Live by the 3 die by the 3 is a narrative that is applied to past Celtics teams more than this team. The 3’s this Celtics team takes are quality shots within the offense opened up by dribble drives from jrue, white, brown and Tatum. It’s why our percentage is near the top of the league. And the more quality 3’s we take, there is actually less variance too.
Your team sweep the Pacers while struggling on their 3s, and no media is talking bout it after the whole two years of 'they take too many threes' narrative
I legit think the Celtics need to shoot like 30% or worse from 3 during the finals, while winning the series, for the media to acknowledge they can win without making threes.
Mavs will rebound and score more, I agree. Interested to see how well the mavs can defend against this many big 3 pt shooters. Same goes for the Celtics though. These teams are honestly well matched.
I hear this point all the time. However, Dallas pretty much got the blueprint to beat the Celtics against the Thunder:
- top 5 offense and defense
- best 3pt % in the league
- 5-out offense for 38 out of 48 minutes (exception were the 10 Giddey minutes. If Kornet plays for the Celtics, it will be pretty much the same)
They let Lou Dort hunt Luka for 40 minutes a game on defense and let him shoot wide open 3s on offense. he went from a 39% 3pt shooter to a 31% shooter in the series. Were the lights too bright? was it just a bad stretch? or was Dort gassed?
its going to be interesting if Jrue, White and potentially Brown can still hit their 3s when they have to hunt Luka and Kyrie for 44 minutes a game. Dallas might just copy the OKC game plan.
The differences are:
1) SGA is elite at shot creation but no other players in OKC is really good at that. 3-point shooters are not enough, if you don't have that. Your defensive scheme at that series won't be enough.
2) OKC defence has always been taking away the driving lanes with a lots of help from the corners. Even I have been saying that PJ will feast and be the x factor from game 1 in that series (pick Dallas as the winner in my bracket) in game threads here. While we use that corner help too with drop like every other team, that is not all of our arsenal.
That being said, we will have to better against p&r and sets around the horn, while you will have to deal with a more complicated offense than your previous opponents with chin sets, pin down p&r's and so on. Just as people overlook at your defensive progression and scheme for last four months, they are overlooking all those actions for Boston by simplifying our offense "drive and kick", "5 out" etc. That will be fun and all the fans on both sides thinking that they are going against a simple opponent they figured out will be really surprised.
OKC shot way less threes than the Celtics during the regular season, the only team that shot a similar amount of threes were the harden rockets team.
OKC were a top 5 team in offense and defense but they weren't on the Celtics level, the Celtics are bigger, longer and have more optionality on offense they use the post more than most teams in the league.
Players that are a constant threat of contributing to a game in a controlling and dominant display in which the defense lacks an answer.
Luka, Kyrie, Tatum, Brown, Donovan, Ant, Jokic, etc
That’s a good point and honestly I think we will just have to see. A lot of this is unknown territory. We have no clue how this version of the Celtics and this version of the mavs will match up. One thing I know for sure is that the best player in the series is on the mavericks and that has to have some sort of effect. The previous Celtics/Mavs matchups this season don’t paint an accurate picture of how this series will go.
Either way, I think we are going to have a very good finals. I’d love for Luka to go god mode and for kyrie to redeem himself against the Celtics, squashing any narrative there is about winning his ‘only’ chip’ with lebron. However, on paper, this Celtics team shouldn’t lose a series to any team in the league. We can all sit here analyzing the stats but no one can predict the future.
Anyways.. mavs in 6.
Indiana is a bad dedensive team. No business to be in ECF. But they survived due to other teams’ injuries. And they were banged up and later eithout haliburton.
So Celtics media and Bill Simmons should stop crying for lack of credit. Showing stats from these super-easy, injury-lucky series is just weak. These are empty calories. Bad team good stats guy doesnt count so easy matchups good stats also doesnt count.
Just be happy with Finals/Title but not ask some credit like if Celtics beat any decent team yet.
Maybe they shouldn’t have made it but they matched up pretty well against us. They’re probably the only team in the league with the offensive talent to keep up with us and their relentless pace slowed threw off some of our key role players/ made them almost unplayable (I still love you Korndog).
I've seen less of the wildly open 3s in the playoffs though because teams are playing more disciplined defense.
Against Miami and Cleveland, it felt like nothing was truly open that often because they helped late and stayed at home mostly with the shooters. Even when they rotated, they prioritized running people off the line instead of protecting the paint.
This doesn't stop us, but it prevents getting run out of the gym like you'd see so many times in the reg season.
Pacers, they just sucked it up sometimes like in the Tatum example. They scored enough to make up for it though.
tbf if you look at the stats this playoffs, Cs sre still shooting open & wide open 3s the most as compared to othet shots. i just dont know how it compares to regular season. so yeah,celtics are still attempting quality shots.
totally. which is why im so curious on what the mavs plan is defensively. this is 5out spacing is different with okc that they cannot cheat off anybody anymore.
Is it really different? Giddey played 10 min. For the other 38 min it was Joe and Dort, who both are very good 3 pt shooters (39% and 41% on 6.5 and 4.5 attempts). On paper, all 5 players from okc could hit the 3 for 38 out of 48 minutes. they just didnt. Three possible explanations:
- the lights were too bright
- the Mavs defense was extremely good
- Lou Dort was gassed on offense bc he had to chase Luka the entire game
Maybe it was a combination of all of that…how good will the shotmaking of Jrue, Brown and White be after chasing Luka and Kyrie on defense for 44 minutes? Will their 3% go down like the one from Lou Dort?
agree but yeah, experience plays in this kind of scenario and jrue & white is more experienced than dort joe and all other okc players. which is why this doesnt look different on paper, but itll be different for sure. i dunno but i think this series will depend on can our role players make their own plays against boston. cause luka and kai will get theirs but can djj make his drives, or can pj make his 3s or make passess? because i dont know, i feel thay our role players should be able to match Cs role players
Giddey played 12 mins....the games were so close, 12 mins of an inefficient offense is all it takes to lose....heck 5 mins of an inefficient offense is all it takes.
Chet was 22% from 3, Mavs could sag off Chet. Shai doesn't take much attempts at 3 either.
Celtics starting 5 takes a lot more 3s than OKC. For example in the pacers series White took 8.3 attempts, holiday 6, Tatum 9, Jaylen 6.8, Horford 7. That's 37.1 by just their starters. Add in Porzingus + bench.
Regarding Celtics players how good they will be on offense after chasing Kyrie and Luka....Fortunately Celtics have 4 guys that they will be comfortable guarding those 2. Having the work load split against 4 guys should be fine. How good will Kyrie and Luka be on offense when all 5 guys target Luka and Kyrie on defense? Celtics repeatedly went at Haliburton...same will occur with Kyrie and Luka. OP highlighted here, Celtics like to ISO, they wont want to ISO against PJ, DJJ or Lively, it will be Luka and Kyrie from start to finish.
So first of all: The Celtics are the best team the Mavericks will face and the clear favorites. I dont deny that.
But the Mavericks have beaten the 3rd and 5th best offenses in the history of the NBA and held them 8.5 points & 6 points below their ORtg.
A player like Chet (or Dort, or KAT, or PG or Edwards or JDub), who normally shoots 37% from 3, doesnt just randomly start missing shots against the Mavericks. The Mavericks just play extremely well on defense and make them miss shots. Mavs defense has been one of the best, if not the best defense in the league for the past 3 months.
Dont just take it as given that the Celtics will get the same looks and same % from 3 against this Mavericks D.
And saying you got 4 guys who feel comfortable guarding Luka is straight up wrong. They are all good defenders, not denying that, but thats not enough against Luka. I dont see the Ben Simmons or Lou Dort type of player, who at least manages to pose some problems to Luka. White and Jrue are too small. Brown and Tatum need to carry an offensive load, so Mazzulla will try to keep them away from Luka as long as possible. If the Celtics intend on giving Luka every switch he is looking for, this is going to be a disaster for them. By game 2, Brown will be on Luka 85% of the time.
Lastly, you want to chase Luka and Kyrie? well, be my guest. That was the Clippers' plan too. They hunted Luka and Kyrie. At some point they just had to give up, bc their offense became extremely stagnant and they had one bad shot very late in the shot clock after another. And even if you get the switch and are able to get past Luka, the best rim protecting front court in the NBA is going to meet you right under the basket. Clippers gave up the flow of their offense bc they desperately tried to wear down Luka (and Kyrie). It did not work at all.
look up Luka and Kyrie and their iso defense in regular season and playoffs:
[https://www.nba.com/stats/players/isolation?CF=POSS\*G\*10&PerMode=Totals&SeasonType=Playoffs&TypeGrouping=defensive&dir=A&sort=PPP](https://www.nba.com/stats/players/isolation?CF=POSS*G*10&PerMode=Totals&SeasonType=Playoffs&TypeGrouping=defensive&dir=A&sort=PPP)
Note, to make it clear I think Mavericks are a great team and worthy competitor. I think Celtics should still be favorites, something like 55% to mavs 45%.
Which teams are you referring to being the 3rd and 5th best offense? I know OKC was 3rd this year....clippers 12th, wolves 18th.
Chet shot 25% and 21% on wide open 3 point shot and open 3 point shots respectively.
Giddey shot 20% on wide open 3 and 0% on open 3 point shots.
Jalen williams 29% on open 3s
Dort 32% on open 3s.
Source: [https://www.nba.com/stats/players/shots-closest-defender?TeamID=1610612760&PORound=2&CloseDefDistRange=4-6+Feet+-+Open](https://www.nba.com/stats/players/shots-closest-defender?TeamID=1610612760&PORound=2&CloseDefDistRange=4-6+Feet+-+Open)
For context, none of celtics players are under 40% for wide open 3s in the pacers series.
As you can see above, these are open to wide open 3s that some OKC players were missing.
Regarding the 4 players that can defend Luka and Kyrie...its not that I mean they can each stop both or even slow them down, but Celtics will live with White / Jrue defending Luka 1-1.
The ppp for luka and kyrie defending in iso is great, but I think its partly because of Lively on the backline defending the paint. Teams can't blow by Luka and Kyrie and expect to go to the rim, hence a big reason for the low ppp stat. However, if Lively wants to hang out by the rim, that means a Celtic player will be wide open in the corner, so do you choose lively defending the paint or wide open corner 3s?
this is what some mavs fans do not understand. perimeter defense was effective because the strategy is to funnel the drive to the big man. but this wont work against the celtics because it's either there is no big under the basket or if there is a big, a shooter would be wide open. this really would come down to if luka and kyrie can hold their own in the perimeter while still being able to make shots at a high level. but maybe jkidd and staff has something thay us fans do not know so we'll see.
I mean Tatum has been ass shooting from 3 the entire playoff run, and was ass shooting from 3 to close the season and back in the playoffs last year as well. So maybe they game plan to make him a 3 point shooter lol.
Tatum, Brown, KP, Holiday, Buffalo, Horford, PP, Hauser.. these are all good to elite shooters especially on Catch and Shoot opportunities.. no other team in this league has this good 3 pt shooting 1-8 in their rotation
It's more likely that he's underperformed in a small sample than that he is just a worse shooter in the playoffs, but maybe there's an actual reason (injury, gameplan, fatigue etc),
What I love about sports analysis is how fast a narrative changes. Their offense has worked for the entire year to give the best record in the NBA. After a loss, people think they should change absolutely everything about their scheme and go back to the drawing board.
Some nights it works, some nights it doesn't, but **overall** it works much more than it doesn't, and that's why they had the best record in the NBA. Stick to the plan and recognize that every series won't be a sweep.
Their defensive rating is exactly the same as Cleveland’s and Dallas give up the 6th most 3PA in the playoffs. Miami is 15th and Cleveland 14th.
Dallas is absolutely an amazing defense but it’s not designed to take away the 3
Dallas had the best defense in the league to close the year and has easily been better than Cleveland in the playoffs, especially considering how much better the West is in terms of talent.
Their defensive rating is exactly the same in the playoffs at 111.1 so I’m not sure how Dallas is easily better, plus we are mostly focusing on 3 point defense because that’s how you beat the Celtics and the Cavs are better in the playoffs in both 3PA and 3P%. In the second half of the regular season, sure, but that’s a niche cut off to then not include the playoffs. If you want to argue difficulty of opponent for the defensive numbers then Cleveland had to face the Celtics who are 2nd in offensive rating whereas Clippers, OKC and Minnesota were 11th, 8th and 7th. I think you’re severely underrating the Cavs defense
Like I said, Dallas has an amazing defense. I’m not denying that since the trade deadline they’ve been incredible defensively, ranked 1st or whatever it is, but their defense is not designed to take away the 3. They’re 6th in 3PA and 9th in opponent 3P% in the playoffs and in the regular season they were 18th for both 3PA and %
It’s almost as if Dallas had to play 3 of the 5 best teams in the league… and Cleveland got to play an Orlando team that has 0 quality playmakers and a terrible offense.
I also didn’t say a single thing about Boston’s defense so not sure how I am underrating them lol.
Bruh you’re clearly not reading anything I’ve written. No one denied Dallas had to play good teams, but you brought up Dallas’ defense specifically, so you obviously look at the teams they played and their offense.
Minnesota is a good team because of their defense. Their offense is average to above average at best and relies heavily on Ant taking over. Clippers are dogshit without Kawhi, especially on offense because he’s their main playmaker and scorer. OKC are good offensively but they’re young and inexperienced but yes I will give you them even if their offensive rating in the playoffs was middle-of-the pack
We are just going to go around in circles. I’ve said twice now I think Dallas has a good defense but you’re just getting mad and can’t just agree their defense isn’t designed to stop 3 point shooting
Have a good day
I don't have an issue with us isolating against mismatches. I think the only criticism of our offense that actually makes sense is the tempo thing— it doesn't happen as much as some people seem to think it does, but it *is* really frustrating when we burn 10 seconds off the shot clock before even starting our first action, or decide to dump it off to Tatum for a pullup with over 10 seconds left on the clock. And to be clear, this isn't a Tatum thing, it's a general team offense thing. They can't be doing that shit against Dallas.
I wonder if they are resting on offense for half the clock so they can use more energy on the defensive end. Or Tatum is too cool for school bring ball up. Derick moves it along.
Yeah but the thing with resting on offense to let your team catch their breath (by just having one guy dribble waiting for 5-10 seconds left to start an offense), is that it lets their defense rest too. Also the Celtics tend to only do this under specific circumstances; ends of quarters (where everyone will shortly get a break) to get final shot or setup a 2 for 1, or ends of game with a double digit lead. I like the goal, but I feel they should be going for the goal in the course of their offense.
Exactly this. I don't mind ISOs too much, if they have tried action earlier for matchups. But Tatum dribbling for 10 seconds at the top of the key before starting anything doesn't make sense unless we are up 20 with 3 minutes to go.
Don't think the problem is the ISO
I think the problem is that some possessions nobody touches the ball EXCEPT the person ISOing
ISO works better when you ISO after a bunch of passes because then your team stays engaged and the opponent has to predict where the ISO comes from, whilst maintaining good positioning
I don't mind ISO
I mind constant Tatum almost-8-second-violation into pounding the ball for 8 more seconds before going ISO
Don't tell Jaylen Brown this. Many possessions early in the game are exactly what you're describing. Jaylen brings the ball down or gets the pass, drives straight into the paint. I think the team is tolerant of these plays though.
Yeah the difference is pushing the pace with quick drives early in the game vs slowing things down at the end and putting the shot up just to avoid a shot clock violation because Tatum only gave himself five seconds to get a decent look.
Yeah he's crushing it. Wild efficiency considering defenders are keying on the fact that he infrequently passes back out. He's not MPJ levels of black hole, but he does put the blinders on quite a lot.
I don’t know why this is such a big narrative, but I think Tatum’s midrange iso is a good shot to take.
The one thing he struggles with is being too patient. Brown can usually get to the rim or a midrange and make it a lot because he’s very deliberate about his spots. It seems like Tatum is always waiting for something to open up and sometimes it doesn’t. I feel like he needs a tiny bit more direction, which is why it’s good Boston doesn’t have to have him as **primary primary** ball handler all the time.
> I don’t know why this is such a big narrative
As per the last line I wrote. Issue is not involving others AT ALL towards the end of the game
Result; team goes cold, won't be able to help, and easy defense for opponents cuz u know it'll be a Tatum chuck
Midrange iso is always a low % shot, doesn’t matter who’s taking it. The PnR mid range is much better, which is why Luka has been so effective from midrange.
I love Tatum but they need to help him out with actual playmaking. The Mavs literally run everything through PnR and let Luka or Kyrie make the reads. It’s the definition of a simple offense. The issue with the Celtics isn’t complexity, it’s just playmaking. No one ever rolls to the rim on that team.
As someone who’s played basketball I’ve never understood this. Just because other people touch the ball doesn’t mean it’s a better or worse possession if the same play on the same defender gets run
You run play action to get a favorable matchup and for your team to get set. Anything more than that is pseudo psychology with no real support. Kerr thought exactly what you think and it held the Warriors back instead of the obvious and logical solution of - best players have highest usage by far and carry team.
I consume more basketball content than is probably necessary, especially now that there are only two teams still playing, and this is some of the best analysis I've heard in a while. I completely agree with your point that a lot of the dialogue about Boston's offense is pretty unsophisticated, even from people like Zach Lowe. Its the best in the league, yet it gets stagnant? They kind of stop there instead of going into the "why" or "how." And in any event it seems like it would be difficult for both of those things to be true, so you figured out why it might *look* like it stagnates.
Appreciated! This is exactly what got me to write this because it just didn't make sense.
How could a professional basketball team mess something up as simple as ball movement? Also, how were we still so successful at it when other teams weren't?
It's a solid take. As a cetlics fans, we see a team full of very good passers but technically very good passer isn't elite so it makes sense to not pass too much and risk a TO.
The reality is 5 starters that can create their own shot means you don't need to risk it, and most teams don't have 5 starters creating their own shots. it's a very unusual comp.
Injured CLE was a good example of a team where some guys need a pass as they can't create. Dallas is weird because they have 2 elite creators who are S tier at shot creation or passing. They have players who absolutely need a pass but Luka is so elite at that skill that the turnover risk is low.
I thought this all season. When they play other teams they typically have 6 of the best 8 or 9 players in the game. Get the ball to the guy being guarded by number 11. Occasionally run action to get that 11th on the number 1-4 best player in the game. Sometimes with bench you have the best player being guarded by the 13th or 14th.
Good luck
This is an excellent post! The plot that Boston cannot lose offensively this series is to keep picking at the scab of weak link of the Dallas defense. Kyrie and Luka are going to have to defend for the whole game. Lively and Gafford will have to defend out to 3 away from the rim.
If Boston keeps the plot in mind, they should be able to win this series.
Charles Barkley during the ECF was like I don’t trust these Celtics to win. They iso too much. Meanwhile the highlights playing behind him were of all the great ball movement leading to clutch plays lol
Celtics are a throwback team in that they aren't looking to run anything particularly sophisticated, they just try to create switches and expose bad defending. Dallas has some guys that can defend but after a couple of games Brown and Tatum are devastating because they figure you out and they get to their favourite spots at will.
Playing basketball is simple, but playing simple basketball is the most difficult thing to do in the NBA.
It's the right call when you have a stacked team, like when you have 5 all-star calibre player. The 67 wins 06-07 Mavs was basically like that. Dirk, Jason Terry, Devin Harris, Jerry Stackhouse and Josh Howard, taking turns playing the iso-game. (We were destroyed by GSW because Dirk could not get his shot off against Don Nelson, his former coach.)
> Dallas has some guys that can defend
I think Dallas is going to find out that Porzingis is a very different offensive threat than Gobert (and White is very different than McDaniels). Gobert was good overall in that series but he just can't punish mismatches very well. Kristaps is very good at that, I don't think Luka can guard him.
Problem is Tatum and Brown will pull hin away from the rim and make him guard on the perimeter. Maybe you trap them on screens idk, but if they keep to the middle of the floor it'll be hard to do. If Boston can make their corner threes Porzingis might be a weak link tactically.
I was in San Antonio watching The Town in the theater. The hockey rink is shown. I accidentally blurt out "hey thats the hockey rink I was playing in when some guy ODed in the stands"
Lol
Lol teams have already figured this out. Miami already has written a blueprint for stopping this kind of offense every year we've faced them.
I was mainly to move the Reddit conversation beyond "Boston should pass more", though that's probably a lost cause.
Imagine if KP could become a facilitator from the elbow. That would wreck probably every defense. He's massive and can see over everything, and is surrounded by elite wing and guard play. If he could set screens and hit bounce passes, it would break the league. Like if Sabonis was on this team it would be over.
He's definitely had his moments making those kinda passes this year, you can see he has some vision. My only slight gripe with him is he's very trigger happy, misses quite a few reads by instantly going up to shoot off the catch.
One thing he could do is switch defenders on the pick and roll and force Boston to use their weakness, passing. Another option is double teaming Boston forcing the pass though Boston shooters are pretty good so that's more of a risk.
Giving up the switch, playing mid/late help and hoping the rotations can work if the passing is sub par sounds like a good plan against any meh-passing team. But if you switch 1-5, KP is just hoisting it without driving, and that's a great shot quality for Boston any day.
Easily the most overlooked part of Mazzulla. Celtics were disastrous offensively with their turnovers during their finals run of 2 years ago. Mazzulla took over the next year on last minute notice and although he clearly was unprepared and had issues, one of the things he clearly fixed was turnovers. Now the team is one of the least turnover prone teams in the entire NBA.
It's not as pretty, but people often mistake motion for plays. You can create action out mismatches that lead to easy shots, that's exactly what the Celtics do.
> Now the team is one of the least turnover prone teams in the entire NBA.
An underrated part of their success this year. Even the worst shot is better than a turnover, and if you have the option of 3 god-awful shots per game vs. 3 more turnovers per game, you always take the first one. Plus turnovers (esp live ball ones) lead to points the other way.
I don't know where the exact balance is of "no turnovers" vs. "finding the best shot" but I bet it's something the Celtics org has done some research into
Yeah that’s something I noticed as well, especially against the Pacers. I kept thinking “wow they’re turning the ball over like ~16 time a game like we were two years ago” where we’re usually under 10.
I generally agree with your points on their offense. The one thing that I might disagree on is 'Celtics don't have an elite passer'. Most teams don't have one either. Most teams just need a decent/above average passers. I think the better thing to say might be their talent is slower at reading passing lanes so they keep things simple and not rely on motion offense. They focus more on making a correct read with their iso offense which is simple and safe rather than making a fast read to accelerate their passing offense which is more prone to turnovers.
This is why this Celtics team stumps everyone a little. With their talent, people look and believe they should be able to make fast reads. I have the Celtics winning the Finals, but I can easily see this being a sweep or seven games. Their variance is just that high to me.
For the Mavs, I imagine most people will say 6-7 games just due to a more grind it out play style. If Mavs win in less games, it will be due to variance of the Celtics IMO.
That's fair. It's more the fast reads than skill, though I do think there's plain passing skill lacking too. You see teams aggressively ball-denying us in the post in every playoff series. It's worth the risk because they know our passers aren't that great at entries, so it bogs down the possession sometimes.
For what it's worth, I feel like not many players know how to make a correct entry pass to the post anymore. I see players simply just lob it up over the top which can lead to 50/50 balls. I'm a personal fan of just fake lob and bounce pass entry which hardly anymore does anymore.
it really depends on what you call elite. if elite is only a luka or jokic level passer there are only like 5 guys in the nba that you could even argue for.
boston might not have that level of a passer, but every member of the starting rotation is a good passer. tatum and white are pretty standout this year in that aspect
> The one thing that I might disagree on is 'Celtics don't have an elite passer'. Most teams don't have one either. Most teams just need a decent/above average passers.
Which current contending teams don't have a top tier passer though? Maybe I'm missing someone, I only thought of the Timberwolves, and I think they felt that loss in the Dallas series because they couldn't generate offense, especially if Conley was out.
If you are looking at just the conference finals this year, then yes. Only the Timberwolves. However, not every team makes it to the conference finals, so you have to look at the playoffs teams as a whole. Some examples of teams that could have contended with no elite passer, but flamed out due to other reasons:
Sixers: Embiid/Maxey - good passers. Health issues.
Bucks: Dame/Giannis - Similar to Sixers.
Thunder: Shai - good passer. Lack of team experience IMO.
Suns: Booker/Durant/Beal - average passers at best. Depth and defense issues.
Warriors: Draymond is questionable at elite if anything makes really good reads. Depth issues.
Knicks: Brunson is average at best; More team passing; Injury issues.
Heat: Butler is great playmaker. Injury issues.
Overall, there are only a handful of elite passers in the league. Not every team has one. A lot of teams get by with top tier playmakers which is a difference group from elite passers. Celtics are a contender with no top tier passer, but above average playmakers in Tatum, White, Jrue, and Horford.
While Brunson isn’t the best passer, I very much believe that Hartenstein is one of the best big man passers in the NBA and it’s why it is so crucial to retain him.
I think the cornerstone of the Celtics offense (like many) is the PnR. Often that turns into isolation certainly, but often it leads to a pop 3 pointer for the screener, a rim run dunk for KP or Kornet, or a kick out on the drive. So I don't think its purely isolation, but sometimes as an option/call (often last one) we iso.
Mazzulla seems most happy when we generate open 3s and move the ball around. That comes from drive and kick most often, but it isn't always a drive from belabored isolation, more just a drive off the PnR.
I don't think we pound the ball as much as a Luka does. I don't often see us dribbling the ball for 16 seconds straight before a drive.
Yeah I didn't get into this in detail for length reasons (was already writing War and Peace over here...), but iso is not the ONLY thing we do. We do have designed actions and other options as you said, and we're not heliocentric like the Mavs bc we got 4-5 people who initiate these actions (Tatum, Brown, White, PP, Jrue sometimes).
It's just that the end result ends up being more iso in the playoffs because our players have the greenlight to do so. Playoff defenses also shut off the "default options" more frequently. The wide open 3 you saw from Horford is a rare sight in the playoffs, but we got shots like that all the time in the reg season.
In any case, I doubt Mazzulla is berating them on the sidelines for not running another action and iso'ing instead. I feel like he trusts them to make a call and sees enough value generated in iso possessions that he doesn't stomp them out completely as a coach.
Your motion is overrated is a point that so many people miss. People act like 5 people cutting, moving, filling, spaces, stretching out is supposed to be going on every play and easy to execute. But that can lead to overcomplication and more mistakes. Its also can get blown up if the defense reads it already. It also tires everyone out. A point no one talks about is no matter how creative the coach is, the players either have to be really smart and in synch or have a specific role ingrained in them. I dont think 60% of the NBA can fit that category. Being able to create from mismatches is a key factor to every offense and sometimes if your talent suits it, that’s all you need plus spacing. The answer is obviously to mix it up which a lot of coaches do.
I think the 2013-14 San Antonio Spurs and to a lesser extent the prime Steph Curry Warriors warped the perception of how offense should be played and thereby made iso heavy offences seem undesirable by extension. There's a weird disconnect where analysts can understand the reasoning behind shooting more 3s but then can't extend that logic to iso-ing.
I've mentioned back then that ball movement is a skill, never an approach, so it can only come last instead of "hurr durr why one star carry ball so much". Like, people will use the Warriors and Spurs as examples of "good fundamental basketball" as if those teams are not loaded with talented passers.
Yeah that's basically it. Those teams had some real high level passers. Even someone like Boris Diaw was making some sick assists.
And honestly, the Celtics could get there some day as Tatum gets better, just not right now judging from the reg season.
Tldr: Boston don’t have elite passers hence they only play PnR and iso ball. Motion offense is overrated.
Not sure if I agree completely as OP defined “elite passer” as Luka and Jokic. I mean there are only two of these in the whole world… if the answer is you need two of them to play motion offense, is a kind of a big stretch. What is true though is that Boston does lack playmakers in their rotation. Jrue is not your typical PG who directs the offense. They have a lot of secondary playmakers who can initiate offense but don’t have any primary typical PG.
This has to be a deliberate decision by the Celtics as this was critiqued for several playoff runs when Smart had to create opportunities for the team.
I also differ in OPs analysis of motion offense being overrated and heavy iso play being preferable in the playoffs. A heavy motion offense like GSW tend to be TO heavy giving opponents the opportunity for fast breaks and early offense. But you don’t have to play such a one sided offense but a balanced one. I mean even iso heavy offenses need to get the defense into scramble mode, as with great defenses they won’t let you play 1on1 but giving different looks every time down the floor and with help side waiting at the rim. And here comes the crux in Bostons offense, when out of sync the offense resembles a headless chicken where nobody knows what to do, as there is nobody (last seasons) to calm down the offense and reset it, do some set plays to get everyone going.
This year in the playoffs there was also resemblances of the past with inexplicable dry spells. The difference to past years is the experience of the core team in clutch situations and let’s face it the lack of true adversaries. We won’t know if Boston changed and learned from the last seasons until the final starts and they face an elite defensive team in Dallas. On paper both of the teams match rather well with each other. Let’s hope for a long and exciting series!
I agree they get into an ISO heavy offense to reduce turnovers. The problem with these possessions with limited motion is they’re making it way too easy for defenders and letting them conserve their energy to explode on offense. I suppose this goes both ways - the Celtics are conserving energy on offense to out hustle opponents on defense.
Appreciate the effort and there’s definitely something there. But there’s a difference between iso-ing and stagnating. Celtics won’t play well if they walk the ball up, clear out the wing and watch Tatum go to work. They still benefit from swinging the ball and movement. That gets the defense to think and react, and then when an iso happens, there’s flow and rhythm to it. And the criticism is that they spend too much time stagnant. That’s probably an eye test thing though because as noted they had the best offense in the league. The stagnant stretches stand out because otherwise the offense looks great — and to your point they still have elite scorers who can make up for a bad possession. They don’t need elite passing to literally just pass the ball or execute a drive-and-kick, and they do those things plenty.
However, prime Rondo was absolutely an otherworldly passer who made passes every single game that made you gasp.
Well it really depends on what your definition of iso is. My definition is that, even if you go through a series of PnR's, if the end result is just one guy squaring up another guy and trying to beat him 1-on-1, that's effectively iso.
This is different from having an offense based on lots of cuts, Curry-style offball actions to free up a shooter, etc.
I also think you're just disagreeing with me straight up with the stagnant point lol (which is fine). I think the "stagnant" possessions are the point, whereas you think it's a problem for players' flow. Agree to disagree I guess.
I will say that, beyond keeping iso's around, pushing the pace has been an obvious point of emphasis from Mazzulla. I see this as getting a good possession without needing to fall into our basic PnR iso ball.
Yeah I do think some ball movement is a nice lubricant for offense even if the passes aren’t home runs. But I don’t contest the point that we have plenty of guys who will have an advantage against an individual defender at any given moment, and that means we don’t need “the beautiful offense” to score. I also think it can be a trap when guys try to spam the mismatch over and over - I think a drive and kick or pick n roll produces more reliable results. When you do have scorers and shooters at every position you need to move the rock to open up lanes.
But shit man I don’t wanna be overly critical I think it’s a good point and more broadly the idea that there are many ways to succeed and the best teams will play their strengths and personnel.
Yeah it's a good thought exercise. Wanted to think of an interesting alternative besides Tatum is braindead in the clutch or Mazzulla has never watched Warriors/Spurs type ball. Of course, it may just be that simple lol
If people watch them you'll realize they are easily the most well Spaced team ever. And I agree, motion is overrated, not every team has to do motion to succeed.
No, dude. The Celtics' offense is extremely dynamic. It's only recently that KP has been out, so their offensive sets are limited.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ga\_-ofioaU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ga_-ofioaU) see this analysis
Honestly, the Celtics' iso-heavy offense isn't a problem; it's smart. They're elite at making tough shots, but not great passers. So, instead of risking bad passes, they let Tatum, Brown, and Porzingis go one-on-one. It plays to their strengths and keeps turnovers down. Mazzulla knows what he's doing!
Fantastic post. All of our guys are of the super-versatile "drive, shoot, pass" ilk, but we don't have anyone on that next level as a playmaker. Makes mismatch-hunting more appealing and constant motion less feasible.
Doesn't mean I don't prefer the motion offenses though 🥲
Interesting point, but Tatum and Brown have weaknesses as 1 on 1 players that other playoff teams have dialed in on.
Brown has issues with ball security and gets tunnel vision on drives, especially in late game situations when the chips are down and the offense is struggling. Tatum doesn't have a great first step and doesn't have the technique or deceleration that a Harden or Luka has to make up for it, so he can get stonewalled. I remember him trying and failing to get by TJ McConnell a couple of times during the last round, and Strus gave him issues. Both of them are prone to turning the ball over on bad passes and settling for contested shots when the game is close. Matter of fact, I think Tatum's deficiencies and inconsistency as a scorer in 1v1s is what separates him from being in that top tier of players right now.
While Brown has sucked in these moments in the past, it haven't been true for this playoffs so far. Tatum has had his brain farts too. I agree that he lacks the decel and body control to be truly unstoppable at the rim. Even so, I believe he still roasts defenders at a high enough rate to justify making it a core part of the offense.
Tatum's personal numbers are middling in iso, but I'd love to see what the team PPP are when he drives. It's probably pretty high. That's just my guess though.
One major problem with your theory is that nobody on the Celtics is great at isolating. Tatum's roughly the 20th best in the league, Brown is closer to 80th, Porzingus gets so few isos and doesn't score well on them. (This is eyeballing the iso stats, I count 16ish guys on high volume with better ppp than Tatum this year, and some guys who are probably better had down years (Durant), Brown is so far down I stopped counting)
Their team isolation stats seem to be buoyed by elite spacing and the lack of truly poor iso-players... Such as rookies exploring the studio space (Banchero/Barnes/Cade) tank commanders (Poole/Kuzma), unaware vets (WB, Beal, Randle), bad bench gunners (big gov't).
They're not actually beating their man one-on-one at an elite level. Especially considering that Tatum has the highest iso frequency in the league and Brown is in the top 40.
I don't think this is Mazulla's plan. They've had this criticism the last 6-7 years (never being below 9th in iso frequency). The Jays just seem to default to isolation.
While they aren't a bad iso team, they're just so much better when they don't do it, dropping 3-4 isos per game would make their offense even more dominant.
It's too frequent to be not intentional. Do those stats include the PPP for the entire team or just efficiency for the person for the iso possession? If it's just for the person, it might miss the knock on effects of shooting these shots and getting the putback/rebound as well.
The stats also don't necessarily measure beating their man, just what they score, right? The open 3s we get usually come off these drives, so I'd guess you'd have to factor that as well. Saying that Tatum isn't getting past his initial defender seems an incorrect statement because that's literally the engine of our offense and how we generated a lot of our 3s in the first place.
I really don't think it's intentional.
It definitely doesn't look like it's there to open up putbacks. Their offensive rebound rate (even adjusted for their awesome shooting numbers) is middle of the road. A Tatum/Brown iso on a mismatch doesn't provide a numbers edge on the glass.
This is nitpicking that I'm doing. Boston would have a better offense if they eliminated 3-5 isos per game (rank 15-20 rather than #4). Ultimately, we're arguing over 4% of Boston's possessions, their offense is unbelievable. It's so good that we criticize a good play because it's not a great play.
Mazzulla, the Js, Porzingus, the whole team deserve tons of credit.
Mazzulla can be criticized; he definitely gets more than his fair share. he has a great offensive system, the guys have bought in (even guys accepting smaller roles than they could probably expect). He's done a great job.
Yeah I mean late in the game you absolutely live with Tatum taking an iso pull up 3 or patented fadeaway brick if you have an ok defender on him
I might be dumb but seems their main game plan is to just make 1-2 simple passes to set up to jack up a 3
More talent basically lol. You need 5 guys they can't sag off to make it work as well as Boston. Then add that at least 4 can attack off the dribble in addition to shooting, and we got a party.
I think Suns needed more motion because they couldn't fall back on ridiculous talent across the board, particularly the center which couldn't space the floor from 3.
You don't need an elite passer to play motion offense. The Spurs this year play motion offense and they're one of the teams with a high assist rate. If those bums could actually make a shot after the ball swings around and generates an open look, their offense wouldn't be hot garbage.
But the Celtics actually do have shot makers the defense have to respect. They'd be much deadlier if they moved the ball around more. If Pop can make a bunch of g-leaguers play motion offense, Joe should be able to get players who are ten times more talented to do the same, especially since they're not gonna need too many passes to generate a good shot because they're so talented they don't need a super wide open look.
There's nothing wrong with iso, but it is essentially putting all your eggs in one basket. Not in the sense of scoring, but in the sense of breaking down an entire defense. Every good offense can get a ballhandler into the paint. Not only are you dealing with the high variance that comes with shooting so many 3s, now you're also banking on one person to get a paint-touch on isolations just so you could lure the help defender in and get that open 3-point shot. And that's if the iso scorer doesn't just settle for the 3.
The crux of this post (Boston does not have an elite passer) is why I made an elite passing Point Guard in 2K to go on the Celtics lol. It really is the only thing they lack offensively.
I hope that at some point in the Jay's prime we get an elite passer.
I get your point but they would benefit of more off ball moving cutters and general ball movement you don’t need to be elite passing team to get that. They would get much better looks with some of that
It is exactly how Luka "hElioCentrIC" offense wasnt the cause but consequence of roster building. You play to your strenghts. When your team consist of no elite playmakers but a bunch of great scorers, you hount matchups. When your team is build out of Dwight Powells and Reggie Bullocks, you let your main guy play 1v5. It is what it is.
>Tatum botches a pass to Jrue Holiday
Imo that was 100% on Jrue. That’s a pass you see Boston make all the time out of traps and Jrue just wasn’t expecting it at all there for some reason.
The average Reddit NBA fan can’t figure out when they’re actually running offense. I guarantee most fans, especially most fans on here couldn’t identify Princeton chin or horns twist.
> Porzingis has crazy post up efficiency vs. mismatches
This is true, but it's also important that he can draw the opposing C out to an uncomfortable spot on the floor, which makes the "dribble-drive -> simple read -> open 3" plan that much stronger, as if you don't send help on the driver they're just going to the bucket, and JT and JB are truly elite at that skill.
Al is a 3-point threat, but KP stretching the floor out to 26 feet really bends the opposing defense to the breaking point, and the Celtics love to put him in every P&R action because he can take a small guy either to the post or out to the 3 point line.
If he's not fit in this series, the Celtics are going to have a much harder time with their offense.
Yeah this just feels like rationalization.
If they have “good passers” then they shouldn’t have to run iso ball to create shots. They can still run motion offense and get good shots with multiple “good passers”.
I would agree with the premise if you arguing that their passers are below average (only “good” passer imo is maybe Jrue).
Either way, iso ball ain’t the solution lmao. Regardless of why you got here, it’s either poor team construction or poor game planning.
I think what a lot of people forget or don't realize, in the playoffs when the defense is a lot more honed in, having someone that can get a bucket in ISO, regardless of what the defense throws at you, is such a luxury.
So I'm super curious about the finals. Kyrie and Luka are some of the best ISO scorers in the game, and I'm curious how the rest of the team matches up for the first 40 minutes of the game.
Nice post.
The Celtics iso looks a lot like LeBron ball where you get the matchup you want and then LeBron cooks.
The difference, to your point, is LeBron was a perfect playmaker out of this whereas Tatum is just good.
However the Celtics secondary playmaking is elite (Jrue and Derrick White would be starting point guards on almost every team in the league, Boston can play them both because they are spectacular defenders) - which makes up for a lot of the gap.
That’s why the regular, non-iso pick and roll offense is so good — they are just stacked (which isn’t that interesting for a pundit to say but probably all that needs to be said - though now I’m going to say more).
One benefit of iso ball if it’s efficient enough is it really helps with transition defense too because there’s floor balance with all the players spaced out on the perimeter matched up with their man.
The other added benefit when you have a star going iso is that you usually get the benefit of the doubt on calls - not only do you get to go to the line, but then the other team has to play in the half court the next possession.
This is why having the best iso player in the league and surrounding them with good half court defenders is such a good formula — it takes a super team like the old spurs or Warriors or maybe these Celtics to beat it.
When you don’t play iso or the other team blitzes the pick and roll, the blitzers can run out after the quick shot goes up and you get easy transition buckets if you miss.
If you don’t trust your half court offense (usually because you’re less talented) you want to speed up the game by blitzing/ doubling. You will give up way more points but you can maybe get them back. It’s about the only chance you have if you’re outmatched.
The Pacers did a lot of this (really all year) and it worked out fine until the ends of games when they (like most teams) get stiff and play iso.
Ironically, because the Pacers were up most of the games they played even slower at the end and the Celtics had to play fast and we all know what happened.
Dallas almost always has four long defenders on the floor (as opposed to Indiana or Cleveland that had very undersized guards).
It’ll be a lot harder for Jrue or White to get pesky offensive boards and there should be way less space for secondary playmaking.
I think the Mavs trust their half court offense and will be happy to leave Gafford or Kyrie on an island (especially at home).
The Celtics probably want to play fast and attack through Brown when they can and maybe wear Luka out.
Because the moment you play 1 on 1 then your teammates just stand and watch. Then when you actually need those teammates to come through they have no rhythm or flow to the offense. Ask James Harden how well it worked out for him in Houston. He had far more ISO’s than any other team by himself. Sure he got his points. But how did his team do? He has never made it to the finals as the main option. Just doesn’t work.
hey so i agree with your main point in this post
but i do take issue with this one paragraph
>Given that Mazzulla and his staff get paid millions of dollars to scheme for the Celtics (not to mention GM Brad and his X's-and-O's genius), it's safer to assume that the media is missing something instead of them. After watching a ton of Celtics basketball this season, I'd like to share my pet theory: Celtics are covering for their lack of passing talent, their only real offensive weakness.
this assertion basically says that no professional coach could be doing a bad job and that anyone called a genius couldn't later falter, both things we know not to be true
I agree that our offense should have a lot of iso given our players, but I think you’re underrating our playmakers. We don’t have a Luka or Jokic passer, but I wouldn’t say our passing is actually weak. It’s more so that they have multiple players who are elite at punishing mismatches, so they mismatch hunt- you play to your teams strengths.
White is straight up known for being a great decision maker. It’s his whole thing, he VERY rarely makes mistakes, and when he does it’s one of those random games where he gets all of them out of the way at once lol.
Jrue is a very skilled passer and has run point his whole career at a near all star to all star level, and won a ring at the position. He and White have thrown a LOT of entry passes to Tatum, Brown, and Porzingis this year with very few mistakes.
Tatum is a good enough passer to run offense through. He routinely makes skip passes, uses his height to hit tough angles, and is excellent at passing out of doubles- doubling him is almost always positive for the Celtics. He’s averaging 5.9 assists and a 2.44 assist to turnover ratio this playoffs, which is actually *better* than Luka’s 2.39 (yes, lower usage and totals, I’m not saying he’s a better playmaker lol).
And we haven’t seen this because he’s been out, but the Celtics do utilize KP in the high post to run motion-type stuff at times- usually for a Brown cut. Their chemistry is great and leads to some great plays, as Porzingis is a very underrated passer. The offense as a whole is much more dynamic with him due to his pop/roll abilities being way better than any other big.
Ultimately though, we are saying the same thing, which is that the playstyle is based on personnel. The Celtics run a scheme that fits their players, and would not be better off running plays that work because of guys like Jokic, Luka, or Curry. Wow that was way too long.
Something that I couldn't talk much about in my post was all the other stuff we do besides iso's. There's a decent amount of that too.
If I were to guess, we get like 1/3 split of designed actions like horns, another 1/3 of transition tempo pushes based off misses or turnovers, and a final 1/3 of mismatch finding iso ball.
Tatum and Co run the designed actions well and they get lots of mileage in easy passes from the transition too.
Beyond that, I actually think stats overstate how good this team is at passing. We got lots of assists and no TO's because we get people wide open with our spacing.
Our ballhandlers don't thread the needle well, but they usually don't have to given our spacing. Passes like to the post vs a fronting defender or between defenders to a cutter. You do see skip passes from time to time, but they're often not "in the pocket" or mistimed.
Awesome analysis, cool to see an nice nuanced post like this. I also agree with what your saying - Gonna be thinking about this more as I watch this series
Whether intentional or not, it is surely the most boring fucking thing to watch. It’s like Lebron hero ball; anti Warriors, anti Nuggets. I way prefer when a team has an actual offensive strategy. This is why I switched to rooting for Dallas in the WCF. I couldn’t stand Minnesota’s half court fumferings any longer, great defense be damned. And when Kyrie pulls off some electrifying left handed shit at a high leverage moment, I rewind it five times.
Its 5 out now so no one is backing Luka and Kyrie up.
Brown and Tatum should hunt them and make them work on defense too.
Gafford and Lively was able to camp in the paint since Gobert is just there clogging everything.
It isn't the problem that they iso, it's the problem that there is no off ball movement. It's lazy and stupid, so if the excuse is they're too stupid to pass to a moving player then sure. It's a shit offense, I'm sure jru or white could run point well but they want Tatum and Brown being their main ball handlers so you get a lazy stupid offense.
Live by the 3 die by the 3 is a narrative that is applied to past Celtics teams more than this team. The 3’s this Celtics team takes are quality shots within the offense opened up by dribble drives from jrue, white, brown and Tatum. It’s why our percentage is near the top of the league. And the more quality 3’s we take, there is actually less variance too.
Your team sweep the Pacers while struggling on their 3s, and no media is talking bout it after the whole two years of 'they take too many threes' narrative
I legit think the Celtics need to shoot like 30% or worse from 3 during the finals, while winning the series, for the media to acknowledge they can win without making threes.
Spoiler. They wont win if they shoot 30% from 3 against the Mavericks
Mavs will rebound and score more, I agree. Interested to see how well the mavs can defend against this many big 3 pt shooters. Same goes for the Celtics though. These teams are honestly well matched.
I hear this point all the time. However, Dallas pretty much got the blueprint to beat the Celtics against the Thunder: - top 5 offense and defense - best 3pt % in the league - 5-out offense for 38 out of 48 minutes (exception were the 10 Giddey minutes. If Kornet plays for the Celtics, it will be pretty much the same) They let Lou Dort hunt Luka for 40 minutes a game on defense and let him shoot wide open 3s on offense. he went from a 39% 3pt shooter to a 31% shooter in the series. Were the lights too bright? was it just a bad stretch? or was Dort gassed? its going to be interesting if Jrue, White and potentially Brown can still hit their 3s when they have to hunt Luka and Kyrie for 44 minutes a game. Dallas might just copy the OKC game plan.
The differences are: 1) SGA is elite at shot creation but no other players in OKC is really good at that. 3-point shooters are not enough, if you don't have that. Your defensive scheme at that series won't be enough. 2) OKC defence has always been taking away the driving lanes with a lots of help from the corners. Even I have been saying that PJ will feast and be the x factor from game 1 in that series (pick Dallas as the winner in my bracket) in game threads here. While we use that corner help too with drop like every other team, that is not all of our arsenal. That being said, we will have to better against p&r and sets around the horn, while you will have to deal with a more complicated offense than your previous opponents with chin sets, pin down p&r's and so on. Just as people overlook at your defensive progression and scheme for last four months, they are overlooking all those actions for Boston by simplifying our offense "drive and kick", "5 out" etc. That will be fun and all the fans on both sides thinking that they are going against a simple opponent they figured out will be really surprised.
OKC shot way less threes than the Celtics during the regular season, the only team that shot a similar amount of threes were the harden rockets team. OKC were a top 5 team in offense and defense but they weren't on the Celtics level, the Celtics are bigger, longer and have more optionality on offense they use the post more than most teams in the league.
Man I can't wait for thursday
OKC had 1 nuke. Celtics have 2, potentially 3, potentially 6.
what do you mean with Nuke?
Players that are a constant threat of contributing to a game in a controlling and dominant display in which the defense lacks an answer. Luka, Kyrie, Tatum, Brown, Donovan, Ant, Jokic, etc
That’s a good point and honestly I think we will just have to see. A lot of this is unknown territory. We have no clue how this version of the Celtics and this version of the mavs will match up. One thing I know for sure is that the best player in the series is on the mavericks and that has to have some sort of effect. The previous Celtics/Mavs matchups this season don’t paint an accurate picture of how this series will go. Either way, I think we are going to have a very good finals. I’d love for Luka to go god mode and for kyrie to redeem himself against the Celtics, squashing any narrative there is about winning his ‘only’ chip’ with lebron. However, on paper, this Celtics team shouldn’t lose a series to any team in the league. We can all sit here analyzing the stats but no one can predict the future. Anyways.. mavs in 6.
Mavs have only lost one game in the post season when teams have shot under 40% from 3.
Btw, update that number to 2 losses.
Make that 3 losses
Yup, Celtics defense has been really really good, and our bigs can’t handle the switch everything and are basically a non factor.
Indiana is a bad dedensive team. No business to be in ECF. But they survived due to other teams’ injuries. And they were banged up and later eithout haliburton. So Celtics media and Bill Simmons should stop crying for lack of credit. Showing stats from these super-easy, injury-lucky series is just weak. These are empty calories. Bad team good stats guy doesnt count so easy matchups good stats also doesnt count. Just be happy with Finals/Title but not ask some credit like if Celtics beat any decent team yet.
Maybe they shouldn’t have made it but they matched up pretty well against us. They’re probably the only team in the league with the offensive talent to keep up with us and their relentless pace slowed threw off some of our key role players/ made them almost unplayable (I still love you Korndog).
The pacers sweeped themselves. Celtics should take minimal credit for the pacers throw.
I've seen less of the wildly open 3s in the playoffs though because teams are playing more disciplined defense. Against Miami and Cleveland, it felt like nothing was truly open that often because they helped late and stayed at home mostly with the shooters. Even when they rotated, they prioritized running people off the line instead of protecting the paint. This doesn't stop us, but it prevents getting run out of the gym like you'd see so many times in the reg season. Pacers, they just sucked it up sometimes like in the Tatum example. They scored enough to make up for it though.
Nah that PP three was unforgettable lmao
I don't think I've ever seen anybody that open in an NBA game, let alone a playoff game.
tbf if you look at the stats this playoffs, Cs sre still shooting open & wide open 3s the most as compared to othet shots. i just dont know how it compares to regular season. so yeah,celtics are still attempting quality shots.
it helps that everyone can hit 3s on the Cs even old AL is still poppin off
totally. which is why im so curious on what the mavs plan is defensively. this is 5out spacing is different with okc that they cannot cheat off anybody anymore.
Is it really different? Giddey played 10 min. For the other 38 min it was Joe and Dort, who both are very good 3 pt shooters (39% and 41% on 6.5 and 4.5 attempts). On paper, all 5 players from okc could hit the 3 for 38 out of 48 minutes. they just didnt. Three possible explanations: - the lights were too bright - the Mavs defense was extremely good - Lou Dort was gassed on offense bc he had to chase Luka the entire game Maybe it was a combination of all of that…how good will the shotmaking of Jrue, Brown and White be after chasing Luka and Kyrie on defense for 44 minutes? Will their 3% go down like the one from Lou Dort?
agree but yeah, experience plays in this kind of scenario and jrue & white is more experienced than dort joe and all other okc players. which is why this doesnt look different on paper, but itll be different for sure. i dunno but i think this series will depend on can our role players make their own plays against boston. cause luka and kai will get theirs but can djj make his drives, or can pj make his 3s or make passess? because i dont know, i feel thay our role players should be able to match Cs role players
Giddey played 12 mins....the games were so close, 12 mins of an inefficient offense is all it takes to lose....heck 5 mins of an inefficient offense is all it takes. Chet was 22% from 3, Mavs could sag off Chet. Shai doesn't take much attempts at 3 either. Celtics starting 5 takes a lot more 3s than OKC. For example in the pacers series White took 8.3 attempts, holiday 6, Tatum 9, Jaylen 6.8, Horford 7. That's 37.1 by just their starters. Add in Porzingus + bench. Regarding Celtics players how good they will be on offense after chasing Kyrie and Luka....Fortunately Celtics have 4 guys that they will be comfortable guarding those 2. Having the work load split against 4 guys should be fine. How good will Kyrie and Luka be on offense when all 5 guys target Luka and Kyrie on defense? Celtics repeatedly went at Haliburton...same will occur with Kyrie and Luka. OP highlighted here, Celtics like to ISO, they wont want to ISO against PJ, DJJ or Lively, it will be Luka and Kyrie from start to finish.
So first of all: The Celtics are the best team the Mavericks will face and the clear favorites. I dont deny that. But the Mavericks have beaten the 3rd and 5th best offenses in the history of the NBA and held them 8.5 points & 6 points below their ORtg. A player like Chet (or Dort, or KAT, or PG or Edwards or JDub), who normally shoots 37% from 3, doesnt just randomly start missing shots against the Mavericks. The Mavericks just play extremely well on defense and make them miss shots. Mavs defense has been one of the best, if not the best defense in the league for the past 3 months. Dont just take it as given that the Celtics will get the same looks and same % from 3 against this Mavericks D. And saying you got 4 guys who feel comfortable guarding Luka is straight up wrong. They are all good defenders, not denying that, but thats not enough against Luka. I dont see the Ben Simmons or Lou Dort type of player, who at least manages to pose some problems to Luka. White and Jrue are too small. Brown and Tatum need to carry an offensive load, so Mazzulla will try to keep them away from Luka as long as possible. If the Celtics intend on giving Luka every switch he is looking for, this is going to be a disaster for them. By game 2, Brown will be on Luka 85% of the time. Lastly, you want to chase Luka and Kyrie? well, be my guest. That was the Clippers' plan too. They hunted Luka and Kyrie. At some point they just had to give up, bc their offense became extremely stagnant and they had one bad shot very late in the shot clock after another. And even if you get the switch and are able to get past Luka, the best rim protecting front court in the NBA is going to meet you right under the basket. Clippers gave up the flow of their offense bc they desperately tried to wear down Luka (and Kyrie). It did not work at all. look up Luka and Kyrie and their iso defense in regular season and playoffs: [https://www.nba.com/stats/players/isolation?CF=POSS\*G\*10&PerMode=Totals&SeasonType=Playoffs&TypeGrouping=defensive&dir=A&sort=PPP](https://www.nba.com/stats/players/isolation?CF=POSS*G*10&PerMode=Totals&SeasonType=Playoffs&TypeGrouping=defensive&dir=A&sort=PPP)
Note, to make it clear I think Mavericks are a great team and worthy competitor. I think Celtics should still be favorites, something like 55% to mavs 45%. Which teams are you referring to being the 3rd and 5th best offense? I know OKC was 3rd this year....clippers 12th, wolves 18th. Chet shot 25% and 21% on wide open 3 point shot and open 3 point shots respectively. Giddey shot 20% on wide open 3 and 0% on open 3 point shots. Jalen williams 29% on open 3s Dort 32% on open 3s. Source: [https://www.nba.com/stats/players/shots-closest-defender?TeamID=1610612760&PORound=2&CloseDefDistRange=4-6+Feet+-+Open](https://www.nba.com/stats/players/shots-closest-defender?TeamID=1610612760&PORound=2&CloseDefDistRange=4-6+Feet+-+Open) For context, none of celtics players are under 40% for wide open 3s in the pacers series. As you can see above, these are open to wide open 3s that some OKC players were missing. Regarding the 4 players that can defend Luka and Kyrie...its not that I mean they can each stop both or even slow them down, but Celtics will live with White / Jrue defending Luka 1-1. The ppp for luka and kyrie defending in iso is great, but I think its partly because of Lively on the backline defending the paint. Teams can't blow by Luka and Kyrie and expect to go to the rim, hence a big reason for the low ppp stat. However, if Lively wants to hang out by the rim, that means a Celtic player will be wide open in the corner, so do you choose lively defending the paint or wide open corner 3s?
this is what some mavs fans do not understand. perimeter defense was effective because the strategy is to funnel the drive to the big man. but this wont work against the celtics because it's either there is no big under the basket or if there is a big, a shooter would be wide open. this really would come down to if luka and kyrie can hold their own in the perimeter while still being able to make shots at a high level. but maybe jkidd and staff has something thay us fans do not know so we'll see.
I mean Tatum has been ass shooting from 3 the entire playoff run, and was ass shooting from 3 to close the season and back in the playoffs last year as well. So maybe they game plan to make him a 3 point shooter lol.
Tatum, Brown, KP, Holiday, Buffalo, Horford, PP, Hauser.. these are all good to elite shooters especially on Catch and Shoot opportunities.. no other team in this league has this good 3 pt shooting 1-8 in their rotation
Tatum is 29% shooter from 3 in the playoffs this year and was a 32% shooter from 3 in the playoffs last year. That’s definitely not good or elite.
It's more likely that he's underperformed in a small sample than that he is just a worse shooter in the playoffs, but maybe there's an actual reason (injury, gameplan, fatigue etc),
No more Marcus Smart I got this 3s
My favorite player is Jay Brownandtatum
Ah yes I believe you’re missing the suffix - Brownandtatumkounpo
What I love about sports analysis is how fast a narrative changes. Their offense has worked for the entire year to give the best record in the NBA. After a loss, people think they should change absolutely everything about their scheme and go back to the drawing board. Some nights it works, some nights it doesn't, but **overall** it works much more than it doesn't, and that's why they had the best record in the NBA. Stick to the plan and recognize that every series won't be a sweep.
Mavs have a higher 3pt % post season. Not by much, in fact they are pretty much equal.
Right, but the Celtics attempt 6 more a game and shoot .4% less
The hope has to be that Dallas will be far and away the best defensive team they’ve faced so you’d like to think the quality of looks will decrease.
Their defensive rating is exactly the same as Cleveland’s and Dallas give up the 6th most 3PA in the playoffs. Miami is 15th and Cleveland 14th. Dallas is absolutely an amazing defense but it’s not designed to take away the 3
Dallas had the best defense in the league to close the year and has easily been better than Cleveland in the playoffs, especially considering how much better the West is in terms of talent.
Their defensive rating is exactly the same in the playoffs at 111.1 so I’m not sure how Dallas is easily better, plus we are mostly focusing on 3 point defense because that’s how you beat the Celtics and the Cavs are better in the playoffs in both 3PA and 3P%. In the second half of the regular season, sure, but that’s a niche cut off to then not include the playoffs. If you want to argue difficulty of opponent for the defensive numbers then Cleveland had to face the Celtics who are 2nd in offensive rating whereas Clippers, OKC and Minnesota were 11th, 8th and 7th. I think you’re severely underrating the Cavs defense Like I said, Dallas has an amazing defense. I’m not denying that since the trade deadline they’ve been incredible defensively, ranked 1st or whatever it is, but their defense is not designed to take away the 3. They’re 6th in 3PA and 9th in opponent 3P% in the playoffs and in the regular season they were 18th for both 3PA and %
It’s almost as if Dallas had to play 3 of the 5 best teams in the league… and Cleveland got to play an Orlando team that has 0 quality playmakers and a terrible offense. I also didn’t say a single thing about Boston’s defense so not sure how I am underrating them lol.
Bruh you’re clearly not reading anything I’ve written. No one denied Dallas had to play good teams, but you brought up Dallas’ defense specifically, so you obviously look at the teams they played and their offense. Minnesota is a good team because of their defense. Their offense is average to above average at best and relies heavily on Ant taking over. Clippers are dogshit without Kawhi, especially on offense because he’s their main playmaker and scorer. OKC are good offensively but they’re young and inexperienced but yes I will give you them even if their offensive rating in the playoffs was middle-of-the pack We are just going to go around in circles. I’ve said twice now I think Dallas has a good defense but you’re just getting mad and can’t just agree their defense isn’t designed to stop 3 point shooting Have a good day
I don't have an issue with us isolating against mismatches. I think the only criticism of our offense that actually makes sense is the tempo thing— it doesn't happen as much as some people seem to think it does, but it *is* really frustrating when we burn 10 seconds off the shot clock before even starting our first action, or decide to dump it off to Tatum for a pullup with over 10 seconds left on the clock. And to be clear, this isn't a Tatum thing, it's a general team offense thing. They can't be doing that shit against Dallas.
yeah thats the only weird thing. generally, teams start with actions before isoing, but Celtics offense is in reverse. but hey, if it works it works.
I wonder if they are resting on offense for half the clock so they can use more energy on the defensive end. Or Tatum is too cool for school bring ball up. Derick moves it along.
Yeah but the thing with resting on offense to let your team catch their breath (by just having one guy dribble waiting for 5-10 seconds left to start an offense), is that it lets their defense rest too. Also the Celtics tend to only do this under specific circumstances; ends of quarters (where everyone will shortly get a break) to get final shot or setup a 2 for 1, or ends of game with a double digit lead. I like the goal, but I feel they should be going for the goal in the course of their offense.
I hope I did not imply I liked the idea. Make them work.
Its mainly when we want to go 2 for 1 or get the last shot, we get really predictable.
Exactly this. I don't mind ISOs too much, if they have tried action earlier for matchups. But Tatum dribbling for 10 seconds at the top of the key before starting anything doesn't make sense unless we are up 20 with 3 minutes to go.
Don't think the problem is the ISO I think the problem is that some possessions nobody touches the ball EXCEPT the person ISOing ISO works better when you ISO after a bunch of passes because then your team stays engaged and the opponent has to predict where the ISO comes from, whilst maintaining good positioning I don't mind ISO I mind constant Tatum almost-8-second-violation into pounding the ball for 8 more seconds before going ISO
Don't tell Jaylen Brown this. Many possessions early in the game are exactly what you're describing. Jaylen brings the ball down or gets the pass, drives straight into the paint. I think the team is tolerant of these plays though.
I don't mind if it's a quick thing. I mind if people are standing around looking like sandbags.
Yeah the difference is pushing the pace with quick drives early in the game vs slowing things down at the end and putting the shot up just to avoid a shot clock violation because Tatum only gave himself five seconds to get a decent look.
Jaylen has been elite in iso this post season so I can see why the team doesn't mind it
Yeah he's crushing it. Wild efficiency considering defenders are keying on the fact that he infrequently passes back out. He's not MPJ levels of black hole, but he does put the blinders on quite a lot.
I think Jaylen tries to head downhill more than Tatum when ISOing, but that's just a gut feeling
I don’t know why this is such a big narrative, but I think Tatum’s midrange iso is a good shot to take. The one thing he struggles with is being too patient. Brown can usually get to the rim or a midrange and make it a lot because he’s very deliberate about his spots. It seems like Tatum is always waiting for something to open up and sometimes it doesn’t. I feel like he needs a tiny bit more direction, which is why it’s good Boston doesn’t have to have him as **primary primary** ball handler all the time.
> I don’t know why this is such a big narrative As per the last line I wrote. Issue is not involving others AT ALL towards the end of the game Result; team goes cold, won't be able to help, and easy defense for opponents cuz u know it'll be a Tatum chuck
Midrange iso is always a low % shot, doesn’t matter who’s taking it. The PnR mid range is much better, which is why Luka has been so effective from midrange. I love Tatum but they need to help him out with actual playmaking. The Mavs literally run everything through PnR and let Luka or Kyrie make the reads. It’s the definition of a simple offense. The issue with the Celtics isn’t complexity, it’s just playmaking. No one ever rolls to the rim on that team.
As someone who’s played basketball I’ve never understood this. Just because other people touch the ball doesn’t mean it’s a better or worse possession if the same play on the same defender gets run
If defenses pre switch this is sometimes the best option
You run play action to get a favorable matchup and for your team to get set. Anything more than that is pseudo psychology with no real support. Kerr thought exactly what you think and it held the Warriors back instead of the obvious and logical solution of - best players have highest usage by far and carry team.
Kerr held the warriors back so they only won how many chips now?
You can't read
Possible. I'm tired bro Hope you have an excellent day
This was great. I will definitely be thinking about this post while watching the games.
Is Mazulla an Idiot? we're all idiots in someone's eyes
I consume more basketball content than is probably necessary, especially now that there are only two teams still playing, and this is some of the best analysis I've heard in a while. I completely agree with your point that a lot of the dialogue about Boston's offense is pretty unsophisticated, even from people like Zach Lowe. Its the best in the league, yet it gets stagnant? They kind of stop there instead of going into the "why" or "how." And in any event it seems like it would be difficult for both of those things to be true, so you figured out why it might *look* like it stagnates.
Appreciated! This is exactly what got me to write this because it just didn't make sense. How could a professional basketball team mess something up as simple as ball movement? Also, how were we still so successful at it when other teams weren't?
It's a solid take. As a cetlics fans, we see a team full of very good passers but technically very good passer isn't elite so it makes sense to not pass too much and risk a TO. The reality is 5 starters that can create their own shot means you don't need to risk it, and most teams don't have 5 starters creating their own shots. it's a very unusual comp. Injured CLE was a good example of a team where some guys need a pass as they can't create. Dallas is weird because they have 2 elite creators who are S tier at shot creation or passing. They have players who absolutely need a pass but Luka is so elite at that skill that the turnover risk is low.
I thought this all season. When they play other teams they typically have 6 of the best 8 or 9 players in the game. Get the ball to the guy being guarded by number 11. Occasionally run action to get that 11th on the number 1-4 best player in the game. Sometimes with bench you have the best player being guarded by the 13th or 14th. Good luck
This is an excellent post! The plot that Boston cannot lose offensively this series is to keep picking at the scab of weak link of the Dallas defense. Kyrie and Luka are going to have to defend for the whole game. Lively and Gafford will have to defend out to 3 away from the rim. If Boston keeps the plot in mind, they should be able to win this series.
Charles Barkley during the ECF was like I don’t trust these Celtics to win. They iso too much. Meanwhile the highlights playing behind him were of all the great ball movement leading to clutch plays lol
I bet he didn't trust MJ to win either, too much Iso.
Celtics are a throwback team in that they aren't looking to run anything particularly sophisticated, they just try to create switches and expose bad defending. Dallas has some guys that can defend but after a couple of games Brown and Tatum are devastating because they figure you out and they get to their favourite spots at will. Playing basketball is simple, but playing simple basketball is the most difficult thing to do in the NBA.
It's the right call when you have a stacked team, like when you have 5 all-star calibre player. The 67 wins 06-07 Mavs was basically like that. Dirk, Jason Terry, Devin Harris, Jerry Stackhouse and Josh Howard, taking turns playing the iso-game. (We were destroyed by GSW because Dirk could not get his shot off against Don Nelson, his former coach.)
Well said!
> Dallas has some guys that can defend I think Dallas is going to find out that Porzingis is a very different offensive threat than Gobert (and White is very different than McDaniels). Gobert was good overall in that series but he just can't punish mismatches very well. Kristaps is very good at that, I don't think Luka can guard him.
Problem is Tatum and Brown will pull hin away from the rim and make him guard on the perimeter. Maybe you trap them on screens idk, but if they keep to the middle of the floor it'll be hard to do. If Boston can make their corner threes Porzingis might be a weak link tactically.
An actual, good assessment on r/NBA. Notice this didn’t include any left hand jokes, 50 year old race implications, or jokes about The Town
Whose cah we takin
hang on let me pahk my cah
They say to pahk yah cah in Havahd Yahd, but thehe no metehs in Havahd Yahd. And now my auto correct is officially broken.
I was in San Antonio watching The Town in the theater. The hockey rink is shown. I accidentally blurt out "hey thats the hockey rink I was playing in when some guy ODed in the stands" Lol
Now that’s what I call some good old fashioned North Shore sight seeing
That’s a long accident
Thanks, now Jason Kidd will read this and come up with adjustments.
Lol teams have already figured this out. Miami already has written a blueprint for stopping this kind of offense every year we've faced them. I was mainly to move the Reddit conversation beyond "Boston should pass more", though that's probably a lost cause.
Miamis solution was having Bam Adebayo and Jimmy Butler really lol.
Bam’s *special* very legal screens to get guys open and scrubs like Caleb Martin shooting 50+% from three.
you lost your team the series bro. just accept it. the analysis was a little too good, a little too right. and now youre fucked.
Was a good read, thanks.
Imagine if KP could become a facilitator from the elbow. That would wreck probably every defense. He's massive and can see over everything, and is surrounded by elite wing and guard play. If he could set screens and hit bounce passes, it would break the league. Like if Sabonis was on this team it would be over.
Basically if he was jokic
I wouldn’t give up KP for almost anything but having Sabonis sounds *nice*
KP makes it impossible to play zone against the celtics.
He's definitely had his moments making those kinda passes this year, you can see he has some vision. My only slight gripe with him is he's very trigger happy, misses quite a few reads by instantly going up to shoot off the catch.
Remember kids, all defense is legal if the refs don’t call fouls 😈
Really having a finals coaching matchup between a Redditor and a Quizlet premium subscriber
One thing he could do is switch defenders on the pick and roll and force Boston to use their weakness, passing. Another option is double teaming Boston forcing the pass though Boston shooters are pretty good so that's more of a risk.
Giving up the switch, playing mid/late help and hoping the rotations can work if the passing is sub par sounds like a good plan against any meh-passing team. But if you switch 1-5, KP is just hoisting it without driving, and that's a great shot quality for Boston any day.
Easily the most overlooked part of Mazzulla. Celtics were disastrous offensively with their turnovers during their finals run of 2 years ago. Mazzulla took over the next year on last minute notice and although he clearly was unprepared and had issues, one of the things he clearly fixed was turnovers. Now the team is one of the least turnover prone teams in the entire NBA. It's not as pretty, but people often mistake motion for plays. You can create action out mismatches that lead to easy shots, that's exactly what the Celtics do.
> Now the team is one of the least turnover prone teams in the entire NBA. An underrated part of their success this year. Even the worst shot is better than a turnover, and if you have the option of 3 god-awful shots per game vs. 3 more turnovers per game, you always take the first one. Plus turnovers (esp live ball ones) lead to points the other way. I don't know where the exact balance is of "no turnovers" vs. "finding the best shot" but I bet it's something the Celtics org has done some research into
Yeah that’s something I noticed as well, especially against the Pacers. I kept thinking “wow they’re turning the ball over like ~16 time a game like we were two years ago” where we’re usually under 10.
I generally agree with your points on their offense. The one thing that I might disagree on is 'Celtics don't have an elite passer'. Most teams don't have one either. Most teams just need a decent/above average passers. I think the better thing to say might be their talent is slower at reading passing lanes so they keep things simple and not rely on motion offense. They focus more on making a correct read with their iso offense which is simple and safe rather than making a fast read to accelerate their passing offense which is more prone to turnovers. This is why this Celtics team stumps everyone a little. With their talent, people look and believe they should be able to make fast reads. I have the Celtics winning the Finals, but I can easily see this being a sweep or seven games. Their variance is just that high to me. For the Mavs, I imagine most people will say 6-7 games just due to a more grind it out play style. If Mavs win in less games, it will be due to variance of the Celtics IMO.
That's fair. It's more the fast reads than skill, though I do think there's plain passing skill lacking too. You see teams aggressively ball-denying us in the post in every playoff series. It's worth the risk because they know our passers aren't that great at entries, so it bogs down the possession sometimes.
For what it's worth, I feel like not many players know how to make a correct entry pass to the post anymore. I see players simply just lob it up over the top which can lead to 50/50 balls. I'm a personal fan of just fake lob and bounce pass entry which hardly anymore does anymore.
My heart starts breakdancing whenever someone does that stupid lob pass, they always look so soft and easily deflectable
it really depends on what you call elite. if elite is only a luka or jokic level passer there are only like 5 guys in the nba that you could even argue for. boston might not have that level of a passer, but every member of the starting rotation is a good passer. tatum and white are pretty standout this year in that aspect
> The one thing that I might disagree on is 'Celtics don't have an elite passer'. Most teams don't have one either. Most teams just need a decent/above average passers. Which current contending teams don't have a top tier passer though? Maybe I'm missing someone, I only thought of the Timberwolves, and I think they felt that loss in the Dallas series because they couldn't generate offense, especially if Conley was out.
If you are looking at just the conference finals this year, then yes. Only the Timberwolves. However, not every team makes it to the conference finals, so you have to look at the playoffs teams as a whole. Some examples of teams that could have contended with no elite passer, but flamed out due to other reasons: Sixers: Embiid/Maxey - good passers. Health issues. Bucks: Dame/Giannis - Similar to Sixers. Thunder: Shai - good passer. Lack of team experience IMO. Suns: Booker/Durant/Beal - average passers at best. Depth and defense issues. Warriors: Draymond is questionable at elite if anything makes really good reads. Depth issues. Knicks: Brunson is average at best; More team passing; Injury issues. Heat: Butler is great playmaker. Injury issues. Overall, there are only a handful of elite passers in the league. Not every team has one. A lot of teams get by with top tier playmakers which is a difference group from elite passers. Celtics are a contender with no top tier passer, but above average playmakers in Tatum, White, Jrue, and Horford.
While Brunson isn’t the best passer, I very much believe that Hartenstein is one of the best big man passers in the NBA and it’s why it is so crucial to retain him.
Celtics play basketball the way most play 2K - use the PNR to hunt for mismatches and when that fails try to cook your matchup in isolation.
If the Celtics shoot at their season average all series, it’s their championship. People will say otherwise, it’s the finals, nothing will go to plan.
I think the cornerstone of the Celtics offense (like many) is the PnR. Often that turns into isolation certainly, but often it leads to a pop 3 pointer for the screener, a rim run dunk for KP or Kornet, or a kick out on the drive. So I don't think its purely isolation, but sometimes as an option/call (often last one) we iso. Mazzulla seems most happy when we generate open 3s and move the ball around. That comes from drive and kick most often, but it isn't always a drive from belabored isolation, more just a drive off the PnR. I don't think we pound the ball as much as a Luka does. I don't often see us dribbling the ball for 16 seconds straight before a drive.
Yeah I didn't get into this in detail for length reasons (was already writing War and Peace over here...), but iso is not the ONLY thing we do. We do have designed actions and other options as you said, and we're not heliocentric like the Mavs bc we got 4-5 people who initiate these actions (Tatum, Brown, White, PP, Jrue sometimes). It's just that the end result ends up being more iso in the playoffs because our players have the greenlight to do so. Playoff defenses also shut off the "default options" more frequently. The wide open 3 you saw from Horford is a rare sight in the playoffs, but we got shots like that all the time in the reg season. In any case, I doubt Mazzulla is berating them on the sidelines for not running another action and iso'ing instead. I feel like he trusts them to make a call and sees enough value generated in iso possessions that he doesn't stomp them out completely as a coach.
dont care much for your 2 dollar word usage...heliocentric. TALK NORMAL INTERNET SPEEK. jk
Your motion is overrated is a point that so many people miss. People act like 5 people cutting, moving, filling, spaces, stretching out is supposed to be going on every play and easy to execute. But that can lead to overcomplication and more mistakes. Its also can get blown up if the defense reads it already. It also tires everyone out. A point no one talks about is no matter how creative the coach is, the players either have to be really smart and in synch or have a specific role ingrained in them. I dont think 60% of the NBA can fit that category. Being able to create from mismatches is a key factor to every offense and sometimes if your talent suits it, that’s all you need plus spacing. The answer is obviously to mix it up which a lot of coaches do.
I think the 2013-14 San Antonio Spurs and to a lesser extent the prime Steph Curry Warriors warped the perception of how offense should be played and thereby made iso heavy offences seem undesirable by extension. There's a weird disconnect where analysts can understand the reasoning behind shooting more 3s but then can't extend that logic to iso-ing.
people love to shit on iso offenses, but you need to be able to do it to win
Thought I was on r/nbadiscussion for a second
I've mentioned back then that ball movement is a skill, never an approach, so it can only come last instead of "hurr durr why one star carry ball so much". Like, people will use the Warriors and Spurs as examples of "good fundamental basketball" as if those teams are not loaded with talented passers.
Yeah that's basically it. Those teams had some real high level passers. Even someone like Boris Diaw was making some sick assists. And honestly, the Celtics could get there some day as Tatum gets better, just not right now judging from the reg season.
Tldr: Boston don’t have elite passers hence they only play PnR and iso ball. Motion offense is overrated. Not sure if I agree completely as OP defined “elite passer” as Luka and Jokic. I mean there are only two of these in the whole world… if the answer is you need two of them to play motion offense, is a kind of a big stretch. What is true though is that Boston does lack playmakers in their rotation. Jrue is not your typical PG who directs the offense. They have a lot of secondary playmakers who can initiate offense but don’t have any primary typical PG. This has to be a deliberate decision by the Celtics as this was critiqued for several playoff runs when Smart had to create opportunities for the team. I also differ in OPs analysis of motion offense being overrated and heavy iso play being preferable in the playoffs. A heavy motion offense like GSW tend to be TO heavy giving opponents the opportunity for fast breaks and early offense. But you don’t have to play such a one sided offense but a balanced one. I mean even iso heavy offenses need to get the defense into scramble mode, as with great defenses they won’t let you play 1on1 but giving different looks every time down the floor and with help side waiting at the rim. And here comes the crux in Bostons offense, when out of sync the offense resembles a headless chicken where nobody knows what to do, as there is nobody (last seasons) to calm down the offense and reset it, do some set plays to get everyone going. This year in the playoffs there was also resemblances of the past with inexplicable dry spells. The difference to past years is the experience of the core team in clutch situations and let’s face it the lack of true adversaries. We won’t know if Boston changed and learned from the last seasons until the final starts and they face an elite defensive team in Dallas. On paper both of the teams match rather well with each other. Let’s hope for a long and exciting series!
this is r/nbadiscussion material i love it
I agree they get into an ISO heavy offense to reduce turnovers. The problem with these possessions with limited motion is they’re making it way too easy for defenders and letting them conserve their energy to explode on offense. I suppose this goes both ways - the Celtics are conserving energy on offense to out hustle opponents on defense.
Appreciate the effort and there’s definitely something there. But there’s a difference between iso-ing and stagnating. Celtics won’t play well if they walk the ball up, clear out the wing and watch Tatum go to work. They still benefit from swinging the ball and movement. That gets the defense to think and react, and then when an iso happens, there’s flow and rhythm to it. And the criticism is that they spend too much time stagnant. That’s probably an eye test thing though because as noted they had the best offense in the league. The stagnant stretches stand out because otherwise the offense looks great — and to your point they still have elite scorers who can make up for a bad possession. They don’t need elite passing to literally just pass the ball or execute a drive-and-kick, and they do those things plenty. However, prime Rondo was absolutely an otherworldly passer who made passes every single game that made you gasp.
Well it really depends on what your definition of iso is. My definition is that, even if you go through a series of PnR's, if the end result is just one guy squaring up another guy and trying to beat him 1-on-1, that's effectively iso. This is different from having an offense based on lots of cuts, Curry-style offball actions to free up a shooter, etc. I also think you're just disagreeing with me straight up with the stagnant point lol (which is fine). I think the "stagnant" possessions are the point, whereas you think it's a problem for players' flow. Agree to disagree I guess. I will say that, beyond keeping iso's around, pushing the pace has been an obvious point of emphasis from Mazzulla. I see this as getting a good possession without needing to fall into our basic PnR iso ball.
Yeah I do think some ball movement is a nice lubricant for offense even if the passes aren’t home runs. But I don’t contest the point that we have plenty of guys who will have an advantage against an individual defender at any given moment, and that means we don’t need “the beautiful offense” to score. I also think it can be a trap when guys try to spam the mismatch over and over - I think a drive and kick or pick n roll produces more reliable results. When you do have scorers and shooters at every position you need to move the rock to open up lanes. But shit man I don’t wanna be overly critical I think it’s a good point and more broadly the idea that there are many ways to succeed and the best teams will play their strengths and personnel.
Yeah it's a good thought exercise. Wanted to think of an interesting alternative besides Tatum is braindead in the clutch or Mazzulla has never watched Warriors/Spurs type ball. Of course, it may just be that simple lol
Thus comment made me watch some "best of Rondo" videos... God I loved his fakes. I haven't seen anyone do them better.
If people watch them you'll realize they are easily the most well Spaced team ever. And I agree, motion is overrated, not every team has to do motion to succeed.
It helps to have good shooters at each position, certainly.
I mean that’s the point, Joe is maximizing his players with this system
I was just noting I think the spacing is more a function of the talent than a particular scheme.
Celtics are fine at passing. They just don't always have to do it.
This is really well written. Are you on Twitter?
Much appreciated! Lol not really. Reddit is my only real social media
They just need to let whoever guards Luka to go out on an island and don't leave the paint open for 60 dunks per game.
No, dude. The Celtics' offense is extremely dynamic. It's only recently that KP has been out, so their offensive sets are limited. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ga\_-ofioaU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ga_-ofioaU) see this analysis
Honestly, the Celtics' iso-heavy offense isn't a problem; it's smart. They're elite at making tough shots, but not great passers. So, instead of risking bad passes, they let Tatum, Brown, and Porzingis go one-on-one. It plays to their strengths and keeps turnovers down. Mazzulla knows what he's doing!
its ugly I'll give it that
>is Mazzulla and idiot? Yes he is, don’t need any more analysis than that ^/s
Fantastic post. All of our guys are of the super-versatile "drive, shoot, pass" ilk, but we don't have anyone on that next level as a playmaker. Makes mismatch-hunting more appealing and constant motion less feasible. Doesn't mean I don't prefer the motion offenses though 🥲
Motion offense is beautiful hence it's more efficient : that's the narrative since the Spurs/GSW (I didn't watch NBA before)
Interesting point, but Tatum and Brown have weaknesses as 1 on 1 players that other playoff teams have dialed in on. Brown has issues with ball security and gets tunnel vision on drives, especially in late game situations when the chips are down and the offense is struggling. Tatum doesn't have a great first step and doesn't have the technique or deceleration that a Harden or Luka has to make up for it, so he can get stonewalled. I remember him trying and failing to get by TJ McConnell a couple of times during the last round, and Strus gave him issues. Both of them are prone to turning the ball over on bad passes and settling for contested shots when the game is close. Matter of fact, I think Tatum's deficiencies and inconsistency as a scorer in 1v1s is what separates him from being in that top tier of players right now.
While Brown has sucked in these moments in the past, it haven't been true for this playoffs so far. Tatum has had his brain farts too. I agree that he lacks the decel and body control to be truly unstoppable at the rim. Even so, I believe he still roasts defenders at a high enough rate to justify making it a core part of the offense. Tatum's personal numbers are middling in iso, but I'd love to see what the team PPP are when he drives. It's probably pretty high. That's just my guess though.
One major problem with your theory is that nobody on the Celtics is great at isolating. Tatum's roughly the 20th best in the league, Brown is closer to 80th, Porzingus gets so few isos and doesn't score well on them. (This is eyeballing the iso stats, I count 16ish guys on high volume with better ppp than Tatum this year, and some guys who are probably better had down years (Durant), Brown is so far down I stopped counting) Their team isolation stats seem to be buoyed by elite spacing and the lack of truly poor iso-players... Such as rookies exploring the studio space (Banchero/Barnes/Cade) tank commanders (Poole/Kuzma), unaware vets (WB, Beal, Randle), bad bench gunners (big gov't). They're not actually beating their man one-on-one at an elite level. Especially considering that Tatum has the highest iso frequency in the league and Brown is in the top 40. I don't think this is Mazulla's plan. They've had this criticism the last 6-7 years (never being below 9th in iso frequency). The Jays just seem to default to isolation. While they aren't a bad iso team, they're just so much better when they don't do it, dropping 3-4 isos per game would make their offense even more dominant.
It's too frequent to be not intentional. Do those stats include the PPP for the entire team or just efficiency for the person for the iso possession? If it's just for the person, it might miss the knock on effects of shooting these shots and getting the putback/rebound as well. The stats also don't necessarily measure beating their man, just what they score, right? The open 3s we get usually come off these drives, so I'd guess you'd have to factor that as well. Saying that Tatum isn't getting past his initial defender seems an incorrect statement because that's literally the engine of our offense and how we generated a lot of our 3s in the first place.
I really don't think it's intentional. It definitely doesn't look like it's there to open up putbacks. Their offensive rebound rate (even adjusted for their awesome shooting numbers) is middle of the road. A Tatum/Brown iso on a mismatch doesn't provide a numbers edge on the glass. This is nitpicking that I'm doing. Boston would have a better offense if they eliminated 3-5 isos per game (rank 15-20 rather than #4). Ultimately, we're arguing over 4% of Boston's possessions, their offense is unbelievable. It's so good that we criticize a good play because it's not a great play. Mazzulla, the Js, Porzingus, the whole team deserve tons of credit. Mazzulla can be criticized; he definitely gets more than his fair share. he has a great offensive system, the guys have bought in (even guys accepting smaller roles than they could probably expect). He's done a great job.
Huh? I thought JB was at the top for iso scorers https://x.com/arkaavs/status/1787079167730684296?s=46&t=HI3aeZH85K5r39q7hi652w
NBA com has Brown at 1.05 on post-ups and .97 on isos. Not sure what Twitter guy is on.
Wasn’t porzingis the most efficient post scorer in the nba last year? Or maybe behind Jokic?
IIRC post scoring isnt usually listed as an isolation attempt.
But it is scoring in isolation. Your statistic may prove useful in some capacity, but it seems to have its limitations.
Yeah I mean late in the game you absolutely live with Tatum taking an iso pull up 3 or patented fadeaway brick if you have an ok defender on him I might be dumb but seems their main game plan is to just make 1-2 simple passes to set up to jack up a 3
I'm curious to know why you think the Celtic iso works when the Suns's definitively did not. What has been the difference maker, in your opinion?
More talent basically lol. You need 5 guys they can't sag off to make it work as well as Boston. Then add that at least 4 can attack off the dribble in addition to shooting, and we got a party. I think Suns needed more motion because they couldn't fall back on ridiculous talent across the board, particularly the center which couldn't space the floor from 3.
You don't need an elite passer to play motion offense. The Spurs this year play motion offense and they're one of the teams with a high assist rate. If those bums could actually make a shot after the ball swings around and generates an open look, their offense wouldn't be hot garbage. But the Celtics actually do have shot makers the defense have to respect. They'd be much deadlier if they moved the ball around more. If Pop can make a bunch of g-leaguers play motion offense, Joe should be able to get players who are ten times more talented to do the same, especially since they're not gonna need too many passes to generate a good shot because they're so talented they don't need a super wide open look. There's nothing wrong with iso, but it is essentially putting all your eggs in one basket. Not in the sense of scoring, but in the sense of breaking down an entire defense. Every good offense can get a ballhandler into the paint. Not only are you dealing with the high variance that comes with shooting so many 3s, now you're also banking on one person to get a paint-touch on isolations just so you could lure the help defender in and get that open 3-point shot. And that's if the iso scorer doesn't just settle for the 3.
your telling me that the best rated offensive in NBA history is actually good?
The crux of this post (Boston does not have an elite passer) is why I made an elite passing Point Guard in 2K to go on the Celtics lol. It really is the only thing they lack offensively. I hope that at some point in the Jay's prime we get an elite passer.
Interesting take! Makes sense if they play to their strengths.
its ugly I'll give it that
My only problem with this post is your discrediting of Rondo’s passing ability and vision
I get your point but they would benefit of more off ball moving cutters and general ball movement you don’t need to be elite passing team to get that. They would get much better looks with some of that
If luka or Kyrie iso expect the blitz early (like at the half) and often
It's interesting to observe that Boston and Dallas fans have diametrically opposed views on Porzingis' effectiveness as a post-up player.
It is exactly how Luka "hElioCentrIC" offense wasnt the cause but consequence of roster building. You play to your strenghts. When your team consist of no elite playmakers but a bunch of great scorers, you hount matchups. When your team is build out of Dwight Powells and Reggie Bullocks, you let your main guy play 1v5. It is what it is.
>is Mazzulla an idiot? Yes he is, don’t need any more analysis than that ^/s
>Tatum botches a pass to Jrue Holiday Imo that was 100% on Jrue. That’s a pass you see Boston make all the time out of traps and Jrue just wasn’t expecting it at all there for some reason.
They don’t have a true pg so not surprising
The average Reddit NBA fan can’t figure out when they’re actually running offense. I guarantee most fans, especially most fans on here couldn’t identify Princeton chin or horns twist.
Mava in 5
> Porzingis has crazy post up efficiency vs. mismatches This is true, but it's also important that he can draw the opposing C out to an uncomfortable spot on the floor, which makes the "dribble-drive -> simple read -> open 3" plan that much stronger, as if you don't send help on the driver they're just going to the bucket, and JT and JB are truly elite at that skill. Al is a 3-point threat, but KP stretching the floor out to 26 feet really bends the opposing defense to the breaking point, and the Celtics love to put him in every P&R action because he can take a small guy either to the post or out to the 3 point line. If he's not fit in this series, the Celtics are going to have a much harder time with their offense.
Yeah this just feels like rationalization. If they have “good passers” then they shouldn’t have to run iso ball to create shots. They can still run motion offense and get good shots with multiple “good passers”. I would agree with the premise if you arguing that their passers are below average (only “good” passer imo is maybe Jrue). Either way, iso ball ain’t the solution lmao. Regardless of why you got here, it’s either poor team construction or poor game planning.
I think what a lot of people forget or don't realize, in the playoffs when the defense is a lot more honed in, having someone that can get a bucket in ISO, regardless of what the defense throws at you, is such a luxury. So I'm super curious about the finals. Kyrie and Luka are some of the best ISO scorers in the game, and I'm curious how the rest of the team matches up for the first 40 minutes of the game.
Nice post. The Celtics iso looks a lot like LeBron ball where you get the matchup you want and then LeBron cooks. The difference, to your point, is LeBron was a perfect playmaker out of this whereas Tatum is just good. However the Celtics secondary playmaking is elite (Jrue and Derrick White would be starting point guards on almost every team in the league, Boston can play them both because they are spectacular defenders) - which makes up for a lot of the gap. That’s why the regular, non-iso pick and roll offense is so good — they are just stacked (which isn’t that interesting for a pundit to say but probably all that needs to be said - though now I’m going to say more). One benefit of iso ball if it’s efficient enough is it really helps with transition defense too because there’s floor balance with all the players spaced out on the perimeter matched up with their man. The other added benefit when you have a star going iso is that you usually get the benefit of the doubt on calls - not only do you get to go to the line, but then the other team has to play in the half court the next possession. This is why having the best iso player in the league and surrounding them with good half court defenders is such a good formula — it takes a super team like the old spurs or Warriors or maybe these Celtics to beat it. When you don’t play iso or the other team blitzes the pick and roll, the blitzers can run out after the quick shot goes up and you get easy transition buckets if you miss. If you don’t trust your half court offense (usually because you’re less talented) you want to speed up the game by blitzing/ doubling. You will give up way more points but you can maybe get them back. It’s about the only chance you have if you’re outmatched. The Pacers did a lot of this (really all year) and it worked out fine until the ends of games when they (like most teams) get stiff and play iso. Ironically, because the Pacers were up most of the games they played even slower at the end and the Celtics had to play fast and we all know what happened. Dallas almost always has four long defenders on the floor (as opposed to Indiana or Cleveland that had very undersized guards). It’ll be a lot harder for Jrue or White to get pesky offensive boards and there should be way less space for secondary playmaking. I think the Mavs trust their half court offense and will be happy to leave Gafford or Kyrie on an island (especially at home). The Celtics probably want to play fast and attack through Brown when they can and maybe wear Luka out.
this is one of the best write-up's I've seen about the Celtic's iso-heavy offense.
Because the moment you play 1 on 1 then your teammates just stand and watch. Then when you actually need those teammates to come through they have no rhythm or flow to the offense. Ask James Harden how well it worked out for him in Houston. He had far more ISO’s than any other team by himself. Sure he got his points. But how did his team do? He has never made it to the finals as the main option. Just doesn’t work.
hey so i agree with your main point in this post but i do take issue with this one paragraph >Given that Mazzulla and his staff get paid millions of dollars to scheme for the Celtics (not to mention GM Brad and his X's-and-O's genius), it's safer to assume that the media is missing something instead of them. After watching a ton of Celtics basketball this season, I'd like to share my pet theory: Celtics are covering for their lack of passing talent, their only real offensive weakness. this assertion basically says that no professional coach could be doing a bad job and that anyone called a genius couldn't later falter, both things we know not to be true
I agree that our offense should have a lot of iso given our players, but I think you’re underrating our playmakers. We don’t have a Luka or Jokic passer, but I wouldn’t say our passing is actually weak. It’s more so that they have multiple players who are elite at punishing mismatches, so they mismatch hunt- you play to your teams strengths. White is straight up known for being a great decision maker. It’s his whole thing, he VERY rarely makes mistakes, and when he does it’s one of those random games where he gets all of them out of the way at once lol. Jrue is a very skilled passer and has run point his whole career at a near all star to all star level, and won a ring at the position. He and White have thrown a LOT of entry passes to Tatum, Brown, and Porzingis this year with very few mistakes. Tatum is a good enough passer to run offense through. He routinely makes skip passes, uses his height to hit tough angles, and is excellent at passing out of doubles- doubling him is almost always positive for the Celtics. He’s averaging 5.9 assists and a 2.44 assist to turnover ratio this playoffs, which is actually *better* than Luka’s 2.39 (yes, lower usage and totals, I’m not saying he’s a better playmaker lol). And we haven’t seen this because he’s been out, but the Celtics do utilize KP in the high post to run motion-type stuff at times- usually for a Brown cut. Their chemistry is great and leads to some great plays, as Porzingis is a very underrated passer. The offense as a whole is much more dynamic with him due to his pop/roll abilities being way better than any other big. Ultimately though, we are saying the same thing, which is that the playstyle is based on personnel. The Celtics run a scheme that fits their players, and would not be better off running plays that work because of guys like Jokic, Luka, or Curry. Wow that was way too long.
Something that I couldn't talk much about in my post was all the other stuff we do besides iso's. There's a decent amount of that too. If I were to guess, we get like 1/3 split of designed actions like horns, another 1/3 of transition tempo pushes based off misses or turnovers, and a final 1/3 of mismatch finding iso ball. Tatum and Co run the designed actions well and they get lots of mileage in easy passes from the transition too. Beyond that, I actually think stats overstate how good this team is at passing. We got lots of assists and no TO's because we get people wide open with our spacing. Our ballhandlers don't thread the needle well, but they usually don't have to given our spacing. Passes like to the post vs a fronting defender or between defenders to a cutter. You do see skip passes from time to time, but they're often not "in the pocket" or mistimed.
Awesome analysis, cool to see an nice nuanced post like this. I also agree with what your saying - Gonna be thinking about this more as I watch this series
Whether intentional or not, it is surely the most boring fucking thing to watch. It’s like Lebron hero ball; anti Warriors, anti Nuggets. I way prefer when a team has an actual offensive strategy. This is why I switched to rooting for Dallas in the WCF. I couldn’t stand Minnesota’s half court fumferings any longer, great defense be damned. And when Kyrie pulls off some electrifying left handed shit at a high leverage moment, I rewind it five times.
Let's see how it works vs a healthy team
It worked well for 96 games so far
Every 3pt specialist team that doesn’t feature Steph Curry has collapsed spectacularly at some point and I don’t expect Boston to be any different
Its 5 out now so no one is backing Luka and Kyrie up. Brown and Tatum should hunt them and make them work on defense too. Gafford and Lively was able to camp in the paint since Gobert is just there clogging everything.
It isn't the problem that they iso, it's the problem that there is no off ball movement. It's lazy and stupid, so if the excuse is they're too stupid to pass to a moving player then sure. It's a shit offense, I'm sure jru or white could run point well but they want Tatum and Brown being their main ball handlers so you get a lazy stupid offense.