bdonovan
05-22-2023, 11:25 AM
Last year, the Miami Heat and Boston Celtics met in the Eastern Conference Finals, same as this year, but then Boston prevailed in a 7 game series.
This year, the Celtics are headed to a sweep, courtesy of Miami.
What changed?
You can look at the Game 1 Lineups in 2022 (https://www.espn.com/nba/boxscore/_/gameId/401438130) and 2023 (https://www.espn.com/nba/boxscore/_/gameId/401547671).
No differences to suggest Celtics are at a greater disadvantage than last year.
For the Heat, same team except K. Love instead of PJ Tucker. For the Celtics, same team except Horford starting in Grant Williams place (G. Williams came off the bench this year); and Marcus Smart healthy.
Very similar team strength.
In the off-season, the Celtics responded to a consensual relationship between coach Ime Udoka and a scheduler for the team by canning Udoka. I could never verify the seriousness of this charge. There were two implications that I could not find proven:
* That the Travel Planner worked for Udoka. If she worked for him, he would have influence over her and a relationship might be coerced. But oftentimes a travel planning role reports up into the team administration and the GM, and doesn't work directly for the coach.
I've read numerous articles and I don't think it was verified she reported up to him. If she didn't report into him, directly or indirectly, it damages the Celtics' case because organizations can sometimes restrict subordinate-manager relationships but not dating across the organization.
* That the consensual relationship violated team policy. I've yet to see the clause that was violated.
If I'm wrong here, please post the evidence as I'd like to see it.
Overall it appeared to me that the Celtics front-office over-reacted and made implications about the exploitive nature of the relationship that were dishonest.
It appeared that the Celtics front office took it personally that the black coach was having relations with a white woman; the rest was all dramatized, playing on implication, since they didn't have a clear cut case to terminate.
As some have pointed out (current Celtics coach) Mazzula is young, inexperienced, doesn't value defense, doesn't seem to make the right adjustments and is in over his head. This could have been avoided.
Just eyeballing it, the Celtics played as a team last year, and this year, they seem to lack cohesion. That's something a coach can help with.
It was under Udoka that the Celtics went from an average team to one of the most dominant teams in the game, especially improving the team defense. Udoka became head coach for the 2021-2022 year; in the prior year, the Celtics were a .500 team (36 W- 36 L). He served for one year as head coach, turning a 50-50 team into winning the East and into the NBA finals.
Last year the Celtics lost the NBA Finals in 6 to the Warriors, who when firing on all cylinders are a very hard team to beat and will go down in history as one of the greatest teams assembled.
The Celtics players themselves deserve some of the blame; still I wonder if they were well-coached, which matters the most in the post-season (given the need for adjustments, planning matchups), if it would have been different.
This year, the Celtics are headed to a sweep, courtesy of Miami.
What changed?
You can look at the Game 1 Lineups in 2022 (https://www.espn.com/nba/boxscore/_/gameId/401438130) and 2023 (https://www.espn.com/nba/boxscore/_/gameId/401547671).
No differences to suggest Celtics are at a greater disadvantage than last year.
For the Heat, same team except K. Love instead of PJ Tucker. For the Celtics, same team except Horford starting in Grant Williams place (G. Williams came off the bench this year); and Marcus Smart healthy.
Very similar team strength.
In the off-season, the Celtics responded to a consensual relationship between coach Ime Udoka and a scheduler for the team by canning Udoka. I could never verify the seriousness of this charge. There were two implications that I could not find proven:
* That the Travel Planner worked for Udoka. If she worked for him, he would have influence over her and a relationship might be coerced. But oftentimes a travel planning role reports up into the team administration and the GM, and doesn't work directly for the coach.
I've read numerous articles and I don't think it was verified she reported up to him. If she didn't report into him, directly or indirectly, it damages the Celtics' case because organizations can sometimes restrict subordinate-manager relationships but not dating across the organization.
* That the consensual relationship violated team policy. I've yet to see the clause that was violated.
If I'm wrong here, please post the evidence as I'd like to see it.
Overall it appeared to me that the Celtics front-office over-reacted and made implications about the exploitive nature of the relationship that were dishonest.
It appeared that the Celtics front office took it personally that the black coach was having relations with a white woman; the rest was all dramatized, playing on implication, since they didn't have a clear cut case to terminate.
As some have pointed out (current Celtics coach) Mazzula is young, inexperienced, doesn't value defense, doesn't seem to make the right adjustments and is in over his head. This could have been avoided.
Just eyeballing it, the Celtics played as a team last year, and this year, they seem to lack cohesion. That's something a coach can help with.
It was under Udoka that the Celtics went from an average team to one of the most dominant teams in the game, especially improving the team defense. Udoka became head coach for the 2021-2022 year; in the prior year, the Celtics were a .500 team (36 W- 36 L). He served for one year as head coach, turning a 50-50 team into winning the East and into the NBA finals.
Last year the Celtics lost the NBA Finals in 6 to the Warriors, who when firing on all cylinders are a very hard team to beat and will go down in history as one of the greatest teams assembled.
The Celtics players themselves deserve some of the blame; still I wonder if they were well-coached, which matters the most in the post-season (given the need for adjustments, planning matchups), if it would have been different.