Flow in the offense

[GreenDreamer]

The Celtics lost last night to the jazz, and I think that the main culptrit (more than the refs and even K.G.'s knee) was the basic offensive approach that we had in the game. One which Doc seems to think is a good way of going about our business, yet often blows up in the team's face.

Despite their early shooting issues, and teh Jazz missed a lot of good looks early on, Utah runs a very fluid and unpredicatable offense. We have a great defensive team, yet they consistently found ways to spring guys free for good looks at the basket. I thought that they squandered a lot of these, and we did a good jobn of keeping them from scoring inside, but the WAY that they got these looks was smart and efficient.

The Jazz MOVE THEMSELVES in the halfcourt. A lot of the time guys are making simple, opportunistic cuts to free themselves for midrange jumpers and inside looks. They do not watch Deron Williams dribble, they help him create passing angles, and also pass the ball themselves to other cutting teammates. i'm fairly certain that most of these aren't set plays, but are rather offensive sets in which the players use their brains and actually try to read the defense and act on their own initiative. They set picks for each other, and attempt to keep the ball moving in a coherent fashion.

The Celts, on the other hand, run a lot of sets designed to get ONE guy the ball, and his teammates basically stand around watching him. Take our pick and roll stuff. Rondo and Pierce are coming off of teh picks and NO ONE is moving. Williams time and again was finding moving teammates coming off of picks, and quite often the Jazz would run secondary cuts off of the initial player movement. Kind of like magic "Look one way, and we get you the other".

We had 14 assists and 19 turnovers in the game. Rondo had 7 of the assists and one of the turnovers. What was he doing most of the time he was out there, though? "Getting the ball" to the guys who were turning it over. It isn't like Rondo, himself, was doing a good job moving off the ball, because NO ONE on this team does a good job of that. It is the "everybody's equal offense" where it is pretended that Paul Pierce and Ray Allen are equivalent playmakers to Rondo ( they are most certainly NOT). Where off the ball movement is the same no matter who is doing the ball handling. Where everyone stands around to receive a pass when the ball handler is doubled rather than moving the butts to MAKE themselves open. We have vastly superior offensive talent on this team to what the Jazz are working with, but the Utah offense is so much more well thought out and effective it isn't funny.

Doc needs to get his head out of his rear end and start getting these guys to set picks for each other OFF OF THE BALL and to get themselves in motion on a regular basis. Standing around ball watching is bad basketball. It ALWAYS has been bad basketball. It is a good thing we are such a good defensive team, because if we had to actually rely on our offense we would be in big trouble. We can roll up bad teams with it, but when we play good ones it has a habit of bogging down.

On a side note: Why is it that we go away from Rondo when he gets hot, either with his playmaking or his shooting? It's like Doc says "Alright, Rondo's rolling, now we can force the ball into the others and it will work better because he drawing extra attention. Also, why is it that we rarely establish him early in a game? Utah lacked shotblockers inside, had a point guard who struggles to stay in front of him, and yet in the beggining of the game everything was force the ball into Paul and Ray. Meanwhile Rondo is getting punked by the refs on BS foul calls because instead of having a chance to blacken Deron's eyes a little, he is stuck only defending him. It is no secret that NBA refs will give a guy like Williams all of the calls if his man isn't giving a problem on the other end. rondo made Deron look bad a few times in the second half, and whaddayaknow, he didn't get screwed on calls. What a shock.

Does Doc realize that we can actually attack with Rondo at the beginning, and at the end of games? That the rules clearly allow this. That going for matchups is good and all, but can be taken too far, and that having a consistent, efficient and UNPREDICTABLE offensive approach is the best way to go.

Games like this one scare the hell out of me. They clearly expose our bench as being extremely ill conceived and our offense as being a predictable turnover fest. I would have complained about us not cranking the pace of the game up, but looking at how exhausted Paul and Ray were, I tjhought better of it.

[Joebiscuit]

Celtics lost because PP bricked like 27 shots he usually makes.

[GreenDreamer]

Celtics lost because PP bricked like 27 shots he usually makes.

They played like garbage for most of the game. Their offense is predictable, and relying omn Paul Pierce to make contested jumpers isn't exactly a good plan. If he's "on", OK. If he's not, you better do something else. Evidently Doc forgot that our leading scorer in the quarter was Rondo.... who also happens to be our point guard, best ball handler and passer. Hey, why play easy when you can make life difficult for yourself?

[ryaningf]

I thought we squandered our chances down the stretch in one important way. Down the stretch, when Rondo and Paul would engage in the pick-and-high-post play at the top of the key, Rondo would never even LOOK at getting to the rim. Usually, the lane was open for him to penetrate, but instead of turning the corner and heading to the rim, he'd put on the breaks and pitch it back to Pierce. Now, when Pierce has it going, that's alright, but after the first 3 misses I think Doc (or Paul for that matter) should have made an adjustment and let Rondo try to get to the rim on that pick and THEN, if the rim was cut off, pass it back to Paul for the high post. We made it WAY too easy for them to defend us, especially since it was apparent Rondo could get by Williams whenever he wanted. Instead, we kept going back to the pre-determined play of isolating Paul at the top of the key (where Harpring continuously fouled him...but that's another post). This is not so much a fault of Rondo's as it is one of Doc's (and to a lesser extent Paul's, who should have the veteran knowledge to know that Rondo had the better advantage last night down the stretch).

[Joebiscuit]

Jazz played horrible for most of the game as well. The game was close. Just about every shot PP has was a good look he just did not hit it. Plus the celtics missed a bunch of FT's. That is what caused them to lose.

[GreenDreamer]

I thought we squandered our chances down the stretch in one important way. Down the stretch, when Rondo and Paul would engage in the pick-and-high-post play at the top of the key, Rondo would never even LOOK at getting to the rim. Usually, the lane was open for him to penetrate, but instead of turning the corner and heading to the rim, he'd put on the breaks and pitch it back to Pierce. Now, when Pierce has it going, that's alright, but after the first 3 misses I think Doc (or Paul for that matter) should have made an adjustment and let Rondo try to get to the rim on that pick and THEN, if the rim was cut off, pass it back to Paul for the high post. We made it WAY too easy for them to defend us, especially since it was apparent Rondo could get by Williams whenever he wanted. Instead, we kept going back to the pre-determined play of isolating Paul at the top of the key (where Harpring continuously fouled him...but that's another post). This is not so much a fault of Rondo's as it is one of Doc's (and to a lesser extent Paul's, who should have the veteran knowledge to know that Rondo had the better advantage last night down the stretch).

Personally, I don't think that Rondo did have particularly good driving lanes at the end, especially with Leon and Perk out there. The gameplan was abviously to get Paul the ball. It is what Doc wanted, and we continued to go to it. Actually, it is what my O.P. was about... the whole "force it into this guy" mentality of this team. Instead of actually running an offense, we just try to set up ISO's. That is garbage, but between Doc's proclivity for this kind of basketball and our bench I guess that thuis is just the way that it is going to be.

P.S., Rondo averaging as many assists as he does is a minor miracle the way that this team is run.

[MyInsatiableOne]

Jazz played horrible for most of the game as well. The game was close. Just about every shot PP has was a good look he just did not hit it. Plus the celtics missed a bunch of FT's. That is what caused them to lose.

Joe, you're actually being realistic instead of pessimistic, and you're dead on!

[ryaningf]

I thought we squandered our chances down the stretch in one important way. Down the stretch, when Rondo and Paul would engage in the pick-and-high-post play at the top of the key, Rondo would never even LOOK at getting to the rim. Usually, the lane was open for him to penetrate, but instead of turning the corner and heading to the rim, he'd put on the breaks and pitch it back to Pierce. Now, when Pierce has it going, that's alright, but after the first 3 misses I think Doc (or Paul for that matter) should have made an adjustment and let Rondo try to get to the rim on that pick and THEN, if the rim was cut off, pass it back to Paul for the high post. We made it WAY too easy for them to defend us, especially since it was apparent Rondo could get by Williams whenever he wanted. Instead, we kept going back to the pre-determined play of isolating Paul at the top of the key (where Harpring continuously fouled him...but that's another post). This is not so much a fault of Rondo's as it is one of Doc's (and to a lesser extent Paul's, who should have the veteran knowledge to know that Rondo had the better advantage last night down the stretch).

Personally, I don't think that Rondo did have particularly good driving lanes at the end, especially with Leon and Perk out there. The gameplan was abviously to get Paul the ball. It is what Doc wanted, and we continued to go to it. Actually, it is what my O.P. was about... the whole "force it into this guy" mentality of this team. Instead of actually running an offense, we just try to set up ISO's. That is garbage, but between Doc's proclivity for this kind of basketball and our bench I guess that thuis is just the way that it is going to be.

P.S., Rondo averaging as many assists as he does is a minor miracle the way that this team is run.

Yeah, I share your distaste for the isolation basketball we fall into occasionally...I place most of that at Doc's feet. As you noted, the Jazz ran their offense down the stretch for the most part, though Williams occasionally created off the dribble as well. Our bench definitely does cause us to lose the flow of our offense...but that's not a good excuse in my book and it's something Doc needs to coach up...he knows we slow down when Rondo leaves the game and he needs to get in Rondo's ear about picking up the pace when he gets back in the game. The more we put the ball in Rondo's hands, the more unguardable this team is...and it's irking to see us move away from that at times when we shouldn't be...

From my memory of the 4th quarter, there were at least 3 times the lane was open on the pick and high post play with Paul and Rondo wasn't even looking for it. To me, it's not even a matter of whether he should or shouldn't have penetrated, it's a matter of not even looking for it. You gotta make the defense play honest and I felt that Rondo was telegraphing that play by never even faking the drive to the basket. As for Perk and Powe clogging the lane, you're right, they did do that on occasion...but on other occasions every one was on the weak side and the lane was prime to penetrate. But again, it's not the penetration v. no penetration that bothers me, it's the lack of any threat of penetration that is bothersome.

[Jammer]

Offensive flow, movement without the ball, and coaching had ZERO
to do with losing to the Jazz. Nada.

Shooting % was minor.

The reasons the Celtics lost to the Jazz were:

1. 30 Stupid Fouls. Bush League plays, wasting precious fouls in the first 2 or 3 minutes of a quarter, that then put the Jazz in the penalty. Wasting possessions. Scalabrine, Powe, Davis and Pruitt especially (16 of the fouls).

2. 19 Turnovers, also UNACCEPTABLE. The Celtics average 1.1 points per possession.
So, Reducing the turovers from 19 to 14 is worth 5.5 points in itself.
Captain Pierce leading the way with 5 TO's is no example to set.

3. Foul Shooting. 19-29. This is an NBA. Making 4 more free throws would have
completely changed the end of the game.

4. Tony Allen missed the game (possibly lost for the season).

5. KG missed the second half.

But there is plenty of issues with items 1 and 2 (Fouls and Turnovers)
to more than explain why the Celtics lost a game that they should have won.

And it wasn't coaching or offensive schemes, it was stupidity by the players.

If the Celtics keep that up they won't be playing in June.

And, it's obvious Marbury and Joe Smith would help,
but the Celtics are stuck with scrubs Davis and Scalabrine right now.

It's time to take out the trash,
also known as ADDITION by SUBTRACTION.