Some big questions answered...

[Octolor]

...Miki Moore can't play.

...Big Baby could be a great sixth or seventh man on a championship team.

...Tony Allen is a bust.

...Scal is a pretty decent player.

...Eddie House is a great role player.

...Danny Ainge has a lot of work to do this offseason.

...Paul Pierce is not one of the best players in the world or at least not as good as he thinks he is. A great player would have gotten by Orlando.

...Rajon Rondo is not yet an elite player. This loss proves that he is not in the same class as Dwayne Wade. Anyone that wouldn't trade Rondo for a deal involving Wade is flat out crazy.

...Ray Allen is on the last legs of his career. It will only be down hill from here, his best days are behind him. I've never seen a Hall of Fame player take entire playoff series off.

...Kevin Garnett is the best player on the Celtics. This team's championship hopes all depend on the health of Kevin Garnett. He is the heart and soul of this team.

[Fencer reregistered]

Agreed with much of that, although Scal drove me crazy passing up open shots. He needs quick-release lessons from Ray or Eddie.

I don't know whether it's Ray's age or what. But he seems to need things to go his way a LOT to shoot effectively. And he makes too many TOs for what he tries to do with the ball.

[JR Hawks]

...Miki Moore can't play.

...Big Baby could be a great sixth or seventh man on a championship team.

...Tony Allen is a bust.

...Scal is a pretty decent player.

...Eddie House is a great role player.

...Danny Ainge has a lot of work to do this offseason.

...Paul Pierce is not one of the best players in the world or at least not as good as he thinks he is. A great player would have gotten by Orlando.

...Rajon Rondo is not yet an elite player. This loss proves that he is not in the same class as Dwayne Wade. Anyone that wouldn't trade Rondo for a deal involving Wade is flat out crazy.

...Ray Allen is on the last legs of his career. It will only be down hill from here, his best days are behind him. I've never seen a Hall of Fame player take entire playoff series off.

...Kevin Garnett is the best player on the Celtics. This team's championship hopes all depend on the health of Kevin Garnett. He is the heart and soul of this team.

-Moore...agree. He obviously won't be brought back.

-Allen...agree. We need to find a way to get rid of him.

-Scal...disagree. He is an 11th or 12th man at best. He looked brutal out there tonight.

-House...disagree. He is little more than a situational player.

-Ainge...agree. Hard to imagine how he could do any worse than he did last offseason. He should be embarassed over that.

-Pierce...agree, but I'll take it a step further. He, too, looked like he was on his last legs.

-Allen...agree. He's trash at this point. We need to find somebody that will take his contract.

-Rondo...agree, but will take it a step further. He will never be the first or second best player on a legit championship contender. Simply doesn't and will never have the offensive game. His decision making and attitude are suspect as well. If you can do a Rondo/Ray trade for Wade at the deadline next year, you do it. Rondo and his agent will be looking for a max deal...if Ainge has any concern about the future of this franchise he will tell them to get real.

-KG...agree. He's twice as good as anyone else on the team. He should be team captain.

[Allanon]

...Paul Pierce is not one of the best players in the world or at least not as good as he thinks he is. A great player would have gotten by Orlando.

Sorry, don't want to be rude but had to laugh at that one...

[DarkAzcura]

When will people learn that the Big 3 are almost all equally important. Take Pierce off this team, and they would have lost this round too, and if they didn't lose this round they would have definitely lost against Cleveland. Same with Ray.

I guess people are sad and frustrated about the lose, but that's no reason to start saying stuff like "Garnett is twice as good as anyone on this team" (that's just not true) and should be team captain. Pierce should remain captain for the remainder of his career.

[SuigintouEV]

...Ray Allen is on the last legs of his career. It will only be down hill from here, his best days are behind him. I've never seen a Hall of Fame player take entire playoff series off.

He also had a 50 point game.

Fact is, you're asking a 33 year old to play 40 minutes a game in scenarios where he can't be asked to score (pick and roll where the roll guy can't pop and can't finish over an elite shot blocker). And to do the above in a series where his teamates can't even make his defender pay for not helping off of him. Rondo and Pierce didn't have great series either.

...Rajon Rondo is not yet an elite player. This loss proves that he is not in the same class as Dwayne Wade. Anyone that wouldn't trade Rondo for a deal involving Wade is flat out crazy.

He's bound to become elite in the future... but that may be too late given the window. A playmaker who can still score efficiently isn't the easiest thing to come by. Hopefully Marbury not only returns, but returns in form, not the shadow of a player seen this year.

...Paul Pierce is not one of the best players in the world or at least not as good as he thinks he is. A great player would have gotten by Orlando.

Offensively playing 2½ on 5 vs a team with the DPOY shotblocker... I can't fault him. The only players that even demanded defensive attention outside of him were Ray Allen (who was having a weak series anyways) and BBD (who for what it's worth, is still a limited scorer. He hit his open jumpers and even made a few other shots, but it just looked... unnatural, ya know, at least compared to garnett

-Allen...agree. He's trash at this point. We need to find somebody that will take his contract.

This team was already one of the worst ITO 3 point volume this year, ya know that? smh. Go take a look at the 3 point shooting on the box score. Without him, shutting down Rondo would be akin to shutting down Baron Davis.

[MyInsatiableOne]

I knew this morning the board would be loaded with negativity after the loss...so sad to see...

[spf211]

I don't think Ray Allen is on his last legs.

Clearly, he's not 24 anymore, but he's also played 191 games over the last two seasons now. That's almost 50 more games than he played in his last two seasons with Seattle (144). The only two year span where Ray has come close to this amount of games was 1999-2001 where he played 187 games -- starting that run when he was 24 years old.

Everyone was pointing to Pierce being fatigued in the first round -- and they were right. The difference between Pierce and Allen is that even when Pierce is on tired legs, he still has the ability/desire to get in the lane and draw fouls.

Is Ray Allen done? No.

Can Ray Allen be effective for another 82 games plus a playoff run of 15-25 games? No, he'll need time off during the season.

The Celtics should consider moving Ray into the same role Reggie Miller had during his last years in Indiana. He could do that effectively until he's 40 -- that's another six years.

[celticsnut]

I am really too frustrated and upset to post, but I want to clear some stuff up here about Pierce and Ray. When Ray's shot isn't falling, he really adds nothing. He didn't look tired to me, but he needs to be playing about 33 mins/game next season. Orlando on the other hand defended Pierce better than any team I have seen in quite some time. Traps, doubles, contested shots. Last night was the first time I didnt see Pierce get to any of his sweet spots, he missed one really easy lay in, but other than that all his shots were contested. He will be just fine and is still an elite player just mins. caught up with him. I am not going to blame this on the coaches or anyone in particular, but you guys really have no clue how bad our offense is without KG. I mean Pierce doesnt get shots within the flow of the offense he has to create for himself almost every single possession. Ray on the other hand can't create and gets all his shots out of plays. I am just so sick of watching Rondo dribble the air out of the ball for 20 seconds at the top of the key while Eddie and Ray run around trying to get open. We ran into a Magic team that didnt really miss tonight and I know our defense wasnt there, but nevertheless tip your hat to them. It is incredible how well they are able to penetrate and get a wide open shot. We didnt do that once this series or even last series for that matter.

I have said it before and I will say it again, when Rondo is on I will go as far as to say he is a top 10 player in the league, when he is off he isnt in the top 100. He just plays with no effort sometimes on defense and lets pathetic guards work him over, ala Rafer Alston. He should be doing nothing but shooting 1000 jumpers a day this offseason. Perk and Baby are just too unathletic to finish at the rim and needed to be depended on. Perk's sequence where he blew 3 layups in the matter of 2 seconds legitimately made me puke in my mouth. Throw it down Big Man.

Most teams in the league have athletic PG's, wings, and bigs off the bench. With the exception of Marbury we dont have one of those things. I dont really know how we will get it, but we are the only team I have seen in the league without an "ATHLETE" on the bench. We just dont have any guys who are able to get us easy buckets. Pietrus and Lee killed us this series. Both of them are more athletic than anyone on our team and they are bench players.

Danny has some serious soul searching to do. I say Sign back BBD, LEON, Starbury, and maybe Eddie. Try and get a guy like Anthony Parker. A guy who can defend the wing and actually make a tough shot. At the end of the day we just dont have enough shooters. Most teams have 5 or 6 guys who can make shots outside. We have 3 who can make a three pointer.

Lastly, I am damn proud of this team. We never ever give up. I did not miss one game this season and I can honestly say each and every night was enjoyable. I may have more gray hairs now because of the stress, but I think we can be happy about our championship last season. Shows how health and no injuries will bring success. We had complete opposite seasons in terms of health and adversity. One thing is certain and I dont care what any fan of another team says because I watched over 1000 nba games this season, there is no other team in the league that got their opponents best like we did. I guess that is the price you pay being the champs with the targets on your back. For that, I think we became a better team.

[drza]

When will people learn that the Big 3 are almost all equally important. Take Pierce off this team, and they would have lost this round too, and if they didn't lose this round they would have definitely lost against Cleveland. Same with Ray.

I guess people are sad and frustrated about the lose, but that's no reason to start saying stuff like "Garnett is twice as good as anyone on this team" (that's just not true) and should be team captain. Pierce should remain captain for the remainder of his career.

There are some reactionary things said after a painful loss, and I agree that Pierce has earned the right to remain captain (No reason KG couldn't be co-captain, but also no real reason to rock the boat and the "captain" thing was always a way to show Pierce respect for being a home-grown Celtic).

That said, the Big 3 aren't really equally important. They are all important, yes, and losing any one of them hurts the team, but KG is really the only one that couldn't be lost in order to maintain a championship-caliber team. Last year Mike Gorman said in an interview that a team takes on the characteristics and personality of their best player, and if nothing else that was obvious with the KG injury.

With KG healthy the Celtics have a historic defense, an efficient offense, play at max energy almost all of the time, and UBUNTU shows up in everything they do on the court. These aren't just general statements, they are measurable phenomena that show up in both the team and individual stats.

With Pierce/Allen/Rondo as the best players during this playoff run, we saw a team with no real identity. They were a mediocre defensive team (spurts of good D, spurts of terrible D, average-to-below average overall) that relied overly heavily on Perk's ability to protect the rim, they played a lot of 1-on-1 on offense (again with spurts of potency but also long dry spells) that was ultimately less efficient, and their intensity level fluctuated wildly from game to game. There was no single aspect of the game that these Cs did at a championship level, and really only their championship EXPERIENCE and guile even got them through the 1st round and made it competitive against the Magic.

With the caveat that you never truly "replace" an All Star player, if it were Ray that had gone down the Celtics could have started Eddie House at the SG and been ok. KG and Pierce would have had to diversify their offensive game a bit, but House would still stretch the opposing defense and each Eastern opponent starts small shooting guards (Gordon, Reddick, West). The team would have still had elite defense and good offense.

If Pierce had gone down it would have been more difficult because the Cs don't have any other legitimate small forwards, but I think that again House could have started at SG and that Allen and Scal would have been able to reasonably cover Hedo. Against LeBron all bets are off, but against the Magic they should have been fine. On offense, KG and Allen can help replace Pierce's scoring and Allen/Rondo/KG all have the ability to take more of Pierce's role as an offense initiator. The team would still have had elite defense and solid offense.

If it were Pierce or Ray that went down instead of KG we can't know for sure that they could have beaten a team like the Cavs, but I can say pretty confidently that they'd have had the chance to find out and it would have been a competitive series. To me, KG's injury was THE story of these playoffs and his health/recovery this offeseason is THE biggest question of the off-season.