More photos » by TOM HEVEZI - AP

Stop comparing me to Chris Paul ...wait, did he say something about me?

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The road weary start of the regular season is over and the team "escaped" with a nice 7-1 record.  Now they've had a few days to ice down knees and eat some home cooking.  Seems like a good time to take a peek ahead at the next few games.

• 11/11 vs. Utah - Will Rondo trash talk Deron Williams too?  If he doesn't, will Deron feel slighted?  I can never figure out the Jazz.  Williams, Boozer, and Millsap are great talents.  Kirilenko was once a star role player, or something like that.  They have a very well respected coach.  Why don't they win more?  Hopefully they'll take at least one more game before figuring it out.
• 11/13 vs. Atlanta - Slowly, ever so slowly, they are moving from "young, plucky team nobody wants to meet in the playoffs" to "pretty good team."  Still love Joe Johnson's game.  Jamal Crawford has finally found a home.  Joe Smith is the grizzled vet while Josh Smith is lurking on the weakside ready to block your shot into next week.  I don't like this matchup for us at all.  Young whippersnappers running all around could prove too tiring for our old legs.  Then again, if our defense smacks them in the face early on, I could see them folding early.
• 11/14 @ Indiana - Another dangerous game in that it is the 2nd of a back to back and the Pacers have some young legs and nothing to lose.  Beyond that, I may have to fall back on ex-Celtic storylines (Bird, O'Brien) because beyond Granger this team doesn't do much for me.  On the bright side, they have completely cleaned out the rif-raff.  Now they need to take that next step (like the Jail Trail Blazers did) and get good again.
• Next week: Golden State and Orlando (we'll cover that one in excruciating detail soon enough).