Marcus Smart: "Jayson and Jaylen, they don't want to pass the ball"

[Vampirate]

Smart thinks he's Kobe Bryant in his prime but better in the worst possible way.

He's just a horrible team mate.

He doesn't give a **** about Tatum or Brown passing the ball, he just wants it so he can jack up more shots at at his blistering 25% on a mere 10 FGA per game.

He needs more in his mind, he's got more bricks setting records to set. (see the lowest 3 point % for anyone who's ever attemped more than a small amount of 3s, ect.).

It has always been one bad sign after another, from him and Tatum being the only players that liked Kyrie to him punching a fan in the stands in college, to him taking cheap shots in games of others players, to him throwing a hissy fit last playoffs and blaming everyone but himself and Jaylen Brown having to take the leadership position to tell him to STFU we need to actual play as a team it's the playoffs and there's not time for this, from him losing his temper and punching glass and injuring himself.

This is just yet another thing from Smart. The most ironically named player in the NBA.

When you are winning, a player strengths stand out and you admire them, when you are losing a players flaws stand out and you loathe them.

Trust me, Smart's not one of those players.

A lot of times when winning you can be happy your team somehow has survived despite having an anchor around it.

He earned a reputation of a guy who's a bull on defense and makes winning plays.

He's a horrible shooter/scorer, but he's still better than a 25% Field Goal and 3 point shooter he's been thus far.

But anyways, while I think you guys will figure it out and get to the playoffs, (there's too much of a track record to say you won't) if you flounder to a bottom feeder it might not be that bad as imo you guys don't have a 3rd reliable scorer (Timelord is probably a super backup but I could be wrong), like an efficient 15 PPG starter to take care of the load so maybe you'll get lucky in the lotto like we did.

[DroseReturnChi]

ive warned celtics fans they are a treadmill team and yr after yr they were the next best team. your 2 best 2 way wings losing mandhandled by 32 yr old demar shame on you ainge and stevens. worst gm of all time.
hoping a broken dennis to be savior for the season and not making upgrade with picks is cringe.
this trade deadline is pretty much final ultimatum. if they dont all in, they might get knocked out in playins. this first 10 games are wake up call to tatum, coach, and fo. tanking for david robinson might be better if they cant package picks for simmons.

[celticfan42487]

Regardless of how you feel about Smart or his play, IMO he's right on the money. Both the J's have horrible shot selection. Then add that they take so many a night and don't create for others.

They average over 45% from the floor and over 37% from 3 for their entire careers.

That's just not correct no matter how much others would like that to be the narrative that is told because it's fun.

If you're asking stud scorers who can't playmake to make up for the fact you have horrible playmakers around them you don't blame them for the roster construction.

That's just completely backwards thinking.

The answer is really boring and obvious, it's just bad roster construction around your talent. Most of that blame lies on Ainge's lap for mission on 100 first rounders and some on just bad luck for every player around them suffering talent ending injuries.

in this nba should your two best players really be bad playmakers though? AD has bron. Middleton is okay becasue freak. kawhi and pg kinda have the same issues but they are both better than these two. booker looked better with cp. assists arent the whole story, but where do you see the two best players average 6 assists per game while having the rock this much in todays game being about generating 3 pointers? im having trouble thinking of good teams that do this, not title teams, just good teams.

I think you're arguing for bad roster construction.

Again to be fair to Ainge if he wasn't one of the worst drafters over the past 5 years drafting endless busts, and didn't have the worst luck he put talent around them that theoretically if they didn't get immediately injured would provide what you're looking for.

IT, Hayward, Kemba, Irving.

You can be a great player without being the ball dominate player on the team. Right now though they're being asked to do things that is the one weakness in their game.

But yeah I suspect some of the best 3 and D young wings with good ISO scoring ability aren't the issue here. They're not Ben Simmons and Embiid they don't clash with anyone on the court. They just can't all be LeBron, some players are going to have flaws.

It'd be like asking Giannis to take 20 3s a game and saying it's his fault he can't do it and is therefore killing his team. It would be an odd thing to criticize him for and throw away everything else he brings to the table.

[celticfan42487]

When you are winning, a player strengths stand out and you admire them, when you are losing a players flaws stand out and you loathe them.

Trust me, Smart's not one of those players.

A lot of times when winning you can be happy your team somehow has survived despite having an anchor around it.

He earned a reputation of a guy who's a bull on defense and makes winning plays.

He's a horrible shooter/scorer, but he's still better than a 25% Field Goal and 3 point shooter he's been thus far.

But anyways, while I think you guys will figure it out and get to the playoffs, (there's too much of a track record to say you won't) if you flounder to a bottom feeder it might not be that bad as imo you guys don't have a 3rd reliable scorer (Timelord is probably a super backup but I could be wrong), like an efficient 15 PPG starter to take care of the load so maybe you'll get lucky in the lotto like we did.

Yeah winning plays is just code for he losses the game and occasionally hits the bricks he throws up.

But yeah depending on when Tatum demands to be traded to the Lakers it's not a bad thing in the end. Just sim the season, hope we can draft a greater than 6'6" tall PG to slide into the lineup.

Just you know put complimentary players on the floor and suddenly the team will look better. We'll see how it goes.

[everdiso]

While I think the jays are super overrated it's not like they have any support. Horford is the only other starting caliber player on on roster and he's way past his prime. and other than Smart I'm not sure there's any other guys you even want to call quality permanent rotation guys.

[Pelly24]

Tatum always kinda lets me down lol. He's never once been on anything resembling a bad team. He's always played with multiple playmakers and talented scorers and guys that could break down a defense. in 2019-2020, he had Kemba and Brown averaging over 20 ppg efficiently and then Hayward being a 17/5/5 guy with solid defense, and a good coach. Before that, Horford and Kyrie. He's great, but in reality, he's a very streaky guy as a shooter and he's only decent athlete. Brown keeps getting better but idk. Dennis Schroder isn't that good. Horford is fine but idk. They lost Hayward for nothing. Just in a rough spot. Still love Marcus Smart.

[TheAlchemist]

Somethings just off about the two, and the way the Celtics team is orchestrated.

The only time I think we all uninamously agreed that the Celts where a ECF / Finalist is when Isiah Thomas was on the team.

The Tatum - Brown pairing hasn't worked out at all. The Celts would be smart, mind the pun, to flip Tatum and get a star piece in return.

[Strepbacter]

Regardless of how you feel about Smart or his play, IMO he's right on the money. Both the J's have horrible shot selection. Then add that they take so many a night and don't create for others.

They average over 45% from the floor and over 37% from 3 for their entire careers.

That's just not correct no matter how much others would like that to be the narrative that is told because it's fun.

If you're asking stud scorers who can't playmake to make up for the fact you have horrible playmakers around them you don't blame them for the roster construction.

That's just completely backwards thinking.

The answer is really boring and obvious, it's just bad roster construction around your talent. Most of that blame lies on Ainge's lap for mission on 100 first rounders and some on just bad luck for every player around them suffering talent ending injuries.

in this nba should your two best players really be bad playmakers though? AD has bron. Middleton is okay becasue freak. kawhi and pg kinda have the same issues but they are both better than these two. booker looked better with cp. assists arent the whole story, but where do you see the two best players average 6 assists per game while having the rock this much in todays game being about generating 3 pointers? im having trouble thinking of good teams that do this, not title teams, just good teams. its not one or the other, both need to get better. kobe freaking bryant has seasons averaging as many a assists as both of them combined with worse teammates.

Except Kobe was one of the best passing SG's of all time and a great playmaker but nice try.

[DCasey91]

It’s seems like overlapping monopolization on a saturated skill is working less today than ever before. Thank the skies about time.

It stands to reason (and these goes for all players looking less impressive than before) but shooting 3+ from the line at 80+% does wonders to the raw stats and TS%.

For me if you have 30%+ usage and don’t have 5 assists a game consistently you aren’t doing it right.

Also simply it could be two chefs trying to be the head and dictate it on his own terms.

[Lalouie]

this is not going to make j&j happy but then again as leaders they're not taking the celts anywhere anyway

so, on nbaTV they were saying this should be kept in house.
screw that.
these guys are not children. they're grown men getting paid millions to do better

sometimes it's better to let everyone know your goals so that it forces you to make good on those goals

[JN61]

Few months back I told everyone the style guys like Marcus smart try to lead in locker room and in the game is bad for the team chemistry and I was shut down so fast by Celtics fans. Well seems I was right...

Players who call out constantly other players when they are subbar is very harmful for the team chemistry. It's not me it's you attitude and dogging out other players is bad.

[JN61]

Man I’ve been hearing for years how Tatum is the next Kobe blah blah blah. What happened y’all? Seems like everybody has flipped on him this year

Well thing is Kobe played much of his career during very slow defensive heavy era. While Tatum plays on one of the fastest eras which is by far the most favourable for the offensive player yet fails to put up similar numbers so my take is no way in hell. Tatum would have been 18-20ppg game scorer back in hand check low 3 point volume era.

[KIRAG]

Although I know it's not fair to judge Udoka just yet being a first time head coach and just 6 games into the season, this is a testament of how good a coach Brad Stevens was. Took this team and starless IT led team 3 times to the ECF and never out of the playoffs except for his first season as a coach with whatever was leftover after the Big 3. And the hardest part of it all was managing egos.

[Pennebaker]

#mambamentality is a blessing and a curse. Or maybe it's just a curse.

[Dupp]

Stevens is wasting his talent not coaching

[kio80]

Just like with Embiid, saying it in public is just not helpful to anyone

Smart is upping Embiid's hand by throwing 2 guys under the bus

[Dubious Handles]

Why is it always Smart putting other players under the bus? Bad "leader".
This is all still Ainge's mess though, all he cared about was bamboozling other GMs and drafting undersized guards while disregarding team coherence and the glaring flaws the team has.

[BostonCouchGM]

This tool has some of the worst BBIQ on the offensive side of the ball so him calling them out is embarrassing for them. That said, in this he’s right

[lambchop]

Looks more like it was their defense that killed them. The bulls scored 39 points in the 4th quarter. Smart and Brown for shooting well, Tatum was meh but not atrocious in terms of shooting, but that -24 is not a good look.

[Duke4life831]

Can we go back and retroactively give Stevens a COY for one of his past seasons haha. I honestly wont be shocked if in 10 years we look back and think of the group Stevens had to coach as a roster filled with impossible personalities to work with. I can easily see it being something along the lines of

Kyrie: Well he's just Kyrie
Brown: Can be arrogant and tough to deal with
Tatum: Natural ball hog that takes every ounce of the coach to prevent him from being a ball hog
Smart: A big personality who's personality is bigger than his actual skill and impact he brings

Like I said in the other Boston thread, maybe for the past years many kept saying that these Boston teams were underperforming under Stevens. In reality, they were actually drastically over performing under Stevens.