Expect a slow start for the Boston Celtics
By John Eyler
The Boston Celtics will need time to become a tight team with defined roles. All the roster changes could lead to a slow start. It’s something to expect as the season gets underway.
The Boston Celtics have made huge changes in this offseason. Gone is Avery Bradley the teams second best scoring threat and Kelly Olynyk, who if you look closely at the stats was the teams third most efficient scorer and top rebounder. They are significant losses. Also gone is starting power forward Amir Johnson, top second unit scoring threat Gerald Green and established back up center Tyler Zeller. Beyond being solid contributors each of these guys had known defined roles within the offense and defense. Known defined roles take a while to develop.
The team the Celtics have assembled for the coming season will need time to become a cohesive group. The talent is there and it is probably superior to last years team but learning how different players will respond to various challenges mid game will lead to some inconsistency. This is why we should expect the Celtics to start slow. We should expect to see some less than beautiful basketball.
In the early going this will be most obvious on the defensive side as replacing Bradley and Johnson will be no small feat. These two were established veterans and the team was accustomed to playing off of their strengths. Further with the changes in the front court, the different types of skills that Aron Baynes and Ante Zizic bring will require adjustment as well. Tyler Zeller and Kelly Olynyk knew where to position themselves and the rest of the team could depend on certain things. That will develop with Baynes and Zizic but it may take some time as they approach the game differently than did Zeller and Olynyk.
Offensively, Gordon Hayward will easily find his role as the team will be built around him. Working with Isaiah Thomas and Al Horford will be a pleasure for him. In fact the starting unit if it includes Marcus Smart and Jae Crowder or Marcus Morris will rather quickly get up to speed. Smart has proven himself in a number of ways and Crowder and Morris are solid veterans adept at playing complimentary roles
Where things will go less smoothly is with the second unit. Terry Rozier, Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum are all very young and there will be growing pains. Teamed with Baynes or Zizic the odds are that there will be some exciting but out of control moments that will be tough to swallow. This extends to those times when these players are working with some of the starters too.
Include Marcus Smart in that “young” group and Zizic, that’s five really young players expected to contribute heavily to a team with championship notions. When was the last tine that happened? Therein lies the biggest question for this Celtics team. Can the youngsters become big time contributors by the time the playoffs roll around?
Next: Breaking Down the Celtics' Bench
One other factor that must be considered as we start the new season is that the expectations for the Celtics are beat the Cavaliers or bust. With those types of expectations early season growing pains will be blown out of proportion. If the team has some setbacks and say a couple of players make some noise about playing time, then things could get uncomfortable.