Just who do the Celtics think they are?

Paul Grenada

I do recall at this point of the season last year the Celtics were in a similar position. Granted this is a 2 – 7 match up as opposed to a 1-8 but the idea is still the same. The Celtics are playing what appears to be a far inferior team and letting them stick around.

In fact, they are making a rookie look like the second coming of LeBron James. Which is saying something because LeBron hasn’t fully arrived yet. Derrick Rose has broken records and egos, sure he had one bad game, but that’s to be expected from a rookie, in his first playoff run. You don’t expect him to sit next to Magic Johnson in the NBA record books.

Last year the Hawks were a young team that could run and jump out the gym, and were too stupid to know the Celts were already NBA champs.

Now the Bulls are young feisty and quick, they hit Paul Pierce and company with everything they have, and then somehow keep finding a way to hit them with more.

For whatever reason, the Boston Celtics have a problem playing with youth, if the other team stands up to their bullying they seem to shrink back. All the posturing goes out the window and you are left with players dazed and confused going “how’d they score more than us?”

It’s as if they come to the court expecting to win, which is what good teams should do. But at some point you figure you would have to put some effort into that win.

You could blame that on the loss of Kevin Garnett, he is their emotional leader and defensive stalwart, but Ben Gordon and Derrick Rose are perimeter players, that’s all on Ray and Paul and Rondo (who is putting on a Hall of Fame performance in his own right but cant stop Rose on his own). Big Baby is doing his best to man the middle, height limitations be dammed. And while the rest of the frontcourt is having teatime in the M.A.S.H. unit, the team as a whole is still capable.

Is this a coaching issue, because it seems like Doc Rivers puts the guys in position to win. But when it’s not Ray missing open jumpers, it’s Rondo not driving to the hole like he was meant to on Sunday night. When stuff like that happens you have to blame the talent.

These guys are good players, among the best in NBA history. But they don’t have that killer instinct that the Cavs or the Lakers have. It is that lack of an assassin’s mindset which apparently plagues the Magic, who are letting another inferior team stick around way too much.

How do you fix a desire to beat your opponent, let them beat you some more?

That does not sound like too good a strategy to me.