In a wiretap story on the Pels, some great frontcourt pairings were listed as rivals to Boogie and Brow beyond the obvious twin tower pairings. One of them I thought was interesting but also hard to justify because gee, the two guys in question, Parish and McHale, happened to play alongside an even greater player by the name of Bird.
So I want to ask this two ways:
1) Larry Bird, circa 1986-87, suddenly materializes on the Pelicans for this season. How far do they go? And how do the Boogie and Brow combo do as his main wingman?
2) Boogie and Brow are transported back to 1986-87 (McHale's peak year), and replace McHale and Parish on the 1986-87 Celts. How do B&B do, and how do those Celts do (were 59-23, made it to the Finals after struggling through two 4-3 series, and then lost to the Lakers 2-4) with their new personnel?
1986-87 Celts btw were a 5-man team:
Bird 28.1pts 9.2reb 7.6ast
McHale 26.2pts 9.9reb 2.6ast
Parish 17.5pts 10.6reb 2.2ast
Johnson 13.4pts 3.3reb 7.5ast
Ainge 14.8pts 3.4reb 5.6ast
top benchers:
Sichting 5.7pts 1.2reb 2.4ast
Roberts 5.5pts 2.6reb 0.8ast
Bird, Boogie, and Brow
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Bird, Boogie, and Brow
- Winsome Gerbil
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Re: Bird, Boogie, and Brow
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Re: Bird, Boogie, and Brow
I think they win it all. Boogie can force an old Kareem out of the paint which he would not like. Boogie could also probably take him off the dribble.
Re: Bird, Boogie, and Brow
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Re: Bird, Boogie, and Brow
Winsome Gerbil wrote:In a wiretap story on the Pels, some great frontcourt pairings were listed as rivals to Boogie and Brow beyond the obvious twin tower pairings. One of them I thought was interesting but also hard to justify because gee, the two guys in question, Parish and McHale, happened to play alongside an even greater player by the name of Bird.
So I want to ask this two ways:
1) Larry Bird, circa 1986-87, suddenly materializes on the Pelicans for this season. How far do they go? And how do the Boogie and Brow combo do as his main wingman?
2) Boogie and Brow are transported back to 1986-87 (McHale's peak year), and replace McHale and Parish on the 1986-87 Celts. How do B&B do, and how do those Celts do (were 59-23, made it to the Finals after struggling through two 4-3 series, and then lost to the Lakers 2-4) with their new personnel?
1986-87 Celts btw were a 5-man team:
Bird 28.1pts 9.2reb 7.6ast
McHale 26.2pts 9.9reb 2.6ast
Parish 17.5pts 10.6reb 2.2ast
Johnson 13.4pts 3.3reb 7.5ast
Ainge 14.8pts 3.4reb 5.6ast
top benchers:
Sichting 5.7pts 1.2reb 2.4ast
Roberts 5.5pts 2.6reb 0.8ast
Celtics coach KC Jones ran his starters into the ground. Fatal mistake. He needed to develop Darren Daye and Sam Vincent in a hurry but that has nothing to do with your question.
Short answer is Davis and Cousins probably flop as Bird's teamates. On offense everything is OK because Cousins and Davis create more space for Bird to work inside. On the other hand I don't think Cousins and Davis can match McHales scoring efficiency. Cousins and Davis are good scorers but they are well behind McHale in true shooting percentage and McHale' did not relally rely on his teammates for his elite true shooting percentage.
Defense is a big problem. The Celtics starters knew how to play team defense together. The Worst problem is that Bird defends power forwards because he is a poor one on one defender of talented small forwards. McHale defended the small forwards.
One exception is in the NBA finals where Burd defends McCray but small forward McCray was a center in college and McCray was not as fast as many small forwards and was not as good of a dribbler as many small forwards and McHale was needed to defend Sampson's length.
Davis is faster than McHale but you can't ask Davis to defend small fowards the way McHale defended small forwards.
I would let Cousins, Davis and Bird have all the Center and power forward minutes. Even Fred Roberts is slower than I like as a small forward and he has a weak offensive game but KCJones played Roberts over Daye because Roberts did not make mistakes. Darren Daye must play and must play well.
Even then I have doubts about Cousins and Davis replacing Parish and McHale defensively.
Re: Bird, Boogie, and Brow
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Re: Bird, Boogie, and Brow
SinceGatlingWasARookie wrote:
Celtics coach KC Jones rand his starters into the ground. Fatal mistake. He needed to develop Darren Daye and Sam Vincent in a hurry but that has nothing to do with your question.
Darren Daye is just wishful thinking. Vincent probably could have helped a bit. More importantly: RIP Len Bias.
Hear you tell it, man I'm fallin/Well somebody must have caught him/Cause every fourth quarter/I like to Mike Jordan 'em.
"I think you'll find that these are the exact same dimensions as our gym back at Hickory."
"I think you'll find that these are the exact same dimensions as our gym back at Hickory."
Re: Bird, Boogie, and Brow
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Re: Bird, Boogie, and Brow
Just having two healthy bigs would have been a huge help for the 87 Celtics. Remember, McHale had a broken foot in the finals. Put Bird on the current day Pelicans and you're talking about a potential Finals team.