BSG Chat

I have to agree 100 percent. Several times during that fourth quarter my outbursts contained the names, Joe Johnson, Ray Allen and several profanities.

A lot of us were worried that Doc be out coached at sometime during the playoffs, but who would have thought it would be in the first round. We still have the superior team, and we should be able to close it out in the next two games.

The other two members of the so-called big three, PP & KG, have to assume a major share of the blame based on their atrocious 4th quarter play, Garnett at both ends of the court.

Careful, guys, you might incur the wrath of the village idiot for being fair weather fans. Simmons is right, though. Hopefully this will be a learning experience and will be corrected in time to get out of this series alive.

Talk about fairweather fans, Bill Simmons exemplifies that and the phrase “classes humanbeing.” His personal assaults on Glenn are unprofessional and crass, just like this statement is crass. I refuse to click on, much less read, any column of which he is a part. I can only hope that in the case of Simmons that all of his chickens come home to roost and that someone in the near future treats him in the same manner in which he treats Coach Rivers.

Blame Doc then, but… are we then to believe that coach Rivers lost all his basketball knowledge after the regular season, including the two blowout playoff games in Boston? What exactly are the X and Os that Rivers was supposed to react to? The problem the Celtics have is not one of coaching, it is one of HEART! The Hawks chipped away at the Celtics psychological armour and found an opening which they exploited. Not a d**n thing Rivers could do about that. He’s the same coach, and they played the same Hawks team. The Hawks coach did not all of a sudden develop a higher basketball IQ or coaching knowledge over the past two games (why in heavens name didn’t he also react to stem the bleeding in games 1 & 2).

I don’t think Doc’s utterly blameless. When you’re the coach and your team gets spanked, you cannot be totally blameless – happens even to legends like Pat Riley and Phil Jackson. No way anyone is going to convince me that during those times when Riley or Jackson were coaching losing teams, their Xs and Os were the problem. My issue is, Doc gets an unfair share of the blame, but not enough of the credit.

But believe that Pierce psychologically backed himself into a corner by picking a fight with Hoford the previous day. It was unnecessary for him to respond to Hoford’s taunting. Consequently, he went into game 4 with something to prove, and he proved it by playing selfish, which didn’t work. But worse, it had the added effect of taking the Celtics out of their Ubuntu mentality. There’s not much a coach can do about these types of things, no Xs and Os will solve that.

Towards the end of the game, the look of beffudlement on KGs face spoke volumes about the his mental state, and this is a guy who is almost always jawing non-stop. There was simply no heart left in the Celtics…

Welcome to the NBA playoffs where HEART happens; where hand signals don’t win games; where you back up your talk by winning.

You wanna know the X’s and O’s. I got ‘em. When the other team’s guy is going for 18 in the 4th and clearly cannot be defended by the man you have covering him…DO SOMETHING!!!!! ANYTHING!!!!! There’s your X’s and O’s.

It’s been said many times “we win as a team and we lose as a team”..it’s true…Doc deserves some of the blame but, there is more than enough blame to go around…with all that being said, the Celtics will get this back on track..and to make sure that is going to happen I’m going to the game tomorrow, so rest easy :D

 Master Po said:
  Doc, like doughnut, has hole. Optimist only sees doughnut, pessimist sees hole.

Well stated Master Po. Coaching in regular season and coaching in the playoffs are two different and separate things. Playoffs are about which team makes the better adjustments game to game. Score two for Woodson (gms 3&4). Score 2 for Doc (gms 1&2). Pressure is on Doc for game 5.

It’s time for Doc to make the proper adjustments. They can’t let Joe Johnson go off again. The Cs have to kick up the defensive intensity and control the defensive boards. The latter can be a problem when a team rotates as much as the Cs do
and boxout responsibilites can change possession to possession.
I hope the NBA assigns some refs who know what a charge is.

I was happy to see Doc validated this year but he was every anti-Doc’s living breathing ghost last night. It is true he does not shoot the free throws. It is true that you can only tell Perk so many times how to avoid defensive 3 secs (I love Perk’s intensity, but he is one dumb player).

But….how do you let Ray take that beating way past when everybody knows Johnson is “in the zone”. We had two defensive tigers – Posey and Tony Allen – icing on the bench. Doc, c’mon, several of us have stuck up for you but that was terrible coaching. At least you had the sense to sit Sam down and not put him back in.

Wouldn’t it be interesting—though I doubt it would ever happen!—if Danny brought in a coaching ‘closer’ for the playoffs next year? Doc is fine as a starter, but you want a fire-thrower in there for the last inning or two. Doc may be good for a solid 7 or 8, but he’s no fire thrower.

To the poster who said the Hawks are good, how do you explain their 37-45 record this year? As for Doc, is it just a coincidence that he has never won a playoff series and that until this year his teams have never won back-to-back playoff games?

Uh, Village Idiot sounds pretty smart to me. Pierce played selfishly, and his focus on offense disrupted the defense. Garnett let Josh Smith get the better of him for most of that game. Allen stunk on D. Rondo shot too much. Powe was invisible for the second straight game. Eddie House got housed in the 4th. And the whole team got suckered into the immature posturing instead of executing. THEY lost focus.

P.S. Atlanta has a lot of talented kids. They are athletic, and they are playing together. Moreover, they are controlling the psyche of the game. Atlanta is better than 37 wins. They grew over the season. Just wanted to add those points because I remember getting shouted down a few weeks ago when I responded to posters who were saying round 1 would be a cake walk.

Having said that, I’m confident the team will regroup and take the next 2 at home. The Celtics are every bit as good as their 66 wins. They have a lot of talented MEN. All they have to do is come into the next game humbled, and execute.