"Beat LA" Never Sounded So Lame

We need to win one quickly, because this is really starting to get embarrassing! We are the laughing-stock of the league…. >:(

Kobe goes for 67?

Laughing-stock or not, I, for one, could care less what the rest of the League thinks. Who will have the last laugh when Oden or Durant is suiting up in green next year?

I would like to see Danny Ainge make a couple of deadline deals, however. First, I’d ship Wally out to anyone who might take him for an expiring contract (Knicks and Malik Rose?). Then I’d give the Suns a call. With Marcus Banks on the outs in Phoenix (Big Surprise), they are looking for a back-up point guard. I’m thinking Delonte West would be a great fit for them, and the Suns own Atlanta’s #1 in the next draft.

For the umpteenth time, the losing will continue until Rivers is fired. Pierce’s return may produce some wins, but the team’s record with Pierce will remain well under .500.

Keeping Rivers as the head coach is the ultimate act of tanking, and with two consecutive losses against the LA teams, he will go into the hall of shame as the Celtics’ most futile coach ever.

Laughing-stock or not, I, for one, could care less what the rest of the League thinks. Who will have the last laugh when Oden or Durant is suiting up in green next year?

If we get either of the two, everything will be forgotten…if we don`t, I don`t know how we are going to survive this year`s draft! We need a top 2 pick.

But it would still be nice if we could stop this losing streak, it is no fun breaking records like this. Win against LA then we can lose a few more…a win every 7 or 8 games would be nice…

My dad fondly recalls being at the “Beat L.A.” game.

As Hollinger points out, losses beyond 62 or so don’t really help in the draft lottery.

But look at the bright side. There is no second round lottery, and the team with the worst record is guaranteed pick #31.

Fire Doc… PLEASE!

Jeff,you had plans on a game nite….WTF is that about…LOL….

Since when are the Lakers BLUE and Gold? They’re Purple and Gold. The owner of that Lakers site needs to get his head out of his hind parts.

we don’t need to tank it,except holding Pierce out,because this group has no chance as is.Wyc,Danny ,Doc,AL,Perk on down the line are toast for this year.We need a top pick-PERIOD.You can’t make a living picking 15,18,23 and trading pick 7.Assets back for Ricky,Walker,Blount etc might help but won’t get a stud.We must get player 1a this summer or we’re screwed.PP&AL are fine but we need one stud to make us legit…good luck Danny…lol

I was at Game 7 of the 83 east finals when the Beat LA chant started. It was NOT intended as a rallying cry for the Celtics Jeff, rather Billy Cunningham, Sixers coach, had said the previous day that Celtics fans “are just a bunch of goons who have no class” So when the Sixers after years of futility were finally going to win a game 7 at the Garden, up about 20 with about 3 minutes left, everyone started chanting Beat LA for the Sixers, not for the Celtics. Cunningham later apologized in the paper and admitted it was a touching moment. And of course they did go on to beat LA for the Sixers only championship of the 80s.

I haven’t had a problem with the losing because up until the past two games they have all been fun to watch. Last’s nights was painful but that’s because I can’t stand watching Jamal Tinsley run the point, and Indiana’s half court slow it down game sucks to watch. At least during the 90s when Pat Riley, Jeff Van Gundy and others turned the entire league into a slow paced halfcourt chess match it was still “Slow it down and beat you up.” Now the Pacers are playing the slow it down game but have skipped the beat you up. The result is just painful basketball to watch, even if it seems to be pretty effective.

Watched a little of NBA Nation last night and realized how little people care about the Celtics. They actually devoted a segment to the C’s but everything they said hinted to the fact that they don’t know anything about the current state of the team. It was, their young talent is overrated, with nothing to back it up. It was, Wally Szczerbiak needs to be traded (not that I don’t agree with that neccessarily but two problems: 1. who would he get us in return, right now not anybody of value. 2. Greg Anthony said that Wally had a “favorable” contract, which I just find absolutely untrue). Then we had all three of the analysts (Anthony, Tim Legler—who I despise as an analyst— and Kiki Vandeweghe—or however you spell it—who sometimes seems to have a clue, but most of the time talks out of his behind) completely ignoring the injuries that have plagued the Celtics and claiming that this is the best the Celtics can do. Not once did they reference Pierce’s injury, Wally’s injury, or Theo’s injury, they didn’t bring up the games that Perk has missed, Delonte (who still can’t just play basketball, he is always getting banged up and that REALLY bothers me about him). The only thing that was alluded to was Tony Allen being missed because of his perimeter defense, which the Celtics have NONE of right now.

I’m not mad about the losing, I’m mad about the things the national media is leaving out. On SportsCenter Scott Van Pelt read Delonte’s ridiculously stupid quote. You know the one about being angry and ped up with the losing and how we are going to go into Indy and get a win. The completely unneccessary quote that probably screwed us over for last night’s game (which he didn’t even play in because he had the flu… again he just doesn’t play). We don’t need people going to the media and spewing out whatever comes to their mind and telling reporter how fed up they are with losing and how they are going to go win in any city. We need people that are going to step up on the floor with their play, not off the floor with their mouths. That was a completely unneccessary and I hope Doc, Danny or someone tells him not to say something like that again. It’s fine to say you are sick of losing. But, basically guaranteeting a win when your team is on an 11 game losing streak in the first place is just not smart. Guarantee that quote was on the bulletin board in the Indy locker room.

Last, why does Allan Ray even play? Give his minutes to Telfair. Sure, Telfair doesn’t play all that much defense, but he tries. He can shoot and doesn’t recklessly drive to the basket when he is overmatched. Other than those 2, maybe 3 games he had when nobody guarded him he has been terrible. Won’t shoot when he’s supposed to, shoots when he shouldn’t because he can’t recognize the open shot Doc is telling him to take and decides to force up bad ones. Just not a good player. I like the kid, he plays hard, he seems to want to succeed, but he just isn’t cutting it.

Brikowski has been right all along.

At this point, our best chance at a top three pick is Doc being our coach. The kids were playing hard for Doc but now I’m starting to see signs of depression setting in.

I think this is a lesson for all of the Paul haters out there. There is a reason why he dominated the ball; because the team is horrible without him. When Paul was healthy all I ever heard was how his presence kept all of the young guys from asserting themselves. Yeah right. His presence kept the Celtics from being the 73 6ers.

Acie Earl

 Greg Anthony said that Wally had a “favorable” contract, which I just find absolutely untrue).

Favorable – For Wally! He’s a salesman just like Doc.

Well I have a ticket for tonight but probably won’t go. On one hand, I enjoy watching Phil Jackson’s teams. On the other hand, my empty seat will be a tiny, silent protest at Doc Rivers’ continuing tenure as the head coach.

Let me tell you about the Celtics bashing by Greg Anthony and Tim Legler. Everyone likes Rivers, a former broadcast colleague and genuinely nice guy, much more than they like Ainge. Therefore, they will blame all of this on Ainge and exonerate Rivers as much as they can. It’s the players who suck and who will never be any good, not the coaching. Last year, Greg Anthony was full of praise for the young Celtic players the one time he bothered to watch them.

Ainge certainly deserves blame—lots of it— for hiring Rivers, and Grousbeck deserves blame—alot of it— for being too cheap to fire Rivers. But anyone who watches the team on a regular basis knows what the real problem is.

“They actually devoted a segment to the C’s but everything they said hinted to the fact that they don’t know anything about the current state of the team. It was, their young talent is overrated, with nothing to back it up.”

What the hell do you have to know?

0-12. That’s it.

The ‘young talent’ we’ve ammassed is 2-18? or soon to be that in it’s last 20 games including losing 12 in a row. Yet, you read this board and people think that Delonte West is worth Atlanta’s pick? Gerald Green should be enough to land a major star in a deal? Perkins isn’t a stiff?

Now it’s the ‘national guys’ that are the ones who are wrong because they say those guys are overrated. The problem right now is THE ESPN GUYS ARE RIGHT. This team sucks.

At this point, saying pretty much anything about this team is like kicking Barbaro today. Anything said by those who weren’t optimistic about this team is just a repetitive “I told you so”, whether it’s intended to be so or not. Anything said by those who were optimistic is just a repetitive “But wait ’til next year! (Yet again)”.

I guess things can best be summed up this way, for better or worse:

In year 4 of the Ainge regime, and year 3 of the Rivers coaching tenure, a team that optimists were pegging for 45-50 wins is on the verge of setting the team record for consecutive losses, and on pace to have the best shot at the #1 pick in this year’s draft.

Possibly our best game of the year was in mid Nov. We played helter skelter basketball and beat them 114 to 88. So you figure, if that works then, why not try again. But we get on 13 pt in the 2nd Q, 13 in the 3Q.
We are down by 20 in the 4Q and then decide, let’s play helter skelter basketball. We cut it to 4 pts with about a 1/2 minute to play. Delonte’s prediction may have worked if we played the up tempo game and dictated the pace.

Even when we were at the start of this current losing streak, Doc and Danny were still claiming we were still so close to turning the corner. I agree 100%, the players aren’t purposely out on the court trying to tank, but this organization’s math formula is: Doc coaching = tank job.

This is what six years of bad drafting and stupid contracts will get you. Ainge has drafted okay considering where he has drafted but the Celtics were too good to get a top pick and too old and overpaid to go anywhere. Ainge got rid of the old and some of the overpaid and replaced them with the young and clueless. There is no defending this. Ainge has failed to add any all-star caliber talent. Al Jefferson is a nice player and a steal at #14, but he is not an All-Star and will at best be a botton tier all star when he hits his peak. Truthfully, Tony Allen, had he stayed healthy might be the best player Ainge has ever drafted. The reality is that the roster is Paul Pierce and a bunch of spare parts. Looking at this team, it is a tribute to Pierce that they won 10 games with him. Could Ainge have done better? Sure. Could he considering the lousy overpaid roster he inherited have buit a contender by now? No way.

The only good news is that in the NBA you either want to be the best or the worst. The worst place to be is in the middle. The Celitcs are the worst, which is better than winning 45 games with a roster that is going no where. Moreover, they are the worst in a year where the draft is the best in a decade or more. Really, what possible reason could there be to let Paul Pierce step on the court again this year? Why? So Tim Legler and the clowns on ESPN can say nice things about the Celtics? So, Doc Rivers can avoid having the worst coaching record in league history? So the Celtics can win a few meaningless games so they can be rewarded with the rights to draft Aaron Grey? To avoid setting loosing records that no one will remember?

Burn the whole thing down. Who cares who is responsible. Let the team hit rock bottom see where the ping pong balls land, get a new coach, and start over again next year.

“Burn the whole thing down. Who cares who is responsible. Let the team hit rock bottom see where the ping pong balls land, get a new coach, and start over again next year.”

I’m assuming you’d be including Danny in the building when it goes up correct?

At this point I don’t want Danny picking the next coach, his track record there is abysmal.

He’s a born scout, not a GM. Putting him in his place is in the best interest of the team.

“I’m assuming you’d be including Danny in the building when it goes up correct?”

I have a soft spot for Ainge, but I think he got very unlucky betting on Raf’s knees and has never recovered. I love his drafts, but he hasn’t made a trade yet that has really improved the team. I understand the frustration with Doc, but unlike the other geniuses on this board I will be the first to admit that I don’t know enough about basketball and am not with the team every day, so I can’t say whether the loosing is all due to bad coaching or just bad players. Ainge has had four years. He did run Tone’s sorry butt out of town, which means I will always have a soft spot in my heart for him. He drafted some good young players and would leave the team with some players worth keeping and hopefully a great draft pick. I think it might be time to let someone else have a try.

It’s stupid to demand Doc Rivers gets fired. It’s not his fault we are losing. If we fire him now then we have to pay two coaches to coach this team which just isn’t good enough for that right now. Doc has done a good job developing the talent. His lack of in-game coaching ability should not override all the good he has done for this team. Maybe he should be let go at the end of the year but doing it to him during the middle of a season which has treated him and his team unfairly is not the right thing to do for the team or for him.

Wouldn’t be a smart move by the Celtics financially or ethically. Doc deserves to be kept on through the end of the year and then be allowed to “step down” as I think either he will or the organization will ask him to. He has only done what he thinks is right for the time he has been here. Whether it was or was not is questionable, but he deserves to go out on “his own terms.”

beat la- beat la- with what! let’s sign doc to a player contract. we could use a vet point guard. and we could have a slower 1/2 court game than indy.

Acie,

At best, all a new coach would do is get the team to win a few meaningless games and hurt the team’s lottery chances. Why bother. Let Doc slug it out for the rest of the year. Further, don’t make a snap decision on the new coach. Take the off season and make a good choice and give that guy a full training camp. Don’t just throw some poor guy into this mess.

No, I’m not going to chant myself hoarse. It’s classless, and in any event I’d rather shout at the incompetent officials.

Grousbeck notices the empty seats. Why do you think they inflate the attendance figures every night? In the old ABA some teams used to make all the fans sit on one side— opposite the TV cameras— to make it appear that the arena was full. Maybe the Celtics will start doing that.

I sometimes fantasize about owning the Celtics. The first thing I would do is fire Rivers. He wouldn’t last 15 seconds after I signed the purchase agreement to acquire the team. The second thing I would do is get rid of Lucky, the cheerleaders, in-game promotions, stunts and contests and that dumb blonde who manages them. I’d get rid of the chatchkes, the T-shirts, the gymnasts, the loud music and the video spots they play on the scoreboard. I’d get rid of the six year olds trying to dribble up the floor and the old farts trying to hit shots for money. I’d get rid of all the junk food at the concession stands and give the fans decent food at decent prices; sometimes I think the Garden will sink into Boston Harbor under the weight of all that saurated fat.

I suppose I’d keep the big screen on the scoreboard to show replays of blown calls by the officials, and then send the tapes to David Stern. I’d use the money I saved by ditching all of the promotional crap to cover the fines.

JohnK,
Isn’t that exactly what I was saying. Why disagree? But, you can’t take the whole offseason to make the choice. You have to go out and do it right after the season ends. That way the coach is involved in all the decisions during the offseason and knows what’s going on.

Acie,

I am not disagreeing. I agree. Fire doc the day after the regular season ends, but make sure you hire the right guy to replace him, even if that takes a while.

“Doc has done a good job developing the talent.”

He has?

Part of developing talent is getting guys to buy into roles that help the team. Injuries have played a huge part in what has happened this year but right now can anyone really say with much confidence (different from blind optimistic hope) that they can see many of the guys on this team playing roles on a championship contender?

Pierce is a given but look at all our other players. Jefferson’s not going to at this point be a key cog on a championship level team, his committment to defense just isn’t there nor is his efficiency on the offensive end. Rondo would make a solid backup PG to come in and be a change of pace guy. Delonte’s probably a backup combo-guard in the role Antonio Daniels played in Seattle a couple years back. Wally’s best fit is as a sixth or seventh man coming in to give the second unit some scoring punch. Green, Telfair, Perkins, Gomes et al wouldn’t get court time except in blowouts or possibly as a very situational role player.

People can use all the stats they can dig up, but none of these guys in the last 20 games have had to be in a position where there was any pressure to win. Putting up big numbers on this team is like putting up big numbers on the Washington Generals.

Hopefully Paul comes back healthy next year and we get a top two pick. Thus making Jefferson the third option, at that point you might be able to sell the idea that something is actually getting built. For now, its shambles.

“I sometimes fantasize about owning the Celtics. The first thing I would do is fire Rivers. He wouldn’t last 15 seconds after I signed the purchase agreement to acquire the team. The second thing I would do is get rid of Lucky, the cheerleaders, in-game promotions, stunts and contests and that dumb blonde who manages them. I’d get rid of the chatchkes, the T-shirts, the gymnasts, the loud music and the video spots they play on the scoreboard. I’d get rid of the six year olds trying to dribble up the floor and the old farts trying to hit shots for money. I’d get rid of all the junk food at the concession stands and give the fans decent food at decent prices; sometimes I think the Garden will sink into Boston Harbor under the weight of all that saurated fat.”

I don’t really care about the food but all of that needs to be done. It is one thing to have a loosing team, that can happen and the mistakes that produced the loosing started long before these guys bought the team. But, that is no reason to loose your dignity and make the thing into a circus with Patricka the Dancing Bear. I hate all that garbage. It has got to go. What clown in the marketing department thinks that garbage is a good idea?

I remember the old college double headers at Madison Square Garden and at the Palestra in Philly. You’d get two games for the price of one, and there was some great basketball. In those days, St. Johns, NYU, Columbia, Villanova, St. Joe’s, Temple and LaSalle had great teams. Even Penn had a team that made the NCAA finals.

I remember those LA-Knicks games and Celtics-Knicks games at MSG in the early 70’s. Every game was a war, and each of those teams had at least three hall of fame players, or close to it.

They didn’t have cheerleaders or exploding scoreboards, light shows or screaming PA announcers. All they had was Cowens, Jo-Jo, Hondo, Clyde, Willis, Wilt, the Pearl, Dollar Bill, DeBusschere, the Logo, Baylor… It was pure basketball, great basketball. When I go to the Garden today, I am reminded of how much the product has deteriorated, and its depressing.

Brickowski – “Let me tell you about the Celtics bashing by Greg Anthony and Tim Legler. Everyone likes Rivers, a former broadcast colleague and genuinely nice guy, much more than they like Ainge. Therefore, they will blame all of this on Ainge and exonerate Rivers as much as they can. It’s the players who suck and who will never be any good, not the coaching. Last year, Greg Anthony was full of praise for the young Celtic players the one time he bothered to watch them.”
 
The dam might finally be cracking on the Doc love. Anthony actually brought up last night how stupid it was to bench Delonte at the start of the season and hand the PG job to Telfair. He didn’t mention Doc by name, but it’s the first time I’ve heard anyone on ESPN even come close to criticizing Doc’s sucky coaching.

Mike

Brick,

What do the 14 year olds remember? Or will we forget about that segment… Being a child today is differnt than being a child 20 yrs ago.

“TBreezy said:
  Brick, What do the 14 year olds remember? Or will we forget about that segment… Being a child today is differnt than being a child 20 yrs ago.”

And your point is….?

Acie Earl,

Brilliant!!! excellent points

Brick,

Go to the game…. Gerald and Jefferson won’t disappoint you

Brick,

If David Stern were half as smart as he is billed to be, he would be fixing the lottery for the 76ers and Celtics and would be drumming up charges to get Isiah banned from the league. The state of the Knicks, 76ers and Celtics is becoming and embarassment and a threat to the entire league. Imagine if the Red Sox, Yankees, and Dodgers were all loosing 100 games a year. Where would baseball be? The NBA used to matter and should matter in New York, Boston and Phily. Now it is a joke and the NBA is loosing an entire gneration of fans from three of the largest and most important markets in the country. For the sake of the league, I honestly hope Oden and Durrant are as good as advertised and go to Boston and Phily and bring that rivalry back. But you watch, they will end up in Memphis and Toranto and 20 years from now people will be watching NBA games on CMT.

A Simple Aside: Phoenix is right now favored to win it all…Folks in Phoenix are worried a little that San Antonio or LA might trade for KG and upset the balance of power, but if they don’t Phoenix will have a grand shot at winning their FIRST CHAMPIONSHIP…I repeat, their FIRST FREAKING CHAMPIONSHIP…
Some seem to think the NBA is an easy Gig, that trades are easy to make, that ping pong balls have desires, that injuries don’t happen, that Malone, Peyton, Shaq, and Kobe are a shoo-in for the championship…Hah!…How’s it feel to be eaten alive…
As for myself, I’ll hope for the best and be happy with watching the kids develop…It’s not as titillating as gunning for a championship right now, but somehow it’s at least within the bounds of “normalcy.”

so, where is DA? Is he hidding?

Brick

As the new owner you’d have to also get rid of the white basketball shoes at home and go back to the black ones which were the trademark of the Celts. I realize it’s trivial but I HATE the look of the white shoes.

Laughing-stock or not, I, for one, could care less what the rest of the League thinks. Who will have the last laugh when Oden or Durant is suiting up in green next year?

If we get either of the two, everything will be forgotten…if we don`t, I don`t know how we are going to survive this year`s draft! We need a top 2 pick.

No, it won’t be forgotten….because you’ll have a clueless 19 year old talented rookie joining a very young team accustomed to losing. If we continue to tank with this coach this will haunt us for years…require another overhaul of the roster, and an overhaul of management. If these talented kids see the writing on the wall and see a choice between playing for Doc Rivers, Tony Barone, or Isiah Thomas, or staying in school and playing for coaches who actually have a system and don’t trash their players in the press, instigate fights, or who’s only coaching experience is coaching Creighton University…..they might just stay in school. Tanking will not improve this team one iota….short or long term…no matter who we get.

This bleeding needs to stop now….but sadly, it won’t. Those of you celebrating these losses as victories are crazy.

I think Danny should have to give every season ticket holder their money back. I can’t take another night of Celtics Dancers, Idiotic Lucky, and flying t-shirts thrown out in a lame attempt to distract actual Celtics fans from the fact that the team is horrible and our only hopes are pinned on bouncing lottery balls. They need to do something. Trade for Gasol, fire Doc, fire Danny, do anything to prove that they actually care that people spent a lot of money to sit in those seats and see basketball not ridiculous side shows.

Good one Po. Brick, I think you are right about not going to the game and having another empty seat in the Gah-en. When the Gah-en looks like a home game for the Hawks, maybe some changes will be made. In my opinion, this entire organization is a train wreck in progress. As Ian said, "And God, he stole the handle, and the train, it won’t stop going, no way to slow down…….

Can we pool all of our money on CelticsBlog, buy the Celtics, and have Brickowski run the team?

It’s a blessing Red did not live to see the mess that this season has become. This season has been a slow death for all Celtics fans and it’s not going to end until game 82 is in the books.

"If we continue to tank with this coach this will haunt us for years…require another overhaul of the roster, and an overhaul of management. If these talented kids see the writing on the wall and see a choice between playing for Doc Rivers, Tony Barone, or Isiah Thomas, or staying in school and playing for coaches who actually have a system and don’t trash their players in the press, instigate fights, or who’s only coaching experience is coaching Creighton University…..they might just stay in school. Tanking will not improve this team one iota….short or long term…no matter who we get.

That is just nuts. I am so sure those kids are going to the NBA for the caliber of coaching. Maybe they are also judging things by the quality of the syphony in the city or the number of Art Musuems or the presence of a good mass transit system. Come back to planet earth with the rest of us. Those kids want paychecks just like the rest of us do. Further, not all 19 year olds are clueless. If you have it, you have it from day one. LaBron James, Dwane Wade, and Carmelo Anthony were all clueless 19 year olds when they came into the league and they all played from day one. Tanking is the only thing that will help this team."

I agree with you JohnK

I am a DA supporer, and this season is lost so we have no choice but to look up to draft night and keep on going, but if we are talking lottery next February he should be fired….and take Doc with him(cause I am beginning to doubt Ainge has the “cojones” to get Doc fired)

“Ball boys”!!!!…..The only thing concerning a pick that you could teach involves either your nose or your butt….. ;D

If you want some hip hop distractions, this is as good as anything in the current Celtics’ “game presentation:”

http://firedoc.ytmnd.com
 

Chamberlain & West vs. Russell & Cousy. I wish I was Bobby Ewing and this was all a dream.

You know !!!!

Maybe Red really had something to do with this…

Maybe he cursed the Celtics this year for allowing the dancing girls on the floor!!

Maybe he something something from above about Oden & Durant to warrant us losing !!!

Maybe he sitting high above acting as the GM and we don’t know it….

Just Maybe…….Red does work in mysterious ways!!

ooops!

Maybe he knew something from above

As owner I wouldn’t fire Ainge immediately but I have a plan. First I would take away his expense account and tell him to forget about trips to places with great golf courses or great restaurants, like Treviso or Shanghai. I’m the one who would be making those scouting trips.

Instead, I’d buy Danny a Land Rover and tell him to beat the bushes for basketball talent in places like Senegal, Angola and Sierra Leone. He could take Chris Wallace with him to push in case they got stuck in a swamp.

If I were Wyc I wouldn’t be sure if the problem is with Danny, Doc or the players. Danny’s trades – not so good; Danny’s drafts – pretty good. Doc’s x’s & o’s not so good; Doc’s other qualities – pretty good. The players – lack of experience – expected; lack of hustle for 48 mins – not expected. Wyc gets smarter on the tough decision via time, as in the rest of the year . Most bloggers would have dumped T Allen in first month. It took time. I’m hoping Telfair will have a T.Allen transformation. I agree that he is bad now but there is something about him that I like. I go along with Brickowski for marketing director – keep Lucky, L’il Phunk, Heroes Among Us and the high flying gymnasts – can the rest. Con man Ernie D especially. Put a shooter out there once in a while Ernie!

The celtics-lakers game is always important because of the historical rivalry. Celtics players should always mark this game on the calender. If they have anything left in the tank, this is the one to outperform. Not only should we try to do well, but we should always watch how the lakers perform because historically some lakers player make good celtics players.

No more excuses, evrock. Teams like the Hornets and Lakers have suffered multiple injuries as well, but no one is laughing at those franchises.

The Celtics are a disorganized mess. The team was a disorganized mess at the beginning of the year (when they started 1-6 against bad teams with everyone healthy) and they are a disorganized mess now.

The Celtics-Lakers rivaly was my absolute favorite sports rivalry as a young’un, even better then Sox-Yankees. But it’s completely dead now. It’s honestly hard to sustain a rivalry between the Eastern and Western conferences in the first place, because you play so few times – and when one team has utterly dominated the matchup for, what, 15 years? The rivalry can’t help but become meaningless.

I just hope they beat LA because even someone in favor of tanking(like myself) would like to see a win thrown in every now and then, just for variety.

“The team was a disorganized mess at the beginning of the year (when they started 1-6 against bad teams with everyone healthy) and they are a disorganized mess now.”

But they went 10-7 after that including a five game win streak. The team was respectible with Pierce but you can’t admit that because you hate Pierce. There has to be a limit to negativity and bitterness.

When did I ever say I hated Pierce? He’s a great player whose skills are being wasted by this coach. Unfortunately he’s pushing 30 years old, and at some point you have to consider making the same kind of decision that Philly made with Iverson.

Now Iverson I do hate. I see that the Nuggets just lost 3 straight and Iverson has come up lame. Surprise, surprise. So where are the people who were saying that Melo and AI together would make Denver a threat in the West? Right now it looks as though they will be lucky to make the playoffs.

Beat LA(st place)
Beat LA(st place)
Beat LA(st place)
Beat LA(st place)
Beat LA(st place)
Beat LA(st place)
Beat LA(st place)
Beat LA(st place)

My apologies Brick, for some reason I thought you were one of the loons on here that thinks the team would be better off without him. Trading him for 10 cents on the dollar like Philly did with Iverson, doesn’t get the Celtics anything other than to the top of the lottery, which is injury is doing anyway. Tell him not to come back and get the lottery pick and Pierce both and have a chance to do something.

Philly didn’t get 10 cents on the dollar for Iverson. They got about what he is worth— as subsequent events have shown.

If you believe in the analysis in The Wages of Wins— as I do— you will see that Iverson is the most overrated player in the league. Pierce, in contrast, is in a group of players just a notch or two below Kevin Garnett in terkms of his ability to contribute to team success. I think that the team’s record without him bears this out as well.

With 30 teams in the league you have to be terrible to get a player
good enough to make you competitive or hopefully better. So if we
are tanking or just naturally stink due to the injuries the result
of getting a high lottery pick is what the team needs. By the way,
Red is watching this with Walter Brown and they are shaking their heads in dismay. If Brick owns the team I’ll take the train in from Cow Hampshire to watch the game WITHOUT the nonsense.

My fanstasy is to be sitting right behind the Cs bench and I’m yelling at
Doc to put Powe and Rondo in and Doc turns around at me and snarls “you
wanna coach?” Then I reply “if I did, you wouldn’t get your job back.”
Warms my heart on a cold winter night waiting for Kobe to drop 35 on my
beloved Cs.

Kobe is likely to drop 50 .

Oh well, guess I’ll go to the game. I want to see how much Andrew Bynum has progressed under a bona fide NBA coach.

I can’t help but think back to all those who didn’t want to trade for Iverson. This team would at least be more interesting had we pulled off that deal. But hey – thank goodness we have Gerald Green, right? ;D

As I see it, Indy is the worst shooting team in the NBA (true stat). Yet they shot 53% against us last night. Defense has been and is a major weakness with this club. Granted there is youth, but there is also a case of coaching and if the players have the desire to play defense. That’s the deal. Do we have the players willing to commit to playing on both ends of the court? Gerald can sky and he has a sweet shot, but clamping down on your man on D, or making the defensive switch is just as important in the scheme of playing winning hoops.

Doc is a nice guy, but Tony Dungy is too and he’s got the Colts in the Super Bowl. For me, I say bring a smart young fundamentally sound assistant coach from somewhere on an intrim basis. If nothing else, we need a team that is going to get after it on the defensive side of the court; and I am 100% confident the Cs can find a coach that can get us playing fundamental ball regardless of W & L the rest of the way.

this thread has obviously gone elsewhere but i wanted to second greengeek on the “beat la” chant. yes, celtics fans chanted that when we were heading to the finals. but, and i think maybe more important as an organization and fan base, we chanted that when philly finally broke through by beating us in 83.

i think that spoke to and about us as a confident, mature fan base. we were champions and could hold our heads up even in loss.

you may now return to your regularly scheduled programming.

first post. greetings.