When is Doc finally going to take responsibility?

[GreenDreamer]

I've been paying close attention to this guy's act for a while now, and I'm sick of it. Have been for a year, at the very least. He simply does not take any responsibility for the struggles of our offense, and the role that his offensive philosophy plays in those struggles.

IMO, it has been Thibodeau's defense which has carried this team throughout the last 2 and half seasons. Time and again, when we lose it is the defense which gets blamed. Doc is very quick to point the finger that way. Why? Well, HE DOESN"T COACH that bit. Tom does. Yet when the offense struggles, the bit Doc is in charge of, he blames the effort of the players and their execution. It used to be his go to explanation back when we had a bunch of kids on the team. "Just you wait and see when I have talented veterans. Then it will work right" was the basic gist of his statements back then.

Well. Is it working right? HELL NO!!!!! Not even close. He has FOUR all star caliber players in his starting lineup. The center spots isn't exactly talent deficient either, yet this offense is fatally flawed. When our super duper defense can't shut down an opponent, our offense actually has to perform, and all too often it does not. I'm pointing the finger at the guy who is calling the shots, and that is clearly Doc. My major problems are as follows.

1. Despite what Doc would LIKE to think, this team actually plays better at a quick pace. Not a blazing, up and down choatic pace, but one in which we get into the offense quickly, and hit the opposing defense in transition as early as possible. Despite what he SAYS, Doc has never even come close to making that kind of ball a priority.

Hell, Kendrick Perkins, who has played almost his entire career with Doc, and Doc's ENTIRE TENURE as coach of this team, still doesn't know how to INBOUND A MADE BASKET. Neither does Paul Pierce, by the way. Perk turns his back on the floor, walks out of bounds (as slowly as possible seemingly), and inbounds the ball (often carelessly), and as a result single handedly destroys every counterbreak opportunity we could get in those possessions. Compare him to Scal, who gets the ball in as quikly as ANYONE in the league, or even Sheed, and it is a joke. Those guys learned the RIGHT way to do it ( and this is not a hard thing to learn), but Perk still doesn't know, and that is because Doc puts ZERO emphasis on such things. (Seriously, if Paul walks past another ball, when he is the closest guy to it and could have easily inbounded it himself, I'm going to puke.)

2. This should be a commonly known fact, but few people ever mention this. Ray Allen does not pass Rondo the ball. It is getting to a near comedic level. Ray would rather chuck up a horrible shot or turn the ball over than pass Rondo the ball. I'm not averse to running screen plays for Ray. Hell, he can't create his shot anymore, so that it the only good way to get him a shot, if he isn't being guarded by a dwarf in the post. The problem is that on the majority of those screen feeds, Ray doesn't take the shot. Once he puts that ball on the ground, you can basically flip a coin on whether the possession is going to be a fiasco or not. Time and again, when he should pass the ball back to Rondo, so that he can do something else, Ray simply blows him off as if ANYTHING that he would do would be better than what would happen if he passed the ball back. Paul isn't a whole lot better, to be honest, but he is better. KG? Well, put it this way, doubling off Rondo onto KG is is an extremely BAD idea, yet if I were the coach of another team, I would double Ray with Rondo's man every time he got it. Why bother guarding a guy if you know that it wont be passed to him by the man being doubled? You can always get back to him before any rotation of the ball. KG passes to Rondo, and it makes a big difference.

3. Doc is like a dog chasing its tail half of the time. His lack of focus regarding the rotations of his team is almost moronic. He forgets to put guys back in, but more often than not he leaves guys out there too long.

4. Doc doesn't like taking those quick shots. No, the Celts are supposed to pass the ball around a lot. That's good basketball, in his opinion. In my opinion, turning the ball over at the rate that we do is the DIRECT result of this BS overpassing. It is really nice to string 4 or 5 nice passes together on occasion, but the FEWEST passes which lead to a good shot, the better. Which reminds me, Doc is fond of saying that playing uptempo would lead to more turnovers. How about looking at the the turnover numbers for the uptempo teams, and tell me if what this dude is saying is, in any way, based in reality.

5. Doc uses Rondo as a scapegoat for his stupid offensive approaches. Lately setting a pick for Rondo is a no no. Yup, why do that for your point guard? The Dallas game, being the biggest monstrosity. Run screen play after screen play for a guy who doesn't pass back to Rondo, and then point the finger at Rondo, because he did what you told him to do. "He wasn't aggressive enough". Did he not pass the ball to Ray agrgressively enough? Or did he not stand in the corner, by himself, aggresively enough? I'm trying to figure out how that would translate into aggression. The Piston game was a hoot as well. Doc is yelling at Rondo to get the ball up the floor quickly (after Perk walked yet another ball out of bounds), and what is Rondo doing when he gets up the floor? Passing off to Ray.... often to never see the ball again. I guess if Rondo got the ball up more quickly, Ray would have learned how to dribble and pass. Don't even think of using Rondo's good individual numbers. A lot of that was in the first half and in transition. Doc decided that we needed to spread it around more in the second half by giving to ball to a guy who is a great shooter and not even decent at anything else. Bravo. Rondo ain't perfect, but I want the ball in his hands, not Ray's.

I could go on, but the game is about to begin.

[celtsloyalty]

First of all Doc is a players coach which is exactly what this team needs. Pierce, Garnett, and Ray do need gameplan coaching, but they also need a coach who will respect who they are and won't constantly be in their ear.

I do agree that Thibidou has been the most important part of the coaching staff and it would've been interesting to see how the celtics faired if he had left this off season. It's unbelievable how well the team has developed defensivly, especially Perk and Rondo.

As for playing a more up tempo offense, the big three would be disabled by the end of the season. KG can't even handle playing a full season of half court offense. They would have no legs come the playoffs. Im sure Doc would love to have a more up tempo offense.

[irie]

I just dislike how much we slow it down sometimes.. keep the pace high and we blow teams out. Slow the pace down and we let teams control the game. Rondo is devastating in the fast break because he is as good as it gets with the ball in his hands, and he is one of the greatest passers in the nba... we should utilize his skills seeing as how he is slowly becoming our franchise player. He's Kidd-esque in terms of his fast break passing abilities. I'd like it if Doc asked the Celtics to push the tempo as much as possible. I'm fine with more bench minutes and less starters minutes, just keep the pace up. Whenever we slow it down is when we get killed.

[Jammer]

I feel that i have to stick up for the coaching staff, although you mention only the Head Coach.

Doc Rivers is a basketball genius. He's light years ahead of nearly everyone watching
in terms of seeing, and understanding, what's going on WHEN IT'S HAPPENING
rather than a few seconds or a few minutes later.

Doc has the perfect personality for this team. He knows when to be tough,
and when to just let things slide. Doc is taken for granted by too many fans.
Doc not only deserved Coach of the Year his rookie year, when he was Named COY,
Doc also deserved Coach of the Year in 2008, but Byron Scott won in 2008.
If they were going to give a COY award that year to someone in New Orleans,
they should have named Chris Paul COY, not Byron Scott.

Anyway, Clifford Ray is an outstanding Big Man coach. Simply outstanding.

Tom Thibodeau is a defensive genius, we don't know much about him on offense,
but the few times Doc has gotten ejected, i liked what Thibs has done.

Armand Hill had an EXCEPTIONAL record at Princeton prior to coming to the Celtics.

That guy named Mike Longabardi, who coached the summer league team,
seems like a postiive reinforcement, open the gym and let the kids play type coach.
Perfect for summer league.

I don't know anything about Kevin Eastman.

[Brett43]

The celtics have the 3rd best winning percentage in the league right now, after Cleveland and LA. We were all unthrilled about their play these last few weeks, but Doc is overall doing a pretty good job IMO. If Ray shoots 3-15, as he has these past few games, that doesn't help, but those numbers are anomalous and will pick up again. The team will surely be in the playoffs with one of the top seeds. I'll take the 2nd or 3rd seed with a bunch of guys who aren't hurt. Sounds fun to me.

[GuyClinch]

The OP is just one of those uninformed ranters - the same kind of people that whine about Bill B. on a Pats forum. Truth is Doc Rivers is a very good coach - and has an exemplary record in creating and running succesful NBA's offenses. Perhaps Rondo does actually screw up now and then despite his gaudy assist numbers. Doc Rivers was an NBA PG so he ya know might know a thing or two about it. <g>

I think Doc has done great at hiding Rondo's weaknesses and playing to his strengths. So I am little mystified why someone who loves Rondo would be so down on him. The guy has shown tremendous growth under Doc's guidance..

[TA42]

Looking at the offensive output the past 3 years you can see that this years unit is barely off from previous years.

2007 - 100.5 per game
2008 - 100.9 per game
2009 - 99.7 per game

Basically off a point per game.

Is Doc perfect? Of course not but his game management is excellent and I don't think the offense is nearly as crippling as some would think.

[Lewis35]

I am not even going to read what the OP said because a dictionary has fewer words in it. What I will say is that Doc won a title with this team, he is a good coach, the players seem to like him. Bottom line is that this Celtics team has so many veterans it should be able to coach itself. Doc is not responsible for the debacle on the court these days the players are.

[GreenDreamer]

Looking at the offensive output the past 3 years you can see that this years unit is barely off from previous years.

2007 - 100.5 per game
2008 - 100.9 per game
2009 - 99.7 per game

Basically off a point per game.

Is Doc perfect? Of course not but his game management is excellent and I don't think the offense is nearly as crippling as some would think.

That is because the offense has always underperformed with Doc, overall. Saying that it is only a liitle worse this season really doesn't mean much in that context. This team has A LOT of offensive talent. Not the most, but certainly top tier, yet Doc doesn't get top tier results from it, and that is with a great defense which feeds it. The stops on the defensive end which feed transition baskets are easy offense CREATED BY THE DEFENSE.

Doc has been riding Thibodeau's defense WHICH HE DOES NOT RUN. I just wanted to be clear about that. Tom is the defense guy, while Doc is the offense guy and team management guy. That is the way it works around here. Giving Doc credit for an area of the game which is NOT directing is BS. This team wins with its defense. You don't hear people talking about what a great coach Parcells was anymore. Why? Because those Giants teams won with defense, and pretty much everyone knows now who was REALLY responsible for that defense. Some Belichick dude. Not that I'm anxious to see Tom take the team over, as he seems to be a defense only specialist, IMO.

You want a real feel for how this offense is, check out the turnover numbers before and after the Garnett trade. Not much difference there. Bring in a bunch of talented vets, and turn the ball over only slightly less than a team full of youngsters, many of whom were crap. Doc's offense CAUSES turnovers, yet he is seemingly oblivious to that. The field goal percentages are far better, but he evidently does not understand the importance of turnovers, offensive rebounding and free throws is the overall balance of how an offense performs. He also seemingly has no real desire to run a faster paced offense.

I got a real kick out of hearing his quote from the press conference the other day. He said something to the effect that the team had to stop relying on its great offense, and get back to focusing on defense. Great offense?!?! The man is completely delusional, IMO.

It's getting old listening to him whine about execution, when he has a loaded deck when it comes to players. Is he the worst coach in the leaague? No, not even close. He is nowhere near being the best either. There are plenty of coaches who could get more out of this bunch offensively, while still stepping aside to allow Tom to do his thing.

The really frustrating thing for me is that actually seems to KNOW how to run the offense just about any way it can be run. The problem is what he WANTS to do. I've seen it fopr years with him and Rondo. Marginalizing Rondo, and then when people go down Rondo's role gets expanded and he explodes... and the offense motors along without much of a problem. The others come back, and Doc then marginalizes him as if what had just happened didn't happen at all. Hell, he did it at the end of this last game. Rondo was the BEST player on the court against the Clippers, yet Doc took the ball out of his hands for the last 5 minutes of the game. If it wasn't for our defense, that decision could have cost us the game, because Paul and Ray were making asses out of themselves in general, especially at the end. The few times that Rondo actually got to do something, he cashed in. Yet, when we had that sequence at the end when Ray got stripped and Paul blocked on back to back possessions, Doc was yelling at Rondo on the sidelines, and Rondo was actually laughing at him in disbelief. Doc wanted them to have the ball, they screwed up, and he was trying to blame Rondo as if he had any control over what happened. Here's one idea: Ray sucks at dribbling and creating for himself and others. Don't have him doing that at the end of games, Doc.

[CeltsfanSinceBirth]

I got a real kick out of hearing his quote from the press conference the other day. He said something to the effect that the team had to stop relying on its great offense, and get back to focusing on defense. Great offense?!?! The man is completely delusional, IMO.

Completely misquoting him. He said something to the effect that offensive rebounding is not as important as defensive rebounding. Offensive rebounding isn't as important when you shoot a high percentage, because you get less chances for offensive boards when your initial shot is actually going in the basket, and that focusing too much on offensive boards leaves you in a weak position for transition defense. Having 2-3 guys crash the boards is gambling if the other team gets the board and runs on you.

Conversely, if the Celtics can start actually securing defensive rebounds, it means they can run more.

As for your gripe with turnovers - sure, it gets ugly at times, but I don't think Doc can really prevent Tony from dribbling the ball off his leg, Rondo throwing the ball away when he jumps in the air to pass, or Perk not being able to handle a quick pass down low. Turnovers are going to happen when you share the ball.

Utah leads the league in apg with 26.1 apg. Boston is 2nd with 23.6 apg. Boston is also 2nd in the league in FG%. I don't see what your gripe is about the offense to be honest with you.

If you're going to put Thibodeau on a pedestal, then why the hell is the team 18th in defensive boards per game?

[floyd]

When will Doc take credit for having one of the best offenses in the league? God only knows.

[celticsnut]

I get upset with Doc only when he plays guys big minutes, however i do have one quam. I saw in the last game vs the Clips that the Celts had the number 1 fg% in the league in January. When I saw that stat we were 5-5. We need to win more games if that is going to be the case. We don't get a lot of possessions and therefore only take a minimal amount of shots comparatively speaking. With a point guard like Rondo, we need to get more shot opportunities. Rebounding and free throw shooting has killed us though.

[armageddon]

No coach is perfect. Doc does a good enough job, but he is still learning from his mistakes, which will be a good thing.

I too, am tired of some of his biggest flaws.
1. Will not use his bench (youth). Sprinkling in Giddens and Walker with the starters would be of great benefit.
2. Along with the above, he has to reduce the old-3's minutes so they can finish games stronger. Garnett's injury was most likely from fatigue of playing too much post surgery.
3. In game adjustments do not happen. Call a timeout once in while when the team starts sucking.
4. Sit a player who is having a bad game - Ray.
5. Have the balls to try Ray as the 6th man.
6. There is absolutely no reason this team should average as many turnovers as it does. Do something.
7. Change the offense so that we can get some offensive rebounds.

The above being said, he's still the best coach we've had in the last 20 years and I'd like to see him stay. Hopefully, he keeps improving.

[Ben-N1ce]

No coach is perfect. Doc does a good enough job, but he is still learning from his mistakes, which will be a good thing.

I too, am tired of some of his biggest flaws.
1. Will not use his bench (youth). Sprinkling in Giddens and Walker with the starters would be of great benefit.
2. Along with the above, he has to reduce the old-3's minutes so they can finish games stronger. Garnett's injury was most likely from fatigue of playing too much post surgery.
3. In game adjustments do not happen. Call a timeout once in while when the team starts sucking.
4. Sit a player who is having a bad game - Ray.
5. Have the balls to try Ray as the 6th man.
6. There is absolutely no reason this team should average as many turnovers as it does. Do something.
7. Change the offense so that we can get some offensive rebounds.

The above being said, he's still the best coach we've had in the last 20 years and I'd like to see him stay. Hopefully, he keeps improving.

None of that can be true

Doc Rivers is a basketball genius. He's light years ahead of nearly everyone watching
in terms of seeing, and understanding, what's going on WHEN IT'S HAPPENING
rather than a few seconds or a few minutes later.

[GreenDreamer]

When will Doc take credit for having one of the best offenses in the league? God only knows.

One of the best offenses in the league? That's a good one. He has some of the best offensive players in the league.... in other words the TOOLS to have a great offense. We do not have a great offense. Not even close. Some coaches, like Rick Adelman, can squeeze a quarter out of two times. Doc has been handed a whole dollar, and gives us back 75 cents, and says " That's more than Adelman's quarter!"

[GreenDreamer]

I get upset with Doc only when he plays guys big minutes, however i do have one quam. I saw in the last game vs the Clips that the Celts had the number 1 fg% in the league in January. When I saw that stat we were 5-5. We need to win more games if that is going to be the case. We don't get a lot of possessions and therefore only take a minimal amount of shots comparatively speaking. With a point guard like Rondo, we need to get more shot opportunities. Rebounding and free throw shooting has killed us though.

The funny part is that when you listen to Doc, he says that the #1 thing he looks at is FG%. So we are shooting a high FG%? Then we are doing great.... according to him. The fact that we are erratic at getting to the line, don't hit the O-boards and bleed turnovers evidently do not qualify as important factors in Doc's book. That is a problem.

As I said earlier, check out the turnover percentage for this team before and after the Garnett trade. It is sad how little we have improved. His system is obviously the cause of these issues.

My main problem with Doc is that he evidently thinks that you have to pass the ball around 4 or 5 times for a shot to be a "good one". He doesn't like the "quick shots". You know, like Rondo getting a pick and finding an open shooter. He doesn't like that stuff. The problem is that when you have INFERIOR passers touching the ball almost as much as the superior ones, then you are going to have turnover problems, unless you are in a one on one system like the Mavs used to run.

During our troubles a couple of weeks ago, Rondo dimed 5 guys in about 2 and half minutes in the fourth quarter of a game to get us back INTO the game, basically on "one pass/one shot" possessions. You know what Doc was railing them about on the bench in the time out? Taking quick shots. They went back to working the ball all over the place, and predictably screwing everything up. It was a joke.

Maybe he isn't aware that this isn't Olympic figure skating. There are no points for presentation. All that matters is how many points that you squeeze out of each possession, and if you bleeding turnovers, not getting to the line, and not hitting the glass, you are probably going to have issues.

I remember Cousy slamming him on this issue a few years back, during Rondo's rookie season. They were turning the ball over on every other possession, and Bob wanted them just to give the ball to Rajon, and do everything off of one pass, but Doc just kept on working his equal opportunity crap. Things really haven't changed all that much.

[armageddon]

You may have hit the nail on the head saying that he's working the equal opportunity system. They do work way too hard to get everyone involved.

[ryaningf]

You may have hit the nail on the head saying that he's working the equal opportunity system. They do work way too hard to get everyone involved.

Yeah, I appreciate what Dreamer's trying to say too. Doc's offense leaves a lot to be desired. But let's take a different tack and look at something pretty straightforward--usage. Are our best players getting the most use in this offense? Unfortunately, the answer is simply no. No so surprisingly, Ray and Rondo are underutilized so far this season, while 'Sheed and House are getting way too many shots relative their performance

Everyone should take a look over at Hardwood Paroxysm:

http://www.hardwoodparoxysm.com/2010/01 ... id-season/

Check out the sweet graphs (which I'd post if I knew how), showing how the usage rate correlates with each player's PER.

Two conclusions:
1. Ray needs more shots. Maybe moving him to the 2nd unit would do this. But maybe his decoy effect gets other people open on the 1st unit. Conversely, moving Ray to the 2nd unit might get Rondo more offensive opportunities, something which also is necessary. I still think Ray to the bench is an experiment worth trying, especially when Daniels comes back.
2. Eddie needs less time on the court. Since we're forced to get Eddie shots to justify his place on the court (since shooting is his only real talent), I think the only way to get his usage in line with his performance is to limit his PT to about 8 minutes a game, mostly around quarters when defenses tend to let up.

Both of these conclusions support each other. Moving Ray to the bench to get him more shots will in turn get more shots for Rondo, while also limiting Eddie House's time on the court, since the 2nd unit would be about defense and getting Ray Allen shots and House would have no role in that.