Ainge comfortable with Walker, Giddens

[LongTimeFan]

Doc may have been taken to the wood shed on this. We peeked too early last year, in part, because of Doc's rotations. All three, Garnet, Pierce and Ray, were worn out when the playoffs started.

Whether we get more vets or not, Doc is going to be under more pressure to manage the season, not just the next game. Whether the pressure comes from DA and the ownership, or from within Doc's head, it will come.

The Celtics brain trust learns from its mistakes, and last season we peaked early. We'll take a few losses to protect our stars and develope our youth.

[ParticleMan]

^^^ i agree with this in general.

i just think it's funny that last year this board was full of threads about how we needed HCA, we had to have HCA to beat cleveland, HCA, HCA... and now, it's all about damn why didn't Doc play the young kids more and rest our big guns, they were too tired, blah blah.

you can't have it both ways. playing the kids would have given us more losses, period. you have to make that sacrifice. losses in november count just as much as losses in april. i think it's a worthwhile sacrifice to make, but that wasn't the concensus last year.

[billfromBoston]

I am not seeing any opinions I agree with here, so I will tell you guys how it is.

We have a window that is open for a few years. Beyond that when we go into rebuilding, Walker and Giddions are below the caliber of players we want to develop. There is really no point in force feeding them playing time when their potential is only that of a decent bench player when we can simply sign a decent bench player. If we use the first half of the season to develop and evaluate that will probably cost us a few games. With so many good teams in the league now we really are going to want to win every game.

Now is not the time to develop players.

Now is the time to stack the team and go all out.

What is the basis of that? Seriously what are you basing the fact that Bill Walker isn't the type of talent you want to feature in your rebuilding. These types of judgements are no different than "Perk will never be a starting C in this league" or "Rondo is not a championship caliber pg."

How is Bill Walker, a freak athlete that can score, rebound and defend, not the type of talent you want to develop? The kid is a lottery pick talent who slid because of knee injury and unwillingness to play overseas. While a lot of things don't translate from the D league to the NBA the 3 pt line is in the same spot and Walker shot 40% over 15 games. You can say the same things about Giddens to an extent I am just less excited about him as a player overall and his age does not match his maturity.

I think the key is that most players period and especially young players need a year a to adjust to Doc's offensive and defensive system's we have seen it again and again. Now they have that year under their belt. Whoever we bring in, Grant Hill aside because he has already played for Doc, is going to have that same adjustment.

In the end I think we will be better in NOV, DEC, and JAN with Davis, Walker, Giddens, and Pruitt in the rotation than if we bring someone else in. Now if your goal is to replace Ray Allen in a year you may not have that guy. But great veteran role players generally start out as young players on great teams that got a shot and come though, ie Derrick Fisher, not talented but underachieving and underdeveloped castoffs from mediocre teams. If you want Trevor Ariza or Tayshaun Prince you don't pay him 8 mil a year you go find a guy like that and give him a chance.

...Ditto...

The "off-season" lasts until the trade deadline. Getting Grant Hill is one thing, going all-out for loser vets with marginal talent and limited playoff experience is another.

If Ainge can't get quality right now - a big leap considering how early it is in the FA process - there is nothing wrong with having Giddens and Walker getting some PT and developing while Ainge waits for the market to shake out and present some trade deadline options.

This year Boston should be very active at the deadline - TA/Scal combo represents a nice little chunk of change and someone of value should be available - SF/SG is the most abundant position in the NBA, if there is a need 6/7 million in expiring contracts will get it done...

All I want is a backup PG and then I'm good - the players actually WANT Walker to be the backup, Pierce included...they like that kid - and Giddens is coming on strong as well....let it happen....

[elrod enchilada]

I am cool with that.

The Cs might be able to get Ridnour at a decent price. He is only under contract for a year, which is nice. Milwaukee is going in the proverbial different direction.

I just want someone who can run an offense and hit open shots.

[sully00]

The issue was far less about playing Bill Walker and about sitting Paul Pierce and Ray Allen. The offense just sucked really bad with the starters out of the game. Adding Marbury didn't help like they wanted. With KG and Sheed Boston will be far more confident in finding offense with Pierce and Allen on the bench. Some sort of steady back up pg play would not hurt.

We didn't peak too early we lost 3 of our 5 big men to injury in the second half of the season, that resulted in us wearing out the rest of the team. Keep that in mind when you all say well 96 mins divided 3 means there isn't enoungh mins for anyone else. Right now the only thing that is changed is we added a 34 year old who was healthy for 66 games last season and are right now down one man.

[GuyClinch]

Doc plays young guys who play defense. Simple as that. He tells them that to start with. Every young kid talks about how they're going to earn time at the defensive end. He played TA as a rookie who couldn't hit an outside shot, but he played D. BBD started getting time when he was playing good positional D, even tho he couldn't hit a 16 footer.

Can't say I agree. Doc wouldn't play TA last year and statistically (I know I will get hate on this) he was the best defender on the team. You might want to argue that he isn't a great defender but he absolutely could play defense.

As far as big baby davis goes - maybe he wasn't hitting his jumpers in the games at first but they evidently believed he HAD a jumper and that's why they stuck with him. Remember coaches see alot more of these guys they we do. His defense was never particularly awesome.

Doc likes guys who can hit Js. You think he plays House for his defense? Ray Allen for his defense? Doc is about the offense. He might pass on a guy who isn't even trying on D. But I never detected that out of Walker. I never saw it in Pruitt. Giddens I never saw.

The assertion that Doc didn't play those guys because they weren't hustling on defense is ridiculous IMHO. Doc is a good coach and gets all his guys to hustle. If I was Walker I would be working on my J.

Pete

[eris]

Doc plays young guys who play defense. Simple as that. He tells them that to start with. Every young kid talks about how they're going to earn time at the defensive end. He played TA as a rookie who couldn't hit an outside shot, but he played D. BBD started getting time when he was playing good positional D, even tho he couldn't hit a 16 footer.

Can't say I agree. Doc wouldn't play TA last year and statistically (I know I will get hate on this) he was the best defender on the team. You might want to argue that he isn't a great defender but he absolutely could play defense.

As far as big baby davis goes - maybe he wasn't hitting his jumpers in the games at first but they evidently believed he HAD a jumper and that's why they stuck with him. Remember coaches see alot more of these guys they we do. His defense was never particularly awesome.

Doc likes guys who can hit Js. You think he plays House for his defense? Ray Allen for his defense? Doc is about the offense. He might pass on a guy who isn't even trying on D. But I never detected that out of Walker. I never saw it in Pruitt. Giddens I never saw.

The assertion that Doc didn't play those guys because they weren't hustling on defense is ridiculous IMHO. Doc is a good coach and gets all his guys to hustle. If I was Walker I would be working on my J.

Pete

Pete, the defense the others were talking about wasn't "weren't hustling", it was "got lost on rotations" in Tib's scheme that the others were talking about, I think.

Everyone, has had a LOT of trouble getting those schemes down, Powe, Baby, Walker, everybody. And when these young guys miss their rotations it leads to (a) easy baskets, (b) fouls on Perk/KG trying to cover, and (c) getting sat back down. I think Powe started to "get it" then he tore up his knee. Baby still has problems, but I think he "get's it" now, too. Walker tried hard, but he was running around like a chicken with his head chopped off on defense last year...he *was* trying, but he kept missing assignments and rotations, then scrambled to catch up, and couldn't. Giddens, we never saw, but my guess is that he was *lost* in practice.

The NBA is a LOT faster and has much more sophisticated/complicated schemes than these guys are used to. For most rookies, it takes time to adjust. Even Red said players make their biggest improvement between their rookie and second season.

Pruitt, otoh, is a slightly different case. He played decent defense when he played, but he was unable to run the team *or* knock down open shots consistently while on the court. You can't have that in your backup PG. Pruitt has to become more aggressive and more assertive and more consistent. I hope I'm wrong, but I don't think he can do it.

Powe, Baby, West, Rondo, Big Al, even Tony *did* get a lot better their second year. I think Walker will. I hope Giddens will. I hope I'm wrong about Pruitt and *he* makes the leap his third year.

Edit: Oh, and I think you're correct about the jump shot. Doc (and Danny) loves him some jump shooters. Yes, Walker should be shooting, shooting, shooting this summer...as should Giddens, Pruitt, and Rondo!

[ParticleMan]

^^^ agree wtih what eris said.

it wasn't about hustle. it's that young kids don't pick up the complicated Thib defense too easily. House may not be a good 1-on-1 defender but he is usually in the right place. His opp PER was 13.4, which shows that he is not a horrid liability in spite of his lack of size, strength, and quickness. this is why i'm a lot more hopeful for Walker and Giddens this year. It seems to take a year (and that's even for the smarter players) to pick up the scheme to the point where they are instinctively in the right place.

as for TA, i strongly disagree that Doc hasn't played him. in fact, given his level of boneheadedness, he has gotten an AMAZINGLY long leash with Doc. and it's directly because, quoting Doc, he's our best wing defender. Doc can live with the TO's and ball-stopping on O because of that. It's just TA has been injured or recovering from injury for so long now that it's hard to give him meaningful playoff minutes.

[GreenDreamer]

If Danny was comfortable with JR and Bill, then I'd be comfortable with Danny getting the boot.

I know that he isn't, though, and I expect him to do everything that can can to get us useful players.

[LongTimeFan]

Sully:

I don't know how you can possibly say we didn't peak to early. My recollection is that we had the best start in the history of the Celtics, if not the NBA. On the other hand by the end of the season both our PF were out and Scal was seeing double. We couldn't handle the Magic.

It wasn't just the distribution of minutes either. The refs let teams beat us up and we took it, so we could win now. We could of retaliated on the court. We did not.

If we had simply accepted the second seed in Atlantic and paced and protected our players, we would have made the finals, possibly won it all. At the start of the season we were either the best or the second best team. At the end of the season we were worn & spent.

[ParticleMan]

i wouldn't say we "peaked" too early. unless by "peak" you mean "had a healthy KG".

our play dropped off with KG's knee troubles and evntually losing him for the season.

i don't think "pacing" our stars would have helped, unless you mean just sitting them for the 1st half of the season. And even then it wouldn't have been enough rest.

i worry a little bit about minutes, but the fact is we pay these guys big bucks to play basketball. why do we have 3 max contracts if we aren't expecting them to play more than 30 mins/gm? nobody else coddles their star like that, except maybe SA and Duncan, and they haven't had much better luck either.

i think we just got unlucky last year. all it does is make the point that you have to build a franshise to be successful long-term, because in any 1 given year so manythings can go wrong.

[leper-con]

We came out like gangbusters, but we should have roped a doped a little in my opinion. LAst years team lacked Depth and we ran our horses early and often. By the time we ran into the LAkers at CHristmas we weren't the better team. What still worries me is the fact the the Celtics are the old team and the Lakers are the younger team. We are defensive minded they are offensive minded..... I wan't someone on our bench that can score points. If we can get someone like that we will be the KINGS of the NBA again.

[sully00]

Sully:

I don't know how you can possibly say we didn't peak to early. My recollection is that we had the best start in the history of the Celtics, if not the NBA. On the other hand by the end of the season both our PF were out and Scal was seeing double. We couldn't handle the Magic.

It wasn't just the distribution of minutes either. The refs let teams beat us up and we took it, so we could win now. We could of retaliated on the court. We did not.

If we had simply accepted the second seed in Atlantic and paced and protected our players, we would have made the finals, possibly won it all. At the start of the season we were either the best or the second best team. At the end of the season we were worn & spent.

WE LOST KEVIN GARNETT TO A KNEE INJURY. C'mon this isn't some sort of missing variable. Did you think we were a championship caliber team without him. Why the hell are we paying him 20 mil then? Add to that the loss of Powe and the salt in the wound of Scal.

We didn't get burnt out in the regular season we got burnt on a brutal 7 game series that involved almost an extra game worth of overtimes. We weren't good enough and while a I guess some fire power on the wings wouldn't have hurt it was the situation in the paint that was the difference. That has been addressed in spades with the addition of Wallace.

But everyone has to keep this straight, it isn't about having a back up for Pierce or Allen it is about having someone who can carry the offense when they sit. Bill Walker could not do that last season, it doesn't mean he can't play SF or SG it means he isn't a HOF All Star. That is the missing piece, hopefully Wallace helps that Hill would have been excellent and with some mins Walker may become that guy he dominated in the D league after doing the same in college and that is a pretty damn good sign, more importantly Matt Barnes and Jamrio Moon aren't that guy hell Chucky Atkins is probably more that guy than them.

While this team lacks a 6'8" wiry athletic SF it isn't what is causing Pierce and Allen to play big mins it is the inability of the offense to function without them. The player that eases that situation can play any position but this team just needs more offense to rest its stars.

[humblebum]

I agree with Sully regarding why Pierce and Allen had to play extended minutes last season - not enough offensive playmakers and scorers off the bench. However, I think that the key to addressing this is to make Rondo the focus of the offense when the bench comes in. That means you need some players that complement Rondo's style, which IMO means shooters and uptempo finishers. That's why Sheed and Hill would have been a near perfect offseason, because Sheed would bring the shooting while Hill is very good at finishing in the open court.

And given those needs I definitely think that Walker or Giddens could excel alongside Rondo in the open court. They also need to be respectable on the perimeter with the jumpshot. It seems that Walker might be closer to fitting this mold of catch and shoot, fast-break finisher. Giddens seems to be more of a creator but I'm not sure he's accomplished enough in this area to become a primary playmaker with the second unit... and his skills in the other areas IMO are less than Walkers. So I'd bet that Walker has the inside track at the 3rd or 4th wing spot.

[GuyClinch]

Everyone, has had a LOT of trouble getting those schemes down, Powe, Baby, Walker, everybody. And when these young guys miss their rotations it leads to (a) easy baskets, (b) fouls on Perk/KG trying to cover, and (c) getting sat back down. I think Powe started to "get it" then he tore up his knee. Baby still has problems, but I think he "get's it" now, too. Walker tried hard, but he was running around like a chicken with his head chopped off on defense last year...he *was* trying, but he kept missing assignments and rotations, then scrambled to catch up, and couldn't. Giddens, we never saw, but my guess is that he was *lost* in practice.

We can't divine what's in Doc's head. But he seems unwilling to play Giddens, Walker, and TA.

You think its defense - I think its shooting. We will see if Doc gives Walker or Giddens meaningful minutes this year. Both seem bright enough to grasp rotations - hell TA can do it and most of you guys think he is (Please Use More Appropriate Word).

TA was plenty healthy in the playoffs and got zero burn. So I don't see how you could buy into this defense mantra. All coaches say that so they can get everyone to hustle on D. But its the J that gets you the burn. Back when TA was playing more he was shooting better.

I do agree that Giddens/Walker have enough promise to be backup 2/3s in the league. I haven't given up on them. I just wonder if they ever will be given a chance. Pruitt - I have given up on him. That might be premature but I thought he got enough burn to prove something last year and he failed. He shot miserably for a shooter.

Pete

[MVP16]

I think the defense vs. shooting argument is more of a regular season vs. playoffs argument. In the regular season, Doc plays guys if they have the team defense down, but don't have the shooting down. Thus, he played TA almost 20 minutes a game during the regular season. In the playoffs, when spacing becomes more crucial due to it becoming more of a half-court game, Doc doesn't play you if you don't have either the defensive rotations down or can't space the floor. Of course, Rondo is an exception since he provides so many other things. So if Walker/Giddens get the rotations down, Doc will play them in the regular season, but wont be comfortable with them in the playoffs unless they can also space the floor with their shooting.

[sully00]

Again Doc has shown more faith in TA than anyone thinks he deserves. He was unable to reestablish himself after the injury. It isn't that he doesn't trust Tony it was simply without Paul and Ray on the floor the offense collapsed, so in that sense no Doc did not trust Tony to carry the offense. The number of guys you are going to find at 2 mil bucks that can carry your offense is going to be real short.

As for Pruitt if his only problem is shooting the basketball then he likely will be fine he is a good shooter they just weren't falling, it happens to plenty of guys especially when they only play 7 mpg.

[GuyClinch]

Rondo is an exception since he provides so many other things. So if Walker/Giddens get the rotations down, Doc will play them in the regular season, but wont be comfortable with them in the playoffs unless they can also space the floor with their shooting

Okay fine then - don't we need to trade or sign a real 2/3 that Doc can use in the playoffs? Point is Doc doesn't have any faith in those guys. I'd say he is pretty far from comfortable with any of them from what I can tell.

[GuyClinch]

As for Pruitt if his only problem is shooting the basketball then he likely will be fine he is a good shooter they just weren't falling, it happens to plenty of guys especially when they only play 7 mpg.

Yeah we will see. I didn't say I was right - just my gut feeling is this guy isn't going to make it. It just seemed he gots lots of good looks and missed them. You can blame it on few minutes if you want but an open look is an open look..

Pete