Random musings waiting for the playoffs

I'm not sure if some of you understand how hard it is to come up with content for this blog every day. Sure, it is a passion and a labor of love, and there are some days when I can't stop the ideas from flowing out of my fingers onto the keyboard. But there are some days, like say, a random day at the end of March, when there's nothing much going on.

So sometimes you just have to sit down and start writing and see where the words take you.

Sure, I could update you on the latest with Jae Crowder (he's hoping to play tomorrow!) or break down the playoff seedings (way too soon to tell and will come down to the final days of the season), but beyond that, there's not a lot of new material to cover. And you know what... that is great.

All I have to do is take a look at the Lakers soap opera, or the Kings dysfunction, or the Knicks prolonged struggles, and it makes me feel warm inside to be a Celtics fan right now.

Don't get me wrong, things can change fast in the NBA. In a few years, the Lakers could be back on the top, the Kings could finally figure out the Cousins stuff, and the Knicks could actually be relevant again. But I doubt it. Something could derail the Celtics' rebuild process as well. But I doubt it.

Right here and right now, the Celtics have a great, stable leadership structure, from the ownership down to the assistant coaches, and everyone at least appears to be on the same page, headed in the same positive direction. You can't say that about a lot of NBA franchises.

The same guy that was the GM of the team when I started this blog in 2004 is still here calling the shots. The current head coach is just starting what appears to be a long, successful career in Boston. A lot of fans around the country wish they could have that kind of stability and future outlook.

Will it all work out? Will these best-laid plans result in fireworks and more banners for the rafters? I guess we'll see, and that's the fun of it all. If life was easy and the Celtics won every game, it wouldn't be very interesting, and I'd probably be blogging about something else. What's that saying? "Nothing that's worthwhile is ever easy." (Or something like that) [wait, Google tells me that I just quoted Nicholas Sparks - that can't be good]

I'm not getting overly stressed about the seedings or who the Celtics will match up with, at least not yet. There will be time for that in mid-April. I'm not stressing about how far the team will make it in the playoffs (a first-round sweep would sting, and a deep run would be fun, but we've already made progress). I can't bring myself to think too hard about the offseason yet (preview: it is going to be bonkers).

Right now we're in a cozy little space in the the schedule. There are still some things to watch for and write about. The team is on a West-coast trip, they are hoping to get their best all-around player back from injury, they soon will play the defending champs, they should soon clinch a playoff berth, and then we'll see how those wacky standings shake out.

But from a big-picture perspective, I'm pretty content to ride out the schedule and appreciate what we have in Boston. A good, hard-working team whose members care for each other, that plays the game the right way, and that has a solid leadership team in place for the future. Hard to ask for much more than that.