Would you rather have Rondo or Sullinger back right now?

[kgainez]

An interesting idea, but pretty simple to solve.

Talent wins championships.
Stars win championships.

Rondo has Sullinger beat in both.  The Heat have a terrible front court in the traditional sense and they're still dominating. 

We need star power that can carry us for games.  Rondo can win a game or two vs the Heat by himself.  Sullinger can not.

I find it hard to believe a guy that rebounds the ball and plays tough can't spark a win against the Heatles.

If we found out and know anything. It's that the Heat are rattled by physicality and have a weakness for rebounding.

[Tr1boy]

Everyone who said sullinger should pretty much be banned for such absurdity 

Rondo lovers really need to get a grip. Just because people don't put rondo on this high pedestal that some of you think he should be on does NOT mean you have to be so nasty just because someone disagrees with you.

Some people on here didn't like the way this team played when rondo was controlling the offense. That is completely understandable.

Some people think him coming back could mess with chemistry, hard to argue how that might indeed be a possibility and even has a realistic chance of happening.

Its also hard to argue that this teams biggest problem right now is not having enough quality bigs who can rebound and keep people out the paint.

So, even tho you may disagree *And that's fine* acting like people that pick sullinger are morons is completely uncalled for and not even remotely true.

  Wanting to go into the playoffs with Sully instead of Rondo is similar to wanting to play with Green instead of Garnett or Bradley over Pierce. The Celts can go into a playoff series with Rondo and there's a decent chance he'll be the best or second best player in the series. Are you claiming that you can say the same about Sully, or that having such players aren't overly necessary to win in the postseason?

I disagree with everything in bold. Rondo is no where near as important to this team as pierce or KG. Also, what I'm saying is, I have yet to see THIS TEAM play well when rondo was the one controlling the offense.

By this team I mean this year. What I'm saying is, I could see rondo coming back and the chemistry this team built go straight in the toilet. What I'm claiming is this teams biggest need is having another BIG next to KG that can rebound and keep people out the paint.

Id rather have another good big next to KG than to have rondo come back If I had to pick between the two. If you disagree, whatever. That's my stance.

  Rondo scored or assisted a higher percentage of his team's points in the playoffs last year than any other player in the league. Claiming that he's nowhere near as important to the team as KG and PP is silly. And it's great that you have to qualify your comments about Rondo with "THIS TEAM" due to your small sample size, as if his entire career (including the time he spent last year playing with the other four starters we have) is somehow irrelevant. But in this case I'd say that it still falls short.

  If you look at our offense up to late Nov (around the time Rondo's assist streak ended) we were a top 10 offense, 6th in eFG% and 3rd in TS%. So THIS TEAM playing well with Rondo controlling the offense clearly occurred, you just weren't paying attention when it did.

Lol if you're trying to tell me that this team was playing well this year with rondo then I have nothing else left to say to you. They might have had some games here and there where they looked ok but overall, no.

I've never seen a team play well and lose so much and look like crap while doing it. Oh, but I just wasn't paying attention lol. I think you're the one not paying attention.

 I've already explained why you can't compare previous years to this year. It doesn't matter how pretty rondos stats look if the team is losing and playing bad.

I watched the games, and I'm 100 percent sure when I say that this team looked ALOT better AFTER rondo went down. Even the 6 game winning streak with rondo didn't look that good compared to the one we had without him. 

You can't play or win a game on a stat sheet. Almost every argument you have NONE of them involve you actually watching the games. Just reading off stats, which explains alot. This current team not only showed no signs of missing rondo, they started WINNING and looking better after he went down. If you can't see that, then I can't help you.

If you've explained why you can't compare previous years to this year, you haven't done a very good job of it.  I don't see why that's the case.  What is it that makes you think that the 38 games you saw him play in this season are a more accurate representation of "the true" Rondo than the more than 500 games he's played as a Celtic prior to this season?

Even if I agreed with everything the detractors had to say about Rondo's play this season--which I don't--the argument that we can't use Rondo's past performance as evidence for what type of player he is is nonsense.

because this is this year and 500 games was yesterday. You don't discount the yesterday completely, but todays don't think you think matters a little more??

Let me put it to you this way. There is a pretty big difference from a 2010 to 2011 paul pierce. Same can be said about KG. The issue is age, the reason why play is not as great.

You get another example in Arenas, who let his contract get to his brains, not as great effort as previous contract year and suddenly is no longer in the nba.

This year the variables are, Rondo let the "star" label get to him, new temmates, more control of decision making, no ray allen, pp and kg not as youthful anymore. But then you have to adjust. Work with your new but talented teammates but play the same hard way you have before. The guy didn't adjust and everyone was just remaining optimistic like "lets just wait, lets just wait". Well half the season is gone and we are hanging on for our lives. Who cares if playoff rondo will show his magic when we were on the verge of not even making the playoffs.

[connor]

An interesting idea, but pretty simple to solve.

Talent wins championships.
Stars win championships.

Rondo has Sullinger beat in both.  The Heat have a terrible front court in the traditional sense and they're still dominating. 

We need star power that can carry us for games.  Rondo can win a game or two vs the Heat by himself.  Sullinger can not.

I find it hard to believe a guy that rebounds the ball and plays tough can't spark a win against the Heatles.

If we found out and know anything. It's that the Heat are rattled by physicality and have a weakness for rebounding.

Sullinger can spark a win, but he isn't going to go out and put the whole team on his back to get the win. He could be an integral part in a TEAM win, but Rondo can go out there and get it all by himself.

I'm not saying Rondo definitely will do that, but he has shown in the past that he can do it.

Sullinger may be perfectly capable of taking over a game to win it by himself, but he hasn't shown that yet so its impossible to say for certain.

Yes the heat have shown they have a weakness for physical play and rebounding, but they've aso shown a weakness for Rondo playing out of his mind at the PG position with no one to match against him.

[Donoghus]

An interesting idea, but pretty simple to solve.

Talent wins championships.
Stars win championships.

Rondo has Sullinger beat in both.  The Heat have a terrible front court in the traditional sense and they're still dominating. 

We need star power that can carry us for games.  Rondo can win a game or two vs the Heat by himself.  Sullinger can not.

I find it hard to believe a guy that rebounds the ball and plays tough can't spark a win against the Heatles.

If we found out and know anything. It's that the Heat are rattled by physicality and have a weakness for rebounding.

Sullinger can spark a win, but he isn't going to go out and put the whole team on his back to get the win. He could be an integral part in a TEAM win, but Rondo can go out there and get it all by himself.

I'm not saying Rondo definitely will do that, but he has shown in the past that he can do it.

Sullinger may be perfectly capable of taking over a game to win it by himself, but he hasn't shown that yet so its impossible to say for certain.

Yes the heat have shown they have a weakness for physical play and rebounding, but they've aso shown a weakness for Rondo playing out of his mind at the PG position with no one to match against him.

This pretty much nails it.

[kgainez]

An interesting idea, but pretty simple to solve.

Talent wins championships.
Stars win championships.

Rondo has Sullinger beat in both.  The Heat have a terrible front court in the traditional sense and they're still dominating. 

We need star power that can carry us for games.  Rondo can win a game or two vs the Heat by himself.  Sullinger can not.

I find it hard to believe a guy that rebounds the ball and plays tough can't spark a win against the Heatles.

If we found out and know anything. It's that the Heat are rattled by physicality and have a weakness for rebounding.

Sullinger can spark a win, but he isn't going to go out and put the whole team on his back to get the win. He could be an integral part in a TEAM win, but Rondo can go out there and get it all by himself.

I'm not saying Rondo definitely will do that, but he has shown in the past that he can do it.

Sullinger may be perfectly capable of taking over a game to win it by himself, but he hasn't shown that yet so its impossible to say for certain.

Yes the heat have shown they have a weakness for physical play and rebounding, but they've aso shown a weakness for Rondo playing out of his mind at the PG position with no one to match against him.

heat ousted us last year
i guess i'm willing to take a gander into different things that work

reg season, we're 2-1 against the heat

faced a blowout with Rondo

won without rondo (and with a Sullinger)...in OT by 2. We had the game won, but some costly turnovers made us have to work a lil harder.

lost by 2 with a nutso performance by JG. Had we gotten just one more offensive rebound, we may be singing a different tune. Then again IDK.

my point is, it's really close with the Heat, as it was all last series. I just like to think we have options...and forgive my green glasses or whatever...I guess that's just me.

[kgainez]

I would probably chose Rondo over Sullinger.

Eitherway JGreen game/development would be impacted.  If Rondo comes back, JGreen will get snubbed and won't get many touches,  if Sullinger comes back JGreen will lose minutes.

Green is key.  Even more so than Sully and Rondo.  But Rondo is very important as well

  Green was never "snubbed" by Rondo. He took more shots per minute playing with Rondo than he does playing without Rondo. People saw Green having some big games after Rondo went out and it didn't occur to them that it might be due to his getting healthier or his getting more minutes with Sully out. Naturally they attributed his play to Rondo's absence.

where are you getting this stat from?

  nba.com. Green averages 12.5 shots per36. He averages 12.9 playing with Rondo, 12.1 playing without Rondo.

  If you look at Green's splits somewhere, his fg% was .421 in Nov, .414 in Dec, .485 in Jan, .512 in Feb and .472 in Mar. His 3fg% was .292 in Nov, .324 in Dec, .345 in Jan, .414 in Feb and .429 in Mar. The fact that his shooting started to turn around in Jan (while Rondo was playing) and he's benefited from steadier (and more) minutes since Sully went out, along with the fact that he took more shots per minute when Rondo was playing kind of punch a hole in the "Rondo was the cause of Green's struggles" claim.

yea but we aren't looking at the types of shots Green was getting and how he was utilized...I'm not sure .8 makes that much of a difference...i know for a fact JG never got over 15 shots (as he's been getting a lot lately).

Anywho...I think the types of shots matter. I think the confidence of his teammates/the chemistry matters. I don't think it punches a hole...I guess it's in how you analyze the data. I felt like in January, Jeff made a turn around thanks to his slump wearing off as well as him being used differently (which I don't NECESSARILY blame on Rondo).

Also...I also want to point out that Jeff was usually like third or so off the bench. He played ALOT with JET, who actually fed him the ball. So I don't think we can just look at that...we got to look at lineups, too.

oh you used per36
but he didn't even play close to 36 minutes...so why use this stat?

he averaged 8.1 shots with Rondo
averages 11.6 shots without Rondo

I'm sorry..I only tend to use per36 when I want to see what someone could do with 36 minutes. I'm trying to analyze the data that's there, not what COULD be there.

[Yoki_IsTheName]

Love Sully but give me Rondo.

Say what you want (detractors) but Rondo makes his money in the Playoffs. And we can REALLY use that.

[BballTim]

I would probably chose Rondo over Sullinger.

Eitherway JGreen game/development would be impacted.  If Rondo comes back, JGreen will get snubbed and won't get many touches,  if Sullinger comes back JGreen will lose minutes.

Green is key.  Even more so than Sully and Rondo.  But Rondo is very important as well

  Green was never "snubbed" by Rondo. He took more shots per minute playing with Rondo than he does playing without Rondo. People saw Green having some big games after Rondo went out and it didn't occur to them that it might be due to his getting healthier or his getting more minutes with Sully out. Naturally they attributed his play to Rondo's absence.

where are you getting this stat from?

  nba.com. Green averages 12.5 shots per36. He averages 12.9 playing with Rondo, 12.1 playing without Rondo.

  If you look at Green's splits somewhere, his fg% was .421 in Nov, .414 in Dec, .485 in Jan, .512 in Feb and .472 in Mar. His 3fg% was .292 in Nov, .324 in Dec, .345 in Jan, .414 in Feb and .429 in Mar. The fact that his shooting started to turn around in Jan (while Rondo was playing) and he's benefited from steadier (and more) minutes since Sully went out, along with the fact that he took more shots per minute when Rondo was playing kind of punch a hole in the "Rondo was the cause of Green's struggles" claim.

yea but we aren't looking at the types of shots Green was getting and how he was utilized...I'm not sure .8 makes that much of a difference...i know for a fact JG never got over 15 shots (as he's been getting a lot lately).

Anywho...I think the types of shots matter. I think the confidence of his teammates/the chemistry matters. I don't think it punches a hole...I guess it's in how you analyze the data. I felt like in January, Jeff made a turn around thanks to his slump wearing off as well as him being used differently (which I don't NECESSARILY blame on Rondo).

Also...I also want to point out that Jeff was usually like third or so off the bench. He played ALOT with JET, who actually fed him the ball. So I don't think we can just look at that...we got to look at lineups, too.

  The reason you don't remember Jeff getting as many shots when Rondo was playing was because Sully was also playing so Jeff wasn't on the court as much. I was talking about how many shots per minute he was getting. So if he's getting slightly fewer shots per minute now but playing significantly more minutes it will result in more total shots now. Also, I was talking about Green's time on the court with Rondo vs his time on the court with Rondo on the bench, not his play in games with and without Rondo. Jet feeding him the ball with Rondo on the bench would result in his getting more shots without Rondo than with Rondo, obviously that's not the case.

[BballTim]

I would probably chose Rondo over Sullinger.

Eitherway JGreen game/development would be impacted.  If Rondo comes back, JGreen will get snubbed and won't get many touches,  if Sullinger comes back JGreen will lose minutes.

Green is key.  Even more so than Sully and Rondo.  But Rondo is very important as well

  Green was never "snubbed" by Rondo. He took more shots per minute playing with Rondo than he does playing without Rondo. People saw Green having some big games after Rondo went out and it didn't occur to them that it might be due to his getting healthier or his getting more minutes with Sully out. Naturally they attributed his play to Rondo's absence.

where are you getting this stat from?

  nba.com. Green averages 12.5 shots per36. He averages 12.9 playing with Rondo, 12.1 playing without Rondo.

  If you look at Green's splits somewhere, his fg% was .421 in Nov, .414 in Dec, .485 in Jan, .512 in Feb and .472 in Mar. His 3fg% was .292 in Nov, .324 in Dec, .345 in Jan, .414 in Feb and .429 in Mar. The fact that his shooting started to turn around in Jan (while Rondo was playing) and he's benefited from steadier (and more) minutes since Sully went out, along with the fact that he took more shots per minute when Rondo was playing kind of punch a hole in the "Rondo was the cause of Green's struggles" claim.

yea but we aren't looking at the types of shots Green was getting and how he was utilized...I'm not sure .8 makes that much of a difference...i know for a fact JG never got over 15 shots (as he's been getting a lot lately).

Anywho...I think the types of shots matter. I think the confidence of his teammates/the chemistry matters. I don't think it punches a hole...I guess it's in how you analyze the data. I felt like in January, Jeff made a turn around thanks to his slump wearing off as well as him being used differently (which I don't NECESSARILY blame on Rondo).

Also...I also want to point out that Jeff was usually like third or so off the bench. He played ALOT with JET, who actually fed him the ball. So I don't think we can just look at that...we got to look at lineups, too.

oh you used per36
but he didn't even play close to 36 minutes...so why use this stat?

he averaged 8.1 shots with Rondo
averages 11.6 shots without Rondo

I'm sorry..I only tend to use per36 when I want to see what someone could do with 36 minutes. I'm trying to analyze the data that's there, not what COULD be there.

  Seriously? Per36 is a per minute stat. It helps people understand things like a player who gets 5 rebounds a game when they play 35 minutes a game isn't a better rebounder than someone who gets 4 rebounds a game in 15 minutes a game. To put this in terms you might understand, when Green plays with Rondo he averages .36 shots a minute, when he plays without Rondo he averages .34 shots a minute, so he obviously shoots more often when he's playing with Rondo.

  It's not at all about what COULD be there instead of what IS there, it's a convenient way of discussing stats used by people who understand that how many minutes you play will affect your numbers.

[BballTim]

An interesting idea, but pretty simple to solve.

Talent wins championships.
Stars win championships.

Rondo has Sullinger beat in both.  The Heat have a terrible front court in the traditional sense and they're still dominating. 

We need star power that can carry us for games.  Rondo can win a game or two vs the Heat by himself.  Sullinger can not.

I find it hard to believe a guy that rebounds the ball and plays tough can't spark a win against the Heatles.

If we found out and know anything. It's that the Heat are rattled by physicality and have a weakness for rebounding.

Sullinger can spark a win, but he isn't going to go out and put the whole team on his back to get the win. He could be an integral part in a TEAM win, but Rondo can go out there and get it all by himself.

I'm not saying Rondo definitely will do that, but he has shown in the past that he can do it.

Sullinger may be perfectly capable of taking over a game to win it by himself, but he hasn't shown that yet so its impossible to say for certain.

Yes the heat have shown they have a weakness for physical play and rebounding, but they've aso shown a weakness for Rondo playing out of his mind at the PG position with no one to match against him.

heat ousted us last year
i guess i'm willing to take a gander into different things that work

reg season, we're 2-1 against the heat

faced a blowout with Rondo

won without rondo (and with a Sullinger)...in OT by 2. We had the game won, but some costly turnovers made us have to work a lil harder.

lost by 2 with a nutso performance by JG. Had we gotten just one more offensive rebound, we may be singing a different tune. Then again IDK.

my point is, it's really close with the Heat, as it was all last series. I just like to think we have options...and forgive my green glasses or whatever...I guess that's just me.

  We were 3-1 vs the Heat in both 10-11 and 11-12, easily handling them in games both years. Take the regular season wins with a grain of salt.

[Spicoli]

So basically, the C's need to go out in free agency and see if they can find a point guard who can effectively run the team and play hard in the regular season. Rondo can sit on the bench for the regular season until the playoffs come around, then he becomes the starter because the playoffs are the only time he shows up to play anyway. Does anyone see anything wrong with this picture? Every other "star" player in the NBA plays hard regular season AND playoffs, but somehow we have Rondo who absolutely coasts in the regular season. This is unacceptable behavior from a "star" player. Give me Sullinger. At least he plays hard every night. 

[BballTim]

So basically, the C's need to go out in free agency and see if they can find a point guard who can effectively run the team and play hard in the regular season. Rondo can sit on the bench for the regular season until the playoffs come around, then he becomes the starter because the playoffs are the only time he shows up to play anyway. Does anyone see anything wrong with this picture? Every other "star" player in the NBA plays hard regular season AND playoffs, but somehow we have Rondo who absolutely coasts in the regular season. This is unacceptable behavior from a "star" player. Give me Sullinger. At least he plays hard every night.

  Sure, as long as the point guard who "coasts" is still able to be top 5 in assists (leading the league 2 years running), top 5 in rebounds/game for point guards (again leading the league 2 straight years) and be 1st or 2nd team all-defense 4 years running. Point guards that can do that while coasting aren't as plentiful as you seem to think. Who do you think fits the bill?

[Tr1boy]

So basically, the C's need to go out in free agency and see if they can find a point guard who can effectively run the team and play hard in the regular season. Rondo can sit on the bench for the regular season until the playoffs come around, then he becomes the starter because the playoffs are the only time he shows up to play anyway. Does anyone see anything wrong with this picture? Every other "star" player in the NBA plays hard regular season AND playoffs, but somehow we have Rondo who absolutely coasts in the regular season. This is unacceptable behavior from a "star" player. Give me Sullinger. At least he plays hard every night.

  Sure, as long as the point guard who "coasts" is still able to be top 5 in assists (leading the league 2 years running), top 5 in rebounds/game for point guards (again leading the league 2 straight years) and be 1st or 2nd team all-defense 4 years running. Point guards that can do that while coasting aren't as plentiful as you seem to think. Who do you think fits the bill?

are you trying to jig the truth or something?? If you watch one of the many loses with rondo being the dominant ball holder, you will see that indeed he coasts and does plenty of other "bad habits" on the court. Little things that put the team out of sync, suck the energy out of everyone and we end up losing.

Most pg's in the league can be a top assist guy, as long as you have a good player or two to pass to. Westbrooke could prob have the same assist or more if he just concentrated being a pg and passed it to durant and everyone else in okc. Rondo of the past didn't get as many assist as now, but he made the right choice usually and passed it to the open guy. Then that open guy passed it to someone else or to someone at the corner for the three.  The new rondo wants to break the assist record and does it by "selectively" passing. He wants screens after screens, picks after picks, so KG or PP can get free to do their thing. But at the cost of again sucking the life out of everyone else.

Why 2008-2010 rondo didn't do this is bc, the big three were the leaders of the team and rondo the side but important player. This is the role Rondo fits best. The blue collar version. From hs, college, Rondo was never considered a star. And not to be down on the guy, but he just doesn't have all the tools to be one in the nba either. If he were smart, he wouldn't let all this "star label" get to him and play the way he has in the past.  I'm not stating he can't grab the horns and try to single handedly win games when the team is down, but the best way for him to make an impact is to do all the little things that made him successful in the past.  Example, setting picks, diving for the ball, grabbing rebounds then trying to finish for a layup, staying with his man on defense, not bossing guys around so much and barking for the ball every single time after a rebound and most importantly passing the ball to the open guy most of the time, regardless what his name is on the back of his jersey

[kgainez]

So basically, the C's need to go out in free agency and see if they can find a point guard who can effectively run the team and play hard in the regular season. Rondo can sit on the bench for the regular season until the playoffs come around, then he becomes the starter because the playoffs are the only time he shows up to play anyway. Does anyone see anything wrong with this picture? Every other "star" player in the NBA plays hard regular season AND playoffs, but somehow we have Rondo who absolutely coasts in the regular season. This is unacceptable behavior from a "star" player. Give me Sullinger. At least he plays hard every night.

  Sure, as long as the point guard who "coasts" is still able to be top 5 in assists (leading the league 2 years running), top 5 in rebounds/game for point guards (again leading the league 2 straight years) and be 1st or 2nd team all-defense 4 years running. Point guards that can do that while coasting aren't as plentiful as you seem to think. Who do you think fits the bill?

if that point guard plays and his team goes 20-23, i don't necessarily need him (or want him)

[Tr1boy]

So basically, the C's need to go out in free agency and see if they can find a point guard who can effectively run the team and play hard in the regular season. Rondo can sit on the bench for the regular season until the playoffs come around, then he becomes the starter because the playoffs are the only time he shows up to play anyway. Does anyone see anything wrong with this picture? Every other "star" player in the NBA plays hard regular season AND playoffs, but somehow we have Rondo who absolutely coasts in the regular season. This is unacceptable behavior from a "star" player. Give me Sullinger. At least he plays hard every night.

  Sure, as long as the point guard who "coasts" is still able to be top 5 in assists (leading the league 2 years running), top 5 in rebounds/game for point guards (again leading the league 2 straight years) and be 1st or 2nd team all-defense 4 years running. Point guards that can do that while coasting aren't as plentiful as you seem to think. Who do you think fits the bill?

if that point guard plays and his team goes 20-23, i don't necessarily need him (or want him)

don't worry , this answer won't be accepted by many and the rebuttal will be , how can you diss a guy who once scored 40 plus in a playoff game. Its like Al Bundy reminiscing that he once scored 4 touchdowns in one game