ECQF: P1 | (1) Boston Celtics vs Chicago Bulls (8) | CHI 2-0

[CjayC]

Lmao and smh at the same time

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[Ice Trae]

Lmao and smh at the same time

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no foul call on that play? WTF

[RiseOfTheEmpire]

Lmao and smh at the same time

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That guy needs the Draymond Special.

Glad to see the Bulls in the playoffs, it would have been a shame not to see Wade, Butler and Playoff Rondo™. Rooting for Lopez, great guy and is having a great series.

You're welcome, Bulls fans But it's not your fault that our President replaced him with Noah...that pull up he did for Phil man......no brainer

[NZB2323]

If Kelly Olynyk ends up injuring Rolo the same way he injured Love he needs to face a harsh penalty. I hope the refs will be watching for that game 1 and protect Rolo. Yanking on a guy's arm as he goes up for a rebound is not okay.

[rich316]

Wow, unbelievable. You can talk about accidents the first time, but when the behavior continues?

This is actually even worse than Draymond, because he's intentionally causing potentially career-altering injuries. I hope he gets suspended.

[shangrila]

The sad thing is this is probably just a nightmare matchup for Boston. If the Bulls make it through they probably get swept by either Washington or Atlanta.

[Clocian]

The sad thing is this is probably just a nightmare matchup for Boston. If the Bulls make it through they probably get swept by either Washington or Atlanta.

Wanna bet on that lol ?

Sent from my SM-G900V using RealGM mobile app

[CjayC]

The sad thing is this is probably just a nightmare matchup for Boston. If the Bulls make it through they probably get swept by either Washington or Atlanta.

Wanna bet on that lol ?

Sent from my SM-G900V using RealGM mobile app

Atlanta own us, would not be shocked if they got swept up by them.

[Bulls03]

I picked Bulls in 6 but the increased effort of Rondo and Wade in the playoffs is definitely overlooked. This is also a completely different style of team they saw during the regular season.

i dont know... wade was good last year in the playoffs but eventually came back to earth a bit... i dont see him shooting 75% from three every game. i think rondo will continue to bring the effort, but stevens may adjust and put bradley or someone bigger on him for long stretches.

Still, i think even if those 3 play well, i think boston still wins if they get typical games from bradley/Crowder/IT.

i see this being 2-2 headed back to boston

The problem with the bold is: Rondo, Wade, Butler - IT has to guard 1 of those 3 for almost the entire time he's on the floor. Will be very difficult to hide IT on defense in this matchup, and if you move him to one of the "scrubs" (my words not yours) like Zipser, then you give up 16 points on 80% TS from a guy who only averaged 5.5 ppg during the season.

Boston has been slow on defensive rotations, that has to improve to prevent dribble penetration, and they have to hope that Mirotic + random hero of the day from the Bulls bench don't shoot lights out and burn them.

The Bulls will almost certainly cool off from range, but not sure what BOS does about the Bulls bigs ragdoll-ing their team on the glass. I think this series goes back to Boston 3-1 Chicago, but wouldn't be surprised if the brooms come out.

I actually missed the bolded in my first reply.

Bradley HAS been guarding Wade most of the series. If they put someone bigger on him he's just going to put them in a pick n roll and attack.

[Bulls03]

The sad thing is this is probably just a nightmare matchup for Boston. If the Bulls make it through they probably get swept by either Washington or Atlanta.

Wanna bet on that lol ?

Sent from my SM-G900V using RealGM mobile app

Atlanta own us, would not be shocked if they got swept up by them.

Playoffs are a different animal and the Bulls are a different animal in the playoffs. I wouldn't be worried about them.

[BR0D1E86]

Wade shot the ball well in game 2, but struggled in game 1. Also, IT (IT had a great 1st game) and Bradley (he did from 3 at least) shot the ball well in game 1.

Bulls are outplaying the Celtics, plain and simple. We will see what happens for the rest of the series, but I think people should stop looking or excuses for why the Bulls have dominated so far.

Wade is shooting 46% in the playoffs. He's hit most of his 3's, but he's only hit 4, so the sample size is pretty small. Thomas is shooting slightly above his season average. Bradley is below, but he's in line with his playoff career averages which are significantly below his regular season averages.

Nothing I said was incorrect. Wade shot the ball poorly in game 1 and did well in game 2. IT had a great game 1 and decent game 2 and Bradley has been good from beyond the arc.

I meant that more as a rebuttal to the original post that the Bulls were on some sort of insane hot shooting streak while the Celtics were on an unusually cold streak. That's not backed up by the stats.

[NZB2323]

Wanna bet on that lol ?

Sent from my SM-G900V using RealGM mobile app

Atlanta own us, would not be shocked if they got swept up by them.

Playoffs are a different animal and the Bulls are a different animal in the playoffs. I wouldn't be worried about them.

Rolo looks a lot different against Dwight Howard than he does against Al Horford. Our biggest strength against the Celtics would be a weakness against the Hawks.

[biggestbullsfan]

The sad thing is this is probably just a nightmare matchup for Boston. If the Bulls make it through they probably get swept by either Washington or Atlanta.

Wanna bet on that lol ?

Sent from my SM-G900V using RealGM mobile app

Atlanta own us, would not be shocked if they got swept up by them.

At this rate ATL might get swept themselves lmao.

We should be more concerned with WAS, and WAS is way too fast for us lol

[Bulls03]

Atlanta own us, would not be shocked if they got swept up by them.

Playoffs are a different animal and the Bulls are a different animal in the playoffs. I wouldn't be worried about them.

Rolo looks a lot different against Dwight Howard than he does against Al Horford. Our biggest strength against the Celtics would be a weakness against the Hawks.

The Celtics biggest strength against us would also be a weakness for the Hawks against us. They have no one the can defend Wade and Jimmy like Bradley and Crowder and don't have defenders off the bench like Brown and Smart. It goes both ways imo. As long as Lopez can hold his own and not let Dwight dominate we would be good imo.

The Hawks don't have a legit #1 guy just like the Celtics. That's part of the reason why Wall is running wild against them.

[Ctownbulls]

The sad thing is this is probably just a nightmare matchup for Boston. If the Bulls make it through they probably get swept by either Washington or Atlanta.

Wanna bet on that lol ?

Sent from my SM-G900V using RealGM mobile app

Atlanta own us, would not be shocked if they got swept up by them.

I don't know about swept but Washington, Milwaukee and Atlanta are the not so obvious teams that Bulls fans know the Bulls would struggle mightily against and most likely lose a series. Boston and Toronto are the not so obvious teams that Bulls fans are not concerned about at all.

[pmfg10]

Center matchup through 2 games:

Lopez - 32 points, 18 rebounds (12 offensive)
Horford - 26 points, 18 rebounds (4 offensive)

ROLO been huge for us this season and even better with the contract we have him at. Straight steal. I called it the day we traded Rose for him

Also have to take into account that Horford has played 6 more minutes than him in the series and also the FG%

[otwok]

Bulls still have the Celtics in front of them, so fans should be focusing on that. If we are looking forward, really the Wizards would probably do very well against the Bulls. I do think the Celtics match up better against the Wizards but even so I think the Wizards are ECF bound.

[Tacoma]

Can someone tell me what objectively makes Stevens a good coach? Not saying he's bad, but he's constantly hailed as the second coming of Pop.

think about it this way. Where would Boston's roster be with Casey instead of Stevens? Would they even get 40 wins? Maybe with IT playing this well.

I disagree. Take a look at the 2013/14 Raptors roster for example. It had Kyle Lowry who wasn't who he is now, a young DeRozan, sophomores starting in Terrence Ross and JV, and had guys like Grievis Vasquez, Chuck Hayes John Salmons playing heavy rotation minutes. That team started really poor, traded Rudy Gay and won at a 50+ win pace the rest of the season, and finished with 48 wins, and a better point differential than this Celtics team. You compare that team to the current Celtics, and the Celtics are more talented.

Take a look:

Younger Lowry
Young DeRozan
Sophomore Terrence Ross
Amir Johnson
Sophomore Jonas Valanciunas
Vasquez
Hayes
Salmons
Hansborough
Fields
Novak

Vs

IT
Bradley
Crowder
Johnson
Horford
Smart
Olynyk
Rozier
Green
Brown

Looks to me like Casey did a better job with less talent if you compare the two rosters.

LOL at crediting Casey for the team turnaround that season. Gay was traded shortly after his atrocious 11-37 shooting night in which Casey gave control to Gay to do as he pleased with impunity. This is classic Casey, he never changes, give the keys of the offense to his favorite player(s) to freestyle and do their thing. He did it with Bosh, Bargnani and Gay.

Casey did not do anything different before and after the Gay trade. All he did was take the keys he gave to Gay and handed it over to Lowry to lead and do as he pleased. But this time it finally worked and Lowry and DeRozan were able to lead this team to victories. Casey was know for defense and Raptors defense sucked that year. So credit goes to Lowry and DeRozan for recent Raptors' success. Casey has been riding their coattails all this time. As a Raptors fan, I'd trade Casey for Stevens as coach each and every time.

[VinBaker6]

think about it this way. Where would Boston's roster be with Casey instead of Stevens? Would they even get 40 wins? Maybe with IT playing this well.

I disagree. Take a look at the 2013/14 Raptors roster for example. It had Kyle Lowry who wasn't who he is now, a young DeRozan, sophomores starting in Terrence Ross and JV, and had guys like Grievis Vasquez, Chuck Hayes John Salmons playing heavy rotation minutes. That team started really poor, traded Rudy Gay and won at a 50+ win pace the rest of the season, and finished with 48 wins, and a better point differential than this Celtics team. You compare that team to the current Celtics, and the Celtics are more talented.

Take a look:

Younger Lowry
Young DeRozan
Sophomore Terrence Ross
Amir Johnson
Sophomore Jonas Valanciunas
Vasquez
Hayes
Salmons
Hansborough
Fields
Novak

Vs

IT
Bradley
Crowder
Johnson
Horford
Smart
Olynyk
Rozier
Green
Brown

Looks to me like Casey did a better job with less talent if you compare the two rosters.

LOL at crediting Casey for the team turnaround that season. Gay was traded shortly after his atrocious 11-37 shooting night in which Casey gave control to Gay to do as he pleased with impunity. This is classic Casey, he never changes, give the keys of the offense to his favorite player(s) to freestyle and do their thing. He did it with Bosh, Bargnani and Gay.

Casey did not do anything different before and after the Gay trade. All he did was take the keys he gave to Gay and handed it over to Lowry to lead and do as he pleased. But this time it finally worked and Lowry and DeRozan were able to lead this team to victories. Casey was know for defense and Raptors defense sucked that year. So credit goes to Lowry and DeRozan for recent Raptors' success. Casey has been riding their coattails all this time. As a Raptors fan, I'd trade Casey for Stevens as coach each and every time.

Bruh what are you talking about?

1) Casey never coached Bosh.

2) The Raptors defense that season was in the top ten.

3) You're giving the credit to Lowry, but I can just as easily say Stevens gave the keys to Thomas... (Like that's a bad thing anyway).

I'm not arguing that Casey is a better coach. I'm just asking what makes Stevens this darling Pop like figure.

[WIN]

The sad thing is this is probably just a nightmare matchup for Boston. If the Bulls make it through they probably get swept by either Washington or Atlanta.

Boston would've gotten pushed by any #8 seed, they're just not built for the playoffs. Chicago was probably the third worst team they could've faced behind Cleveland & Washington, but every other team would've given them a hard time as well.

Now with that said, Chicago isn't getting swept by anyone. ATL is a terrible matchup and they'd probably lose in the 2nd round to either ATL or WAS, but the series will go 6 most likely.