Lowe - Excerpt from Hornets article on Celtics' draft day offer

[LarBrd33]

Yes, clay.  Being that I'm just some random Celtic fan and not actually a soothsayer, my opinion is wrong pretty frequently.  But since we're in a thread about the value difference between 9 and 15, I don't think I need to apologize for pointing out that we had a discussion about the value difference between 9 and 15 weeks before the season even ended. It's a relevant callback.  I didn't bump it.

[Rondo9]

By the looks of it we were within striking distance in the 4th of 3 of the 4 and a couple buckets from us to close the 4th of 2 and we had a chance to make it 2-2. You made a note of us only scoring one point in 2 mins but Cavs with the best player in the world only scored 3!

It's a subjective thing, but in my opinion, if you never had the lead in the last two or three minutes of any game in a four game sweep, it wasn't close.  Period.  The Celts were never even within a possession of grabbing the lead.  The Cavs never were put in a position where they needed to make a basket, or get a stop, in order to win the game.

Yes, it's true the Cavs only scored 3 points in the last 2 minutes in that game, but they already had a substantial lead and they really didn't need to score any more than that to ice the game.  In each of those games, the Cavs were just playing to run out the clock late in the 4th.

Eh it was pretty much a back and forth game mostly. The Celtics just lacked that extra gear.

[D.o.s.]

You know reading the article, I still don't understand why people kept feeling that the Cavs were in chill mode, because every game was pretty close.

According to several people here the games weren't even close either, i.e. their observations didn't fit with their preconceived notions of what was going to happen in the series, so they warped the semantics of the word "close." 

Well, it wasn't close in that Boston had much of a chance to win but it was close in that Cleveland had to play pretty hard and pretty well for each victory.

Mike

This is a good distinction. The Cavaliers definitely couldn't mail in those games like the two we won at the end of the season, but the Celtics were never really threatening to win any of them.

I think if you want to further bottom line it, you could simply say we were swept. Was it a massive bloodletting every game? No, but come on. We were swept. We couldn't even win one of the games at home with the other team taking it easy with a 2-0 and 3-0 series lead.

Taking it easy? Their best players played 40 minutes.

This is technically true, but I think this belies the point a little bit:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/playoffs/2015-nba-eastern-conference-first-round-celtics-vs-cavaliers.html

So Kyrie Irving and LeBron James both played 40+, but after that the Cavaliers didn't have a single player break 30. So, yes, their two best players played more than 40 minutes. Jae Crowder also had a higher ORtg than LeBron over that series, so clearly we are all set with Jae Crowder and you wouldn't trade him for James.

[oldtype]

I think we can all agree that making the playoffs hurt us in the long run.

Then again, I'm not sure what more we could have done to avoid it. When people talk about how much making the playoffs hurt us they seem to be implying that the organization made a conscious choice that ended up badly, but our front office did just about everything short of dumping actual players with actual trade value for nothing in order to get a lottery pick. We were just better than expected, that's all.

Also, it was the most fun I've had watching the Celtics in ages, so there's that.

[PhoSita]

^weird.

On topic: I think pretty much everyone agrees that Kaminsky was a bad pick at #9?

Probably.  In a vacuum, I think Kaminsky could end up being a player on par with many other guys taken in a similar range in the draft, but since Winslow was still on the board it's a lot harder to defend the pick.

It's especially a dubious pick from the standpoint that Charlotte wanted to shore up their roster with NBA ready players -- they could have taken two such players at 15 and 16 (e.g. Portis and Anderson or Dekker) and still had a chance at getting a top 10-15 talent in the future with the Brooklyn pick.

Clearly, Charlotte thinks Kaminsky has a chance at being a very good player, and chose quality over quantity.  They may be wrong, but I kinda like Kaminsky's game.  I won't be shocked if he proves them right.

[ImShakHeIsShaq]

By the looks of it we were within striking distance in the 4th of 3 of the 4 and a couple buckets from us to close the 4th of 2 and we had a chance to make it 2-2. You made a note of us only scoring one point in 2 mins but Cavs with the best player in the world only scored 3!

It's a subjective thing, but in my opinion, if you never had the lead in the last two or three minutes of any game in a four game sweep, it wasn't close.  Period.  The Celts were never even within a possession of grabbing the lead.  The Cavs never were put in a position where they needed to make a basket, or get a stop, in order to win the game.

Yes, it's true the Cavs only scored 3 points in the last 2 minutes in that game, but they already had a substantial lead and they really didn't need to score any more than that to ice the game.  In each of those games, the Cavs were just playing to run out the clock late in the 4th.

 You're right down 5 with 2 minutes to go isn't striking distance. I mean no team has ever come back from 5 down in 2 minutes.


I don't remember the games moment by moment but I bet those 3pts came from the line from intentional fouls. We clamped them down but couldn't score ourselves, they clamped too, even though we shut down a team w/LBJ and Kyrie and they shut down IT4.

[Rondo9]

You know reading the article, I still don't understand why people kept feeling that the Cavs were in chill mode, because every game was pretty close.

According to several people here the games weren't even close either, i.e. their observations didn't fit with their preconceived notions of what was going to happen in the series, so they warped the semantics of the word "close." 

Well, it wasn't close in that Boston had much of a chance to win but it was close in that Cleveland had to play pretty hard and pretty well for each victory.

Mike

This is a good distinction. The Cavaliers definitely couldn't mail in those games like the two we won at the end of the season, but the Celtics were never really threatening to win any of them.

I think if you want to further bottom line it, you could simply say we were swept. Was it a massive bloodletting every game? No, but come on. We were swept. We couldn't even win one of the games at home with the other team taking it easy with a 2-0 and 3-0 series lead.

Taking it easy? Their best players played 40 minutes.

This is technically true, but I think this belies the point a little bit:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/playoffs/2015-nba-eastern-conference-first-round-celtics-vs-cavaliers.html

So Kyrie Irving and LeBron James both played 40+, but after that the Cavaliers didn't have a single player break 30. So, yes, their two best players played more than 40 minutes. Jae Crowder also had a higher ORtg than LeBron over that series, so clearly we are all set with Jae Crowder and you wouldn't trade him for James.

Okay, But if they went easy on the Celtics, then Lebron and Irving wouldn't play all those minutes.

[oldtype]

^weird.

On topic: I think pretty much everyone agrees that Kaminsky was a bad pick at #9?

Probably.  In a vacuum, I think Kaminsky could end up being a player on par with many other guys taken in a similar range in the draft, but since Winslow was still on the board it's a lot harder to defend the pick.

It's especially a dubious pick from the standpoint that Charlotte wanted to shore up their roster with NBA ready players -- they could have taken two such players at 15 and 16 (e.g. Portis and Anderson or Dekker) and still had a chance at getting a top 10-15 talent in the future with the Brooklyn pick.

Clearly, Charlotte thinks Kaminsky has a chance at being a very good player, and chose quality over quantity.  They may be wrong, but I kinda like Kaminsky's game.  I won't be shocked if he proves them right.

I think Kaminsky will very likely preform at the average level for his draft position. (Replacement level starter/good rotation player) It's not a bad pick in a vacuum if you ignore the fact that Winslow was still on the board AND they rejected an offer of five billion draft picks.

[BradGOA]

First time poster, long time Celtic fan.

This thread is getting out of hand.

Not drafting Winslow over Kaminsky just shows how incompetent Charlotte is. But is also shows just how much teams value lottery picks. That is the gist of what I took from this article.

[ImShakHeIsShaq]

I think we can all agree that making the playoffs hurt us in the long run.

Then again, I'm not sure what more we could have done to avoid it. When people talk about how much making the playoffs hurt us they seem to be implying that the organization made a conscious choice that ended up badly, but our front office did just about everything short of dumping actual players with actual trade value for nothing in order to get a lottery pick. We were just better than expected, that's all.

Also, it was the most fun I've had watching the Celtics in ages so there's that.

No, we all don't agree.

[Emmette Bryant]

I think we can all agree that making the playoffs hurt us in the long run.

Dude.  Speak for yourself.  I don't agree with this at all.

[PhoSita]

 You're right down 5 with 2 minutes to go isn't striking distance. I mean no team has ever come back from 5 down in 2 minutes.

Being within striking distance doesn't mean much if you never strike.

Like I said before, the Cavs were never put in a position where they had to either score or get a stop in order to secure the win.  The Celts never put that kind of pressure on them.

Based on that, I think you can say that the Celts didn't get totally blown away, but I don't think you can call it close.  What's more, I don't think the Cavs were playing anywhere close to the level they reached later in the playoffs.

Put it this way -- I think the Celts got the most out of the roster they had and didn't lay down despite facing a vastly superior opponent.  That's admirable, even if it doesn't mean they're any closer to actually winning in the playoffs.

[tankcity!]

I think we can all agree that making the playoffs hurt us in the long run.

Dude.  Speak for yourself.  I don't agree with this at all.

Why don't you agree? What is the benefit of getting swept in the playoffs? If Sullinger and Olynk were the one's contributing to our success, then I would agree, but they aren't. It was role players like Jerebko, turner, and sixth man Thomas that led us.

[max215]

I think we can all agree that making the playoffs hurt us in the long run.

Dude.  Speak for yourself.  I don't agree with this at all.

Why don't you agree? What is the benefit of getting swept in the playoffs? If Sullinger and Olynk were the one's contributing to our success, then I would agree, but they aren't. It was role players like Jerebko, turner, and sixth man Thomas that led us.

Crowder actually came into his own during the series, and it's very possible that he'll be a large part of our future.

[PhoSita]

I think we all just have to accept that for some fans, making the playoffs has inherent worth that by itself justifies the playoff run.  For some other fans, making the playoffs in and of itself does not hold much worth, if at all.

There's a fundamental disagreement there that we're not going to resolve by reiterating the same arguments over and over.