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[quote=YahooSports]Rivers told Yahoo! Sports that his decisions to relegate Allen to a sixth-man role and give point guard Rajon Rondo complete freedom with the ball and leadership were ultimately what helped lead Allen to leave Boston.[/quote]
This seems more like an indirect shot at Rondo
Paul Pierce has never been in a agreed in principle trade, so there's no reason to bring his name up in this scenario. :confusedshrug:
And another thing, who is really sounding like the pouting crybaby in all this? Sounds like Doc Rivers to me.
Ray hasn't had anything negative to say about Rondo or any other Celtic since he signed w/ the Heat. You gotta love Doc's douchey passive aggressive way of throwing Ray under a bus there. Very slick. :applause:
[QUOTE=PJR]And another thing, who is really sounding like the pouting crybaby in all this? Sounds like Doc Rivers to me.
Ray hasn't had anything negative to say about Rondo or any other Celtic since he signed w/ the Heat. You gotta love Doc's douchey passive aggressive way of throwing Ray under a bus there. Very slick. :applause:[/QUOTE]
Completely agree. And as usual the fans fall for the bait and bash the person who hasn't done a single thing wrong.
At the end of the day Ray played out his contract and had the right to make whatever decision he chose. Not sure whats being accomplished by trying to find a "bad guy" in all this.
[QUOTE=wang4three]I am not disregarding anything. Ray was a good defender, but he wasn't what he could've been. [B]He's got great foot speed and instincts[/B], but he was never an elite defender. I don't I'm implying as much as I'm directly saying: Ray wasn't as a great as a defender as he could've been. He's not a liability on defense, but he wasn't a tremendous asset either. He could've been an All-Defense 1st teamer in my opinion.
I love Ray, but I'm just saying like it is.[/QUOTE]
I agree about the foot speed, but not the instincts. Ray was a good one on one defender for the Celtics and underrated besides elsewhere, but one on one defense is where natural instincts come into play the least. They come into play the most on help/team defense and that is where Ray makes little to no impact because he doesn't have as high as basketball IQ on the defensive end as he does on the offensive end and mostly settles for just staying with his man and not getting into off the ball defense. As far as the Celtics go it wasn't an issue as Garnett, Pierce, and Rondo pretty much had the team/help defense down pat especially with Garnett as an anchor, but Ray on his own man was a good one on one defensive player. As you said he had good foot speed, he rarely falls for fakes, and he recovers well so he almost always gets a hand in opposing players face. He always guarded Kobe well in the the two finals because Kobe was happy to settle for jumpers instead of drive and Ray managed to always get a hand in his face. Now that Ray is getting up there, he will have trouble staying in front of a quick guard who is good off the dribble though.
The main reason as to why Ray isn't much known as a defensive player at all till the Celtics is that the Bucks and Sonics were primarily offensive teams. In 2001 they were 1 in offense, but they were in the 23rd in defense and in the 20s every single year Ray was there. Defense was just not part of the culture in Milwaukee. In 2005 when the Sonics made the playoffs and to the 2nd round they were 2nd in offense and 27th in defense. Basically every single season on the Bucks or Sonics whether they made it to the playoffs or not is the same story. Top of the league in offense, bottom of the league in defense. They just did NOT have the personnel to be good defensive teams and a SG was not going to change that. I remember watching those teams play, especially the Sonics and the had the Sonics had no defensive big men at all and Rashard Lewis was a terrible defensive player especially...they basically had nothing. Ray was never actually on all defensive team till he came to the Celtics but either way he would NEVER have been first team all defensive team and I say that with him being my favorite player, but seeing how many undeserved Kobe has I'm not sure that means anything anyway.
Can we start poking at Celtic fans whom claimed the rift between Ray and Rondo was fabricated by the media, citing "How can it be true, Rondo invited him to dinner during the Holidays!"
[QUOTE=PJR]Ray hasn't had anything negative to say about Rondo or any other Celtic since he signed w/ the Heat.[/QUOTE]
Uh-huh, because everything that he's ever said or thought has been in a press conference :rolleyes:
[QUOTE=PJR]Paul Pierce has never been in a agreed in principle trade, so there's no reason to bring his name up in this scenario. :confusedshrug:
And another thing, who is really sounding like the pouting crybaby in all this? Sounds like Doc Rivers to me.
Ray hasn't had anything negative to say about Rondo or any other Celtic since he signed w/ the Heat. You gotta love Doc's douchey passive aggressive way of throwing Ray under a bus there. Very slick. :applause:[/QUOTE]
So Doc Rivers deflecting the "blame" from Rondo, and instead owning that portion of the blame by stating it was he that wanted and told Rondo to have more freedom with the basketball, is being a pouting crybaby?
Anyway, so, how exactly does Ray think he'll be "more involved in the offense" in Miami? Instead of having to deal with your point guard, who is, by design, [I]suppose[/I] to have the ball in his hands dictating the offense, he'll now have to deal with Bron, then Wade, then Chalmers as the primary, secondary, ect ball-handlers.
Where exactly is the improvement in utilization?
I don't understand why Ray was complaining about Rondo having the ball the majority of the time. It puts less pressure on Ray and Rondo is an excellent passer. I'd rather have Rondo with the ball than Ray because then Rondo would not be the one standing still and hardly contributing. Ray can contribute w/ or w/o the ball.
I do understand Ray's decision though and don't blame him for going to Miami. He can get wide open shots and can probably have more attempts than at Boston.
[QUOTE=lilbeastnani]Yup. Lee + Terry + Bradley (when he returns) >>>> old Ray Allen with ankle and attitude issues.[/QUOTE]
I hope so because you're comparing three players combined to one old aging player.
[QUOTE=BlackVVaves]So Doc Rivers deflecting the "blame" from Rondo, and instead owning that portion of the blame by stating it was he that wanted and told Rondo to have more freedom with the basketball, is being a pouting crybaby?
Anyway, so, how exactly does Ray think he'll be "more involved in the offense" in Miami? Instead of having to deal with your point guard, who is, by design, [I]suppose[/I] to have the ball in his hands dictating the offense, he'll now have to deal with Bron, then Wade, then Chalmers as the primary, secondary, ect ball-handlers.
Where exactly is the improvement in utilization?[/QUOTE]
The Heat will probably play Chalmers less and play Allen, Wade, and Lebron together. All three have experience running a team especially Lebron and Wade, so the Heat don't need Chalmers out there if they actually want their best players on the court. It's not like Allen just went to a team and is playing with Carmelo and Monta Ellis.
I feel like they are beating the dead horse here.
Doc's made several lowkey snide remarks throwing Ray under the bus since he agreed to sign with Miami.
He threw out some nonsense that Ray was apparently jealous that Boston made Garnett their primary off-season focus. Which sounds like bullshit to me, because Ray Allen has always maintained the opinion that KG was the most important player on the Celtics, and had the upmost respect for his ability as a player. :confusedshrug:
[url]http://articles.boston.com/2012-07-08/sports/32581846_1_celtics-coach-doc-rivers-ainge-ray-allen[/url]
[QUOTE]Rivers hinted that perhaps the Celtics first courting Kevin Garnett to return may have irritated Allen, who may not have felt he was a priority.
[QUOTE=BlackVVaves]
Where exactly is the improvement in utilization?[/QUOTE]
I think having more wide open shots than he has ever had in his career did the trick. Seeing what Mike Miller did in game 5 of the Finals, and thinking: "I could do that, 25 times over the course of a season".
Ray being a little baby, rondo has to be the leader he's the ball handler.
This is a really good, honest opinion. I'm not used to reading too much real honesty in these type of articles.
[QUOTE=Boston C's][/B]
Just no...
and ray in his bucks and sonics days had plenty of handle... As a sonics fan I can tell you that in his first full yr here he actually ran point for us the majority of the time...dude could handle and could score with the best of them
I love rondo but call me when rondo is able to be a franchise player for a decade and that can take a bunch of scrubs to the playoffs and 50 wins (seattle 05) and not have 3 hall of famers to help him
we'll see how rondo does then[/QUOTE]
Ray's teams were very good when they won 50+ wins. He usually missed the post-season during his prime because his teams were scrubs most of the time. I don't think Ray ever took a scrub team to the playoffs.