Kyrie Irving is making the case the Celtics are better without him
There is no doubting that Kyrie Irving is one of the most gifted players the league has ever seen. He possesses some of the best handles we’ve seen since Allen Iverson and has the “mamba mentality” as he proved when he sunk the Golden State Warriors with the game-sealing 3-pointer in game seven of the 2016 NBA Finals. That being said…
…Irving has been a net negative against the Boston Celtics. Neither the counting stats nor the advanced stats paint an encouraging picture regarding his performance this series.
That is not to say Irving has been awful the entire series. He was dominant in game one, pouring in 26 points and dishing out eight assists. Besides Boston’s only win however, Irving has struggled.
The struggles start from his efficiency (or lack thereof) from the field. Irving has posted a 37% field goal percentage from the floor, which in a nutshell, isn’t awful. It’s certainly not what you would expect from a top 20 player, though, and in no way, shape or form one you’d expect from a guy that left a three-time defending eastern conference championship team.
Where things get ugly are his 24% conversion on his 3-point attempts. Through four games, he has shot the ball 25 times and his hit just six of those attempts. Many of Irving’s attempts are those he creates for himself, either pulling up in transition or from his patented step-backs.
Give credit where credit is due though. Irving has been leading the team in scoring with almost 22 points a game. He also has more assists per game than the next three highest assist totals on the team.
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That also comes with his usage as the team’s alpha. Irving has a 31% usage rate and is relied on to create for not only himself but for others. So far, the team’s dismal assist rate coupled with the team losing the turnover battle has resulted in Boston being outscored by 28 points through the first four games.
While you can’t blame Irving for Gordon Hayward’s complete and utter free fall from an All-Star talent, but with Irving leading the team in minutes played and usage, he is not doing a good enough job as a leader for a young squad.
When Boston had its backs against the wall yesterday, Irving tried to takeover, repeatedly driving to the rim and pulling up from deep to muster a comeback. He looked like a guy that had checked out on his teammates and was just trying to earn himself a max contract this offseason.
Irving will get that max-deal somewhere. Unfortunately, it might not be with our beloved Boston Celtics. From the looks of it, it appears as though Irving is better suited to link up with another superstar (think Kevin Durant, Kawhi Leonard or even LeBron James again) than lead a team by himself.
This was a Celtics team built to win a title this year and right now they don’t look remotely close to being capable of doing that. It doesn’t make sense to keep this core together after the turmoil that has consumed this season.
Irving appears to be the odd man out. Hopefully the Celtics can at the very least delay that discussion with a win on Wednesday.