First let me say that I want the Celtics to be better than last year. I want them in the Finals competing for the championship. I want everything to go just right. I want those things, I just don't think it will happen.
First, this is a brand new team with little to no resemblance to the solid, deep team that went to the ECF last year. Newly constructed teams take time to meld together. Everyone needs to learn their role and learn their team mates strengths, weaknesses and tendencies. Newly put together teams don't normally gel as quckly and as successfully as the 2007-08 Celtics. That team was the statistical anamoly, not the norm. I think expecting this team to come together that quick and be a +56-57 win team is unrealistic.
Second, we were good last year because we were deep. We had one all-star/MVP candidate and a whole bunch of great role players that made this team 12 deep with experience. On any given night last year you could get 15+ points in a game from bench players Olynyk, Jerebko, Green, Smart, Brown and Rozier. And though Zeller never could score that much as a twelfth guy he could give solid minutes.
This year that is gone. Baynes isn't a scorer. Smart or Brown will be a starter. Crowder, who would have been our 6th man, is gone. Rozier will be back but every other player has zero NBA experience. All you have to do to see how inexperienced teams do in the NBA is watch the young teams that litter the lottery every year. Unless Smart fixes his shot or Brown and/or Tatum develop instantly into scorers that can give you that 15-20 points a game fairly consistently, this team will not be deep. And the bench could give up tons of points on top of being outscored every game.
Third, the Irving trade weakened us for this year. If IT is healthy this year, Irving would have to upgrade his game significantly to become the super efficient high scoring guard we had last year and Cleveland could have this year and as I said earlier, Crowder is gone. Zizic looked awful in Summer League and probably would have sat a lot and been awful when he got in, but he is big and can at least rebound and foul a lot helping to preserve our bigs: Horford, Baynes, Morris. We don't have a player like that anymore.
And if you're expecting Kyrie to be a substantial defensive upgrade over IT, you're going to be disappointed. I could care less if he is 5" taller than Thomas, he is as bad a defender as Isaiah, just for different reasons. He will need to be hid on defense a lot.
I think the trade can't be judged to see who won it for many years. I think short term we lost it but I think long term we could have won it. We will see.
Overall, I think Ainge took this team a step back this year to take 2-3 steps forwards in years to come. He is booking on Kyrie being here for 7 years and being the face of the team. He is booking on Brown, Hayward, Tatum and the LA/Sac pick all playing at star level in 3-4 years. And he is betting that he hits with some of the inexperience and youth like Yabusele, Nader, Theis, Ojeleye and future late picks for them to become very good rotational contributors. That's a lot of uncertainty and its something you usually see in lottery teams, not contenders.
I hope my pessimism is replaced, but as most you who have seen my posts over the years know, I am not high on unproven youth. So I just want to say, especially to those in the game threads, don't go crazy if we aren't a 60 win team or even a ECF team. This team may not even win as many games as last year and could be too shallow and thin to be a successful playoff team this year.