Brian Scalabrine Could Have a Breakout Season

Scalabrine is beautiful, a true coaches dream. He will do anything asked and not complain. He makes very few mistakes. There are no high expectations so anything positive is gravy. He is happy just to be on the team and one of the guys.

This season is indeed an opportunity for him. I wish him well.

The only problem is that in a lineup of House Daniels Scal Baby Sheed, Scal is playing the 3. Which means he has to do a little bit better than “scamper” around the perimeter.

Although i do agree with everything you’ve said here, Scal was mocked then when we had nothing else we had to turn to him and he rose for us. I love Scal and the way people heckle him makes me very upset. This IS Scals big year and if he can hit is open shots he’s gonna have the opportunity to put up some numbers this year.

Scal came into a bad situation and tried to do too much when given the chance to play. With this team his role is very much defined. To me shooting is the least of what he gives us, but I’ll take those threes. It’s his defense that I don’t people appreciate. After a play or two he can figure out whoever he’s defending and adjust his game to that. He’s very effective. It’s also all those intangibles that don’t appear in the box score. He can also hit his free throws.

will be as an expiring deal that will be moved midseason (with TA and maybe others) for someone that would contribute more than a couple of buckets a game and some “scampering”. Preferably someone with a bit more of a an offensive game and the ability to rebound and/or ballhandle.

It’s not his fault he was offered a contract for more than he’s worth for at least 2 years too many but when a player signs for a contract there are expectations placed upon them to earn their pay. Unfortunately for Scal, he didn’t start to earn it until year 4 of his deal.

scal is useful, but very limited. usually, the more time he gets means there’s someone who has more potential that is getting less, like a gomes. nevertheless, he grows on you. shelden williams might not be the second coming of leon powe, but i hope scal is not allowed to crowd him out.

I think you should also touch on how the team statistically plays with him in the game. The 5-man units with Scal, over the course of the entire last season, performed very well and much better than some of the other options off the bench.

I know I’m the minority here, but I’d rather see Scal in there 80% of the time over BBD.. and last season statistics show it. Don’t tell me he guards crappy players.. Scal guards Amare, Bosh, and other high octane offensive players quite well.

More importantly though he limits his mistakes, knows his role on every posession, and spreads the floor successfully. And this is coming from someone who used to roast Scal and his contract!!

broke out last season.

But still, what a ridiculously stupid way to spend $15M!

That was interesting read however Scal still doesn’t have the goods to be on this second unit, he’s one of the best paid athletes I’ve ever seen to not have any real talent.
His jump shot isn’t good enough to rely upon it, his defense is pathetic, his athleticism is that of a retired 40 year old man.
Scal is one very nice person and that’s what Danny got when he paid him $ 15 million dollars. He is literally the worst athlete on the team and probably the nicest
Danny couldn’t give Scal to any NBA team !!

I know I’m the minority here, but I’d rather see Scal in there 80% of the time over BBD.. and last season statistics show it. Don’t tell me he guards crappy players.. Scal guards Amare, Bosh, and other high octane offensive players quite well.

More importantly though he limits his mistakes, knows his role on every posession, and spreads the floor successfully. And this is coming from someone who used to roast Scal and his contract!!

by TomHamilton30 on Oct 13, 2009 5:03

You have got to be kidding !!!
Scal couldn’t guard Amare or Bosh with any success other than to deliberately foul them I seen nearly every game of the C’s over the last 4 years and I guarantee you Scal is a horrible defensive player 80% of the time ! His passing is so bad I expect a turn over every time he handles the ball !
BBD is a much better player than Scal

I like Scal, and think he can help out against particular matchups. He’s relatively versatile, which is a nice characteristic for an end-of-bench player. His corner 3 isn’t deadly but it’s respectable, you can’t leave him alone out there.

With that said, barring a serious injury (knock on wood) he’s not going to get the minutes this year for a breakout season. I think he’ll end up fighting Landlord for a few scraps of minutes, Landlord’s a better rebounder and the guy you’d put in against a more traditional center, but he can’t spread the floor like Scal.

It’s also virtually inevitable that if there IS a trade to be done, he’ll be included.

But, the overarching lesson of the Scalabrine Era is that… you do not give role players five-year contracts! I tend to think that Danny has internalized this, which may be part of why he hesitated to match the Posey offer and maybe why he didn’t pull the trigger on a Nochioni deal. Signing Scalabrine has not done one iota to hamper this team’s ability to sign other players, but despite the public pleas of “we love Scal,” I’m sure there were plenty of times that DA regretting the signing.

Not today, though. Hell, I hope they can re-sign the big lug next year!

Period.

yeah! wooooooooot!

Are you talking about acne here?

I have all of his wideos. I will be trying out for the Celtics next year because I learned so much from the wideos

And April fools is a long ways away.

Scalabrine is what he always will be. The new team will not help him have a breakout season, he will be buried on the bench much like he was when we won in ’08. My only real recolection actually of him that year was talking trash to the media in a postgame interview during the finals…

Everyone commenting here seems to always pull the stale card about his hustle. However, in reality i don’t see one lazy player in a Celtics that doen’t bust his butt. What sets Scalabrine apart in that aspect, really though?? Because he is the epitome of a scrub that tries, & a good game for him isn’t messing up too much to cost a game?? Come on people smarten up and put the kool-aid down, its nauseating.

As overpaid as he is, every year Scals looks out of shape. I can literally smell the beer sweat through my TV when the camera man pans on him. Maybe i would have been more optimistic had he lost some weight right when Danny decided to pay him 15million. Maybe even after year 2 sigh

His positives do not outweigh his many negatives imo. Nothing more than an expiring contract, or trade filler. If only other GM’S were as positive as the author…

I like the long look back at Scal.

If I’m being honest, when I first saw Scal play for the Cs I thought, “What is this guy doing playing basketball?”
That was when he was with the young group so aptly described in Greg’s piece, and trying to overcompensate for their vast weaknesses.

I actually thought that last season should be viewed as his break out or break -in year. You could see the positive results when he was on the floor – often.

The idea of a vet team is right, IMO. And finding his niche took time and encouragement from Doc for him to become the spot up three point shooter he has become, as mentioned in a beat writer’s article recently.

His defense can be quite good against certain players and for limited minutes. It is when he is on the floor for extended minutes that some of his deficiencies can become more noticeable/exploitable.

I remember his defense getting under Garnett’s skin one game when he was still in Minnesota.

But his value extends beyond the court to the locker room in many ways. There is no one who exhibits the ‘team first’ concept better than Brian Scalabrine. He is worth a vet minimum contract for that alone.

I’m not sure I see him as a head coach some day, but certainly a front office guy could easily be in his future, IMHO.

Nice job, Greg.

I believe he’s in a contract year, since the last year of his deal was reportedly a team option. Scalabrine would be better off being traded to a team where he could be a regular rotation player. In Boston that will not happen.

no question Scal fills a need but his signing was still a mistake and the $5M we pay him each year could have been used to sign James Posey or other good players. He also is a timebomb as far as getting another concussion so any plan that relies on Veal is flawed IMO just as it was flawed last year to think Tony Allen could replace Posey. I don’t mind Scal where he is now but honestly I’d rather have had Jamario Moon.Matt Barnes or Jason Kapono as our back up small forward

“Five minutes” should have been “five or ten minutes”

It will be interesting to see how Scal does at the SF position. He is a smart player. Logic would suggest he gets beat easily. But smart defensive players know their weaknesses. I don’t think his competition is TA, Walker, Williams, or Giddens. Its how well the team plays with Hudson. (Daniels moving to SF)

Scal must be worried. With Hudson injected into the second team with rotation minutes they were playing amazing. I’d rather put my money on Hudson having a “yeah that’s right I’m a first round player” year than Scal having a breakout year. Here’s sarcastically hoping that Hudson doesn’t explode with a 20pt game and push Scal out.

will eventually have an outbreak.

Every team could use a Scal type player for the right price,if its only for insurance purposes mainly.In case a starter breaks down before the season is done,or to play in garbage time.Scal raising his game this season isn’t something i think will happen,but he is/has been a steady contrbutor to the Celtics for awhile.He is almost like,“in case of emergency,break glass” kind of a player.

A perfect summation of Scal. Those of us that have stuck up for him over the years have never hit the nail on the head as you did. He is a well suited bench player on a championship team. Can give you a little home run ball, a little defense, a good, selfless pick, few brainless errors, (not a lot of rebounds, I’ll concede that point), no ego problems, and let’s not forget (oh yee few Republicans) he didn’t vote for Barack Obama.

I only saw the first two preseason games but anyone who thinks Sheldon Williams has more to offer than Scal is blind.

And if all else fails down low, Wallace should be lying in the weeds with an extra serving of help defense.

This comment jumped out on me because one of the more notable things for me in the NJ game the other day was watching Scal and Sheed play team defense together. A couple of times they totally caged Harrington and seemed to to really understand what the other was doing.

Scal is not a ‘great’ defender by any stretch, but he has sound fundamentals and perhaps most importantly he stays aware of his team defense so that if he’s going to get beat, he usually makes sure he gets beat on the help side. Scal’s biggest weakness on defense is probably that he gets slap happy trying to compensate for lack of lateral speed, but generally he is a plus asset on defense.

Offensively his game is more obvious – set picks and roll to the corner for the three. He does this very well as his 3-point shot has developed into a fairly reliable tool.

I would love if they could trade him and get good value, but I have a hard time believing they could get better value out of a trade than he already provides for them as a roll player. At most they get a cheap, similarly-talented body that is making less so they clear up what? A million or two? And what, exactly would they be doing with that money? And they’d now have a similarly-talented body that doesn’t know the Celtic’s systems as well.

Alternatively they trade Scal for a higher-priced commodity – how will they afford that?

I think at this point, Scal has more value to the C’s than we would ever get for him in a trade.

TA, on the other hand, has little remaining value to the Cs from what I can tell, yet his pure athleticism and relative youth probably means he has some value to other teams. If we get anything for him, it would probably be a gain, even if its just a future 5th round pick.

oops, i was referring actually to Scal & Sheed’s play in the ‘NY’ game.

Scal’s contract cost us Posey. Like most i wanted Scal and TA gone. But if you have ever been on a really good team the idea starts to sink in that Scal would be better for this team if he played out the rest of the year. A world beater he’s not but he does give a good account of himself when called on to play. If we get good value for him then trade him but I would rather he play out the season. If you look at it he’s just as valuable as Eddie House. Scal plays better D than House.