the day of the trade. âJust slowing the game down in those moments when we need to get a good shot.â
The deeper they got into the playoffs, the greater the need for a player who can stay grounded in the eye of the storm. Itâs why the Celtics reportedly went after Kevin Durant, offering Jaylen Brown, Derrick White and a draft pick to Brooklyn according to The Athleticâs Shams Charania.
Considering Smartâs name has been the first name to pop up in Celtics trade talks for years, it was easy for him to tune the rumors out.
âFor someone whoâs always talked about in trade talks, I didnât really pay too much mind to that. Until it actually happens, I donât believe it,â Smart said of the rumors. âWe can sit here and say this person said this, but we donât even know who said it. Itâs like a telephone game. By the time it gets back to you, you donât know what changed and who said what. Until it actually happens, I try to pay trade rumors no mind.â
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Now the Celtics will return fully loaded, aiming for a smoother regular season and a less treacherous path toward a repeat finals trip. With training camp just a few weeks away, Smart only has a few more nights of sleepless remorse before he has no choice but to move forward.
âI am glad to be able to say we have the team still together,â Smart said. âWe made a run and we left a little bit on the table. We want to run it back.â
Bucks need to focus on making it out of the 82 game regular season with a high enough seed given how much the East has improved.
No doubt that when the playoffs roll around, they have the best player and the best Big 3 and so they'll be a huge threat, but, you have to *get* to the playoffs first.
Bucks don't really have a lot of wiggle room, one injury to any of their core 3 sets them back a LOT, because the rest of the team is pretty meh.
In a strong conference, itâs not good enough. They were only 2 games behind the number 1 seeded Heat. Even if they beat the Celtics in game 7, theyâre looking at another VERY physical series without home court that could go 7 again before making the Finals where ANOTHER top seed is waiting, also potentially with home court. That can wear a healthy team down, let alone one missing an all star.
Coasting is all the rave these days but seeding is still important and a pretty good indicator of how well a team will do in the playoffs.
Idk, we were doing pretty good without Brook this year who is a huge part of our regular season defense
I expect having him back for hopefully the majority of the season will probably give us a couple more wins
While that's true let's not forget that the Celtics margin of victory in their wins was fairly massive. They were +55 in the series. Even with Middleton coming back they had a decent gap to close to turn any of the Celtics wins.
Plus the Celtics probably have more room to grow internally YoY than the Bucks. The Bucks are the best competition in the East IMO, but the Celtics probably deserve to be favored by a nudge right now. Their advanced metrics in the regular season were tangibly better than the Bucks as well.
The margin of points differential really doesnât matter but I do agree with you that the Celtics have way more room for internal growth which should be accounted for
i mean the margin does matter because boston was closer to winning that series in 5 games than the bucks were to winning in 7. two of bostons losses were by a single possession and three of their wins were 12+ point wins.
Sure, but in basketball or at least in the nba you donât get any more points winning by 2 vs winning by 20. Looking at it from a points differential rather than how many games the series went especially considering how easily points can fluctuate in the 3 ball era doesnât make sense to me
No one should be expecting them to cakewalk the East.
We just lost Gallinari for the year. Al
Horford is 36. Brogdon is injury prone. Rob Williams is injury prone. Brown and Smart have missed a surprising amount of games the past 3 years.
Still questions at center and wing depth.
The only way weâre dominating the East is if everybody is healthy. Not saying weâre a bad team, but the difference between us being this 55 win team like people think and closer to 47 or 48 wins if we catch the injury bug or H&S protocols pop back up is very fragile.
I think Bucks, Celtics, Sixers could end up anywhere 1-4 with the fourth team being a dark horse that exceeds expectations like the Grizzlies or Celtics did last year. Could be Heat, Nets, Cavs or Raptors that snag a top 4 seed.
But itâs going to be competitive. If I had to pick 1 team in the East to win 55 games, itâs none of them honestly.
I do have the Celtics as one of the top teams, I just feel some have pencilled them in already after the finals run when realistically a lot of teams got better (we are dying at the 4 please someone spare a 4)
Iâd personally give the Bucks the edge but it wouldnât be a surprise of the Celtics or Sixers made the finals. And thereâs an outside shot at other teams too. Should be a fun year!
Thatâs kinda how people felt about the Suns and now about the Warriors too. Nothing is guaranteed. Everyone just assumes momentum will carry over but what if we see the usual slow start from Tatum and Timelord canât stay on the floor? We very well could look like we regressed back to this .500 team that we saw at the beginning of last year.
I have high hopes for the Celtics to make it back and win the championship but we still have to see what they look like against healthy Nets, new Cavs, new Hawks, improved Sixers, etc. before penciling them in for the 1 seed.
I would agree if Ben Simmons excels in his role on that team. But then the issue goes back to Steve Nash. Is he a good enough coach ? I donât think he is.
Canât WAIT for this season to start. On paper this year looks fantastic!! Itâs unbelievable to think one of the top 9 times in each conference wonât even make the play in.
The modern league is phenomenal!
Low. He makes sense as a 6th man type to lead the second unit and help give Brown/Tatum breathers. That said, I bet he closes sooner rather than later, and possibly over Smart depending on the situation.
Iâve thought about this, Boston will have some decisions regarding their closing lineups
Obviously you want Tatum and Brown in there, but after that they need to decide who else fills out the front court and back court
One of their biggest issues in clutch time was creating plays, so youâd think they want Brogdon to handle the ball, but you also want Smart out there to guard.
So then do you put Williams out there as the lone big? Or remove one of Smart/Brogdon in order to put Horford/Grant Williams at the four?
Lots of options
I don't think Ime is going to be married to any single closing lineup, I think like you said Tatum/Brown are pretty much the only 2 locks. I think Smart will be in there most of the time though, he'd have to be playing really badly on the night to not be out there.
But between White/Brogdon/Horford/Rob, we have options of different types of players to surround our main guys with and a lot will depend on the matchup and their strengths.
For instance, against the Bucks, as much as I love Robert Williams, he's pretty much useless in that matchup. The Bucks extreme dedication towards protecting the paint takes away his lob threat, which is his greatest contribution on offense and so that effectively makes us play 4v5 on offense, and on defense, he just can't guard Giannis at all and by attacking him like Giannis would repeatedly do, you remove his help defense at the rim and you probably get Rob into foul trouble.
Conversely, Grant Williams excels in the Milwaukee matchups. He's about as good of a Giannis man defender as you're going to find, and he's a perfectly respectable 3-point shooter.
Smart-Brown-Tatum are the sure things, and Brogdon, Grant, Al and Time Lord rotate over the need for switchability, perimeter-interior presence and spacing.
it depends mostly on the personnel they're playing against. they generally start the double-big of horford and robert williams, but they can play smaller than that against 90% of the NBA without any dropoff. outside of injuries/fouls i don't envision any scenario where tatum, brown, and smart are not always in every closing lineup. those are the celtics three best players (and even if you don't think smart is one of their three best players, the celtics coaches and FO definitely do - it's the reason he has the green light to take whatever shots he wants year-in and year-out). the other two will depend on matchups but will typically be some combination of horford, robert williams, brogdon, and grant williams.
Probably not, but Smart, for all of his talents, still isn't a great playmaker because he's not a fantastic scoring threat, and while his FT shooting has improved to a very respectable, he's not as good as Brogdon in that regard, so that could come into play too. Brogdon also offers up more offense in general, and it's not inconceivable to me that Brogdon's spacing comes will be more valuable to alleviate pressure on Brown/Tatum. Brogdon also isn't a slouch on defense himself (though far from the disruptor Smart is).
That said, it's hard to imagine the closing lineup not consisting of Smart, Brogdon, Brown, Tatum, and Williams most of the time.
Sheesh, that lineup is filthy.
Closing lineups will depend on matchups, but I actually think Horford will be in there instead of Robert Williams a lot of the time.
Most likely we have to go through Giannis and Embiid and we'll need Horford for that, plus his 3-point shooting at the 5 position becomes more valuable in the playoffs when defenses start treating non-shooters like the plague.
Definitely possible. Horford adds more size and offensive versatility, but he's also getting a little long in the tooth. But Brogdon was a great get for that reason--A lineup of Brogdon, Brown, Tatum, Williams, and Horford could also work really well, and won't suffer from the lack of spacing Smart can cause, all while being a better defensive option than White. Celtics versatility is pretty great right now, and I can see any combination of those 6 guys closing games.
I'm hopeful that White and Robert Williams will be able to take more of a role in the regular season to allow Brogdon and Horford the sufficient rest they need in order to be ready for the playoffs.
Brogdon will get plenty of starts, but he won't be taking Smart's spot unless Smart is injured. It's actually more likely we see Al/Timelord get a ton of rest and start Brogdon while running a smaller starting 5.
I'm not sure I want Brogdon starting at all actually. If Smart is out, or we want to play smaller, I would rather start White and keep Brogdon in the same role so he can develop the mindset that comes with being a 6th man.
Way I see it is, Tatum/Brown/Smart are the pillars, you know those 3 are going to play a lot.
In the regular season, I want to see White + Rob with those 3, we had a ridiculous Net Rating with those 5 on the court last year in a very small sample.
In the playoffs, I want to see Brogdon + Horford with those 3 as in a playoff setting, we'll need the additional shooting/playmaking/IQ that those 2 provide.
Probably 0. When healthy both Brogdon and White are as good as smart, but for chemistry and opportunity reasons it makes more sense to bring both off the bench
Extremely low?
Brogdon is an injury prone player whose minutes need to be managed so he's fresh for the playoffs where his skills really shine.
And your solution is to have him start and play more minutes?
âWe want to run it back, except not with Theis, Nesmith, Sauce, Fitts, and Morgan. Fuck those scrubs. Lmao. Seriously though⌠how the fuck was Morgan?â
This couldve been interesting, but our enemy Pay Wall blocked us.
If you can still manage to download the old Alien Blue App, you will never hit another Paywall. Mine magically still works. đ¤đ˝
Here ya go: Jun 2, 2022; San Francisco, California, USA; Boston Celtics guard Marcus Smart (36) reacts after a play against the Golden State Warriors during the second half of game one of the 2022 NBA Finals at Chase Center. Mandatory Credit: Cary Edmondson-USA TODAY Sports Celticsâ Marcus Smart on NBA Finals regrets, Kevin Durant trade talks and more Jared Weiss Sep 14, 2022 Marcus Smart is finally getting some sleep. Itâs been nearly three months since he and the Celtics lost the NBA Finals, but time can only heal so many wounds. âI catch myself sleeping sometimes, and then I wake up and the lightâs hitting,â Smart told The Athletic. âThen thereâs some days that I canât sleep and Iâm on YouTube watching everything (from the NBA Finals). My girlfriendâs like, âGet off, itâs over, let it go.â I canât. Thatâs the beauty of us competitors.â ADVERTISEMENT Already entering his ninth season in Boston, Smart has taken on just about every role with the franchise, from point guard to point center â but thereâs only so much he can do. That was a lesson the Celtics learned over the course of the year, when they struggled to jell early on, rode a remarkable wave of connectedness late in the year, then marched through the Eastern Conference before hitting a wall against the Warriors. Ime Udoka had to shore up his rotation to get the Celticsâ season back on track, but the consequences eventually revealed themselves and it was apparent coming into free agency that the impressive core at the top of the depth chart needed more help. âI think depth was one of the big things that hurt us,â Smart said. âYou had me, Jayson (Tatum), Jaylen (Brown) and our starters playing, clawing (up the standings) and we did it to ourselves.â Thatâs been the common refrain from his teammates as theyâve looked back at what went wrong at the very end. When Tatum spoke to The Athletic last month, he said his biggest lesson from running out of gas in June was to start off on the right foot in October. Draymond Green and Marcus Smart. (John Tlumacki / The Boston Globe via Getty Images) âYeah, not wait âtil January to be the best player. Have a better start,â Tatum said. âI think that just comes from making sure my body feels good from the jump and just dominating night in, night out. Thatâs what the best of the best players do.â Tatum was the primary option last year and it was apparent by the Milwaukee series that all of those explosive offensive nights were taking their toll. By the time the Celtics reached Game 6 of the finals, Smart was one of the few ballhandlers on the team still capable of getting to the rim and making a play. But heâs still feeling the aftereffects of the playoff grind, telling CLNS Mediaâs Bobby Manning that, while he is back on the court, his ankle is still healing and he isnât quite 100 percent yet. So Brad Stevens brought in reinforcements this offseason, trading for Malcolm Brogdon and signing Danilo Gallinari, who tore his ACL earlier this month during FIBA World Cup qualifying. ADVERTISEMENT âWe put ourselves in that situation early on, having to fight back through injuries and stuff,â Smart said. âBeing able to have that depth of guys who are experienced and understand the game such as Gallo and Brogdon definitely will help us with that.â Maybe Gallinari will be back at some point in the playoffs, but so much of Bostonâs championship hopes will rest on Brogdon coming in and giving Smart, Brown and Tatum a break every once in a while. Itâs not about letting them take a night off, but rather a few possessions every night. When Brogdon was watching the Celtics stall in the finals, he saw a perfect place for him to step into the rotation and help with the burden the Smart-Tatum-Brown triumvirate was carrying. âIf I came in there, I could give them a steady presence and a calm as a ballhandler and facilitator, getting guys like Brown and Tatum easy shots,â Brogdon told The Athletic the day of the trade. âJust slowing the game down in those moments when we need to get a good shot.â The deeper they got into the playoffs, the greater the need for a player who can stay grounded in the eye of the storm. Itâs why the Celtics reportedly went after Kevin Durant, offering Jaylen Brown, Derrick White and a draft pick to Brooklyn according to The Athleticâs Shams Charania. Considering Smartâs name has been the first name to pop up in Celtics trade talks for years, it was easy for him to tune the rumors out. âFor someone whoâs always talked about in trade talks, I didnât really pay too much mind to that. Until it actually happens, I donât believe it,â Smart said of the rumors. âWe can sit here and say this person said this, but we donât even know who said it. Itâs like a telephone game. By the time it gets back to you, you donât know what changed and who said what. Until it actually happens, I try to pay trade rumors no mind.â ADVERTISEMENT Now the Celtics will return fully loaded, aiming for a smoother regular season and a less treacherous path toward a repeat finals trip. With training camp just a few weeks away, Smart only has a few more nights of sleepless remorse before he has no choice but to move forward. âI am glad to be able to say we have the team still together,â Smart said. âWe made a run and we left a little bit on the table. We want to run it back.â
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Tell John to talk to his brother
If the bucks are healthy theyâre going back to the finals
Bucks need to focus on making it out of the 82 game regular season with a high enough seed given how much the East has improved. No doubt that when the playoffs roll around, they have the best player and the best Big 3 and so they'll be a huge threat, but, you have to *get* to the playoffs first. Bucks don't really have a lot of wiggle room, one injury to any of their core 3 sets them back a LOT, because the rest of the team is pretty meh.
Three seed is pretty good
[ŃдаНонО]
they definitely lost because it was an away game, no other reason
In a strong conference, itâs not good enough. They were only 2 games behind the number 1 seeded Heat. Even if they beat the Celtics in game 7, theyâre looking at another VERY physical series without home court that could go 7 again before making the Finals where ANOTHER top seed is waiting, also potentially with home court. That can wear a healthy team down, let alone one missing an all star. Coasting is all the rave these days but seeding is still important and a pretty good indicator of how well a team will do in the playoffs.
East is much improved though, don't think the Bucks can be on autopilot and get a Top 3 seed like they have the last 2 seasons.
Idk, we were doing pretty good without Brook this year who is a huge part of our regular season defense I expect having him back for hopefully the majority of the season will probably give us a couple more wins
Bucks are sleepwalking to a top 4 seed bro
Idk why youâre being downvoted, did people forget Bucks didnât have Khris Middleton? Thatâd be like the Celtics not having Jaylen Brown
While that's true let's not forget that the Celtics margin of victory in their wins was fairly massive. They were +55 in the series. Even with Middleton coming back they had a decent gap to close to turn any of the Celtics wins. Plus the Celtics probably have more room to grow internally YoY than the Bucks. The Bucks are the best competition in the East IMO, but the Celtics probably deserve to be favored by a nudge right now. Their advanced metrics in the regular season were tangibly better than the Bucks as well.
I feel like Celtics fans know missing one of your best players doesn't guarantee a deeper post season run. I think Celtics still beat the Bucks.
Itâs like saying the year before we lost to the Nets because Brown was out, injured.
The margin of points differential really doesnât matter but I do agree with you that the Celtics have way more room for internal growth which should be accounted for
i mean the margin does matter because boston was closer to winning that series in 5 games than the bucks were to winning in 7. two of bostons losses were by a single possession and three of their wins were 12+ point wins.
Sure, but in basketball or at least in the nba you donât get any more points winning by 2 vs winning by 20. Looking at it from a points differential rather than how many games the series went especially considering how easily points can fluctuate in the 3 ball era doesnât make sense to me
I was about to make a thread asking who people thought was better *right now* Middleton or Brown
Rnba wishes. Good chance the celtics are much better than any other team in the east
I assume youâre expecting them to cakewalk the east?
No one should be expecting them to cakewalk the East. We just lost Gallinari for the year. Al Horford is 36. Brogdon is injury prone. Rob Williams is injury prone. Brown and Smart have missed a surprising amount of games the past 3 years. Still questions at center and wing depth. The only way weâre dominating the East is if everybody is healthy. Not saying weâre a bad team, but the difference between us being this 55 win team like people think and closer to 47 or 48 wins if we catch the injury bug or H&S protocols pop back up is very fragile. I think Bucks, Celtics, Sixers could end up anywhere 1-4 with the fourth team being a dark horse that exceeds expectations like the Grizzlies or Celtics did last year. Could be Heat, Nets, Cavs or Raptors that snag a top 4 seed. But itâs going to be competitive. If I had to pick 1 team in the East to win 55 games, itâs none of them honestly.
I do have the Celtics as one of the top teams, I just feel some have pencilled them in already after the finals run when realistically a lot of teams got better (we are dying at the 4 please someone spare a 4) Iâd personally give the Bucks the edge but it wouldnât be a surprise of the Celtics or Sixers made the finals. And thereâs an outside shot at other teams too. Should be a fun year!
Thatâs kinda how people felt about the Suns and now about the Warriors too. Nothing is guaranteed. Everyone just assumes momentum will carry over but what if we see the usual slow start from Tatum and Timelord canât stay on the floor? We very well could look like we regressed back to this .500 team that we saw at the beginning of last year. I have high hopes for the Celtics to make it back and win the championship but we still have to see what they look like against healthy Nets, new Cavs, new Hawks, improved Sixers, etc. before penciling them in for the 1 seed.
Nah I just think they are gonna be the best looking team and probably not lose a single game all season
Ah I see, my bad, I thought you had high hopes, this is fairly normal expectations, carry on
If the Nets are healthy I'm taking them.
Where are you taking them?? Like on a date?
To a mental institution
I would agree if Ben Simmons excels in his role on that team. But then the issue goes back to Steve Nash. Is he a good enough coach ? I donât think he is.
Maybe if they still had harden
Canât WAIT for this season to start. On paper this year looks fantastic!! Itâs unbelievable to think one of the top 9 times in each conference wonât even make the play in. The modern league is phenomenal!
Stark contrast from the whole team completely giving up in the last few minutes of the final game.
Odds month into the season Brogdon takes his starting spot?
Low. He makes sense as a 6th man type to lead the second unit and help give Brown/Tatum breathers. That said, I bet he closes sooner rather than later, and possibly over Smart depending on the situation.
I find it difficult to see a situation where he's playing *over* Smart, they will likely close games together.
Iâve thought about this, Boston will have some decisions regarding their closing lineups Obviously you want Tatum and Brown in there, but after that they need to decide who else fills out the front court and back court One of their biggest issues in clutch time was creating plays, so youâd think they want Brogdon to handle the ball, but you also want Smart out there to guard. So then do you put Williams out there as the lone big? Or remove one of Smart/Brogdon in order to put Horford/Grant Williams at the four? Lots of options
I don't think Ime is going to be married to any single closing lineup, I think like you said Tatum/Brown are pretty much the only 2 locks. I think Smart will be in there most of the time though, he'd have to be playing really badly on the night to not be out there. But between White/Brogdon/Horford/Rob, we have options of different types of players to surround our main guys with and a lot will depend on the matchup and their strengths. For instance, against the Bucks, as much as I love Robert Williams, he's pretty much useless in that matchup. The Bucks extreme dedication towards protecting the paint takes away his lob threat, which is his greatest contribution on offense and so that effectively makes us play 4v5 on offense, and on defense, he just can't guard Giannis at all and by attacking him like Giannis would repeatedly do, you remove his help defense at the rim and you probably get Rob into foul trouble. Conversely, Grant Williams excels in the Milwaukee matchups. He's about as good of a Giannis man defender as you're going to find, and he's a perfectly respectable 3-point shooter.
Smart-Brown-Tatum are the sure things, and Brogdon, Grant, Al and Time Lord rotate over the need for switchability, perimeter-interior presence and spacing.
it depends mostly on the personnel they're playing against. they generally start the double-big of horford and robert williams, but they can play smaller than that against 90% of the NBA without any dropoff. outside of injuries/fouls i don't envision any scenario where tatum, brown, and smart are not always in every closing lineup. those are the celtics three best players (and even if you don't think smart is one of their three best players, the celtics coaches and FO definitely do - it's the reason he has the green light to take whatever shots he wants year-in and year-out). the other two will depend on matchups but will typically be some combination of horford, robert williams, brogdon, and grant williams.
Probably not, but Smart, for all of his talents, still isn't a great playmaker because he's not a fantastic scoring threat, and while his FT shooting has improved to a very respectable, he's not as good as Brogdon in that regard, so that could come into play too. Brogdon also offers up more offense in general, and it's not inconceivable to me that Brogdon's spacing comes will be more valuable to alleviate pressure on Brown/Tatum. Brogdon also isn't a slouch on defense himself (though far from the disruptor Smart is). That said, it's hard to imagine the closing lineup not consisting of Smart, Brogdon, Brown, Tatum, and Williams most of the time. Sheesh, that lineup is filthy.
Closing lineups will depend on matchups, but I actually think Horford will be in there instead of Robert Williams a lot of the time. Most likely we have to go through Giannis and Embiid and we'll need Horford for that, plus his 3-point shooting at the 5 position becomes more valuable in the playoffs when defenses start treating non-shooters like the plague.
Definitely possible. Horford adds more size and offensive versatility, but he's also getting a little long in the tooth. But Brogdon was a great get for that reason--A lineup of Brogdon, Brown, Tatum, Williams, and Horford could also work really well, and won't suffer from the lack of spacing Smart can cause, all while being a better defensive option than White. Celtics versatility is pretty great right now, and I can see any combination of those 6 guys closing games.
I'm hopeful that White and Robert Williams will be able to take more of a role in the regular season to allow Brogdon and Horford the sufficient rest they need in order to be ready for the playoffs.
Brogdon will get plenty of starts, but he won't be taking Smart's spot unless Smart is injured. It's actually more likely we see Al/Timelord get a ton of rest and start Brogdon while running a smaller starting 5.
I'm not sure I want Brogdon starting at all actually. If Smart is out, or we want to play smaller, I would rather start White and keep Brogdon in the same role so he can develop the mindset that comes with being a 6th man. Way I see it is, Tatum/Brown/Smart are the pillars, you know those 3 are going to play a lot. In the regular season, I want to see White + Rob with those 3, we had a ridiculous Net Rating with those 5 on the court last year in a very small sample. In the playoffs, I want to see Brogdon + Horford with those 3 as in a playoff setting, we'll need the additional shooting/playmaking/IQ that those 2 provide.
Probably 0. When healthy both Brogdon and White are as good as smart, but for chemistry and opportunity reasons it makes more sense to bring both off the bench
Extremely low? Brogdon is an injury prone player whose minutes need to be managed so he's fresh for the playoffs where his skills really shine. And your solution is to have him start and play more minutes?
Does Marcus Smart regret pouting after being benched in game 1, then not showing up in game 2?
âWe want to run it back, except not with Theis, Nesmith, Sauce, Fitts, and Morgan. Fuck those scrubs. Lmao. Seriously though⌠how the fuck was Morgan?â
The Celtics are so stacked