Celtics Drop Raptors on Lazy Sunday

and we simply DO need to win – home court in the playoffs is earned by winning games now.

And both Rondo and especially Ray have been his most efficient players on the court – Ray is tops for the team and Rondo is either 3rd or 4th depending on how you look at it. KG is up there, but injured. Pierce has been injured. In other words, to win games, he needs both Ray and Rondo on the court.

Daniels being out also hurts because he can spell minutes for both Ray and Rajon. TA being out the early part of the season also hurt.

If we can get the rest of the crew healthy, then not only will Doc have the guys who can sub for those two directly, we should potentially have the guns to pull out to more blow-out leads, allowing Doc to rest guys like he wanted to.

Part of the irony this year is that so many of the YOUNGER guys – who are needed to rest the older guys – have been injured. BBD, Daniels, Walker, TA – losing those guys for extended periods is not helping to keep the minutes of the old farts down.

Ray Allen is very quietly having a fantastic basketball year, even though his personal scoring numbers are down. He may be the most valuable player on the team so far this season.

good points about RR’s minutes. I’d like to see them limited at 40-ish, but let’s not forget that we are missing Marquis Daniels. He and House make a great 1-2 combo together and when MD is healthy he’ll take the bulk of the backup ballhandling.

Opening up the roster spot was probably a good call. I liked Hudson’s game, but seeing him continuely battle to beat the 8 second violation a couple nights ago was very telling of his ability to play pg (or lack there of..). TA has looked much more up to the task. I think we’ll see Danny activate Ty Lue with that last roster spot post-all star break. He’s already practicing with the team no doubt, so he’ll fit right in.

My feeling is that we won’t need to make any panic trades to fill that hole. Between Daniels, TA’s new found ability to play pg, and the potential to activate Lue who is already working with the team - looks to me that Danny has got us covered at the point.

I still think we are the best team in the league, even more so than I did prior to the season now that I’ve seen how much Rondo has improved. He is an absolute game/series changer with his defense and all-around game.

Wallace is an excellent post defender and unlike Shelden can also play great perimeter defense. One of the jobs of a big in our defense is to be able to step out quickly to contest the perimeter shot from the freed man when we do a double – and then get back in the post. KG and Sheed are both superior defenders because they both do this extremely well. Perkins is slowly getting better at it, but spaces out at times and gets out late (he also doesn’t have the long stride that KG & Sheed have).

Williams is a great post player – an extremely efficient rebounder – but is almost useless at perimeter defense. That impairs the team defensive concept which has us doubling guys on the perimeter and requires us to contest every perimeter shot, with the expectation that a big can come out – either to help on the double or to contest the shot of the abandoned man.

He needs to get better at picking up the switch and coming in and out on defense before he gets more minutes.

BBD is indeed just getting back into game shape – he’s had to relearn to use his butt against some guys that have more length – but even he plays much better Celtic defense than Shelden at this point. He is more experienced in the system and hustles in and out to the right spot.

Rebounds are important – but they are not as important as contesting shots because it is making them take a poor shot that even creates rebounds.