Game 3 starts in about an hour. Enjoy Senor Fresh's remix to Whatever We Like before the game and let's hope Kevin dominates the paint, Paul gets to the line, Ray pops threes, and Rondo triple dubs the Celtics to a 3-0 series lead.
Boston Celtics coach Doc Rivers is leaning toward leaving the team after this season, sources told the Boston Herald, but he told the newspaper Tuesday that no final decision had been made about his future.
There had been rumors in seasons past about the 48-year-old Rivers stepping down, and once again it's the tug of his family life -- not another NBA coaching opportunity -- that may pull him away.
Family first. You know at first when I look at this article I said to myself it makes perfect sense for Doc to leave the Celtics after this season. He has three seniors, one in college and two in high school. One of his sons is one of the best high school basketball players and will be starting his college career. He doesn't want to miss this time in his son's life. He needs to be there for his son. To help his son and watch his son achieve success. Then, you know I actually sat down and thought about it for a minute. Family first. That phrase is used all the time in this situation, but what about the Celtic family?
Back when the Celtics signed Doc to a contract to coach the team I thought it was a horrible decision. I did not think Doc was the right man for a job. He was fired from the Orlando Magic for his inability to create a winner. There was no denying Doc could coach the young guys and develop them, but he was not a proven winner. Secondly he was not a Celtic. Doc was an Atlanta Hawk, he had been through the battles through out the 80s against the Celtics and should have hated them. Why would a Hawk be a good fit for the Celtics? There was so many ex-Celtics out there dying for a job, why didn't Danny give one of them a shot. Instead, he chose an Atlanta Hawk to bring back the Celtic pride? Give me a fucking break, right?
Then Doc went on to lead the Celtics to a championship with the aid of Danny Ainge trading for Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen. There was some Doc supporters who said Doc deserved praise for taking a bunch of players who had never played together and turn them into a championship winning team. There was also a flip side who said the team didn't even need a coach. They were so talented they were going to win the championship no matter what. Especially since Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett, and Paul Pierce wanted it so badly.
I was on neither side. I was 50/50. I thought Doc did what he always did. Didn't lose a game for the Celtics that year, but most certainly didn't win a game. He does a solid job year in and year out. You get exactly what you want from Doc. Exactly what the team should do.
So it this brings me back to my original point. Family first. Doc River is choosing his family first. The Rivers family. That's why Danny should have hired a Celtic. If he had done that, family would never be a reason because the coach's family would have been the Celtics. Just before the ship sinks and the Celtics become even older than they look today, Rivers is going to bolt and claim he needs to be there for his kids.
And that my friends proves, Celtic tradition was not brought back with Banner 17. There is no Celtic Pride anymore. The team has shown that this season and now the coach will show it this off-season.
So Danny, do what is right for the Celtics and not for Doc. Don't let Doc sit around all off-season and try to decide. We don't need a Brett Favre saga here. When you get bumped out of the first or second round, tell Doc to go be with his kids like he wants to be. Get someone in here that will restore Celtic Pride. Someone that will infuse energy into the big 3. Someone that will tell Rasheed Wallace to stop shooting threes and get down low. Someone who will call out Kendrick Perkins. Get someone in here with a vision. Someone who can win games when we least expect. Someone who will restore Celtic Pride.
I hate to jinx their game, but the Celtics, Rondo in particular, have started on absolute fiaaaaaarrrrrr!!! Let's GOOOOOOOO!! And Scal's spray tan is yet to be seen...man this night keeps getting better and better!
Common throws down a nasssssssty freestyle at the Ghostbar in Dallas to conclude all star weekend. He starts off decent, then tosses in a D-Wade reference, then a few Rondo shout-outs, then a few funny ass Lil Wayne tips, then a Jerry Jones shout. Enough ranting for me, just listen to the damn thanggggg!!
OtB is counting down the days 'til the NBA 2009-10 season tips off by ranking the top 50 players in the league. On Tuesday there are/were 12 days left.
This was inevitable. The battle between Rondo and Rose cemented it. I had to offer up a salute in the hopes that we get to see lots of battles between the two young guards in years to come. Rose gets the nod here because he's poised more perfectly to take the reins of an up-and-coming team. Rondo looks like he'll have to outlast the current era and then see what rises from the ashes with him. Rose? He's ready to go now.
If I compared the entire Celtics power base to British Kings of Olde, let me expound upon the potential that is Derrick Rose by saying...well, he's the Black Knight. For all you neophytes out there who are confused and thinking of Batman now, realize that I'm still on the Arthurian tip, whether by choice or by guided voice I know not. Anyway, Rose is the Black Night because he exudes mystery. He is the x-factor. The knight not feasting at the round table who still manages to carpe diem. Rose, for all his laconic early-Kareem-isms, comes rife with metaphorical propensities. Think of all the things swirling through my head that I could do with the surname Rose. I could go Shakespearean. I could talk about the line-up of myths wherein flush'ed-of-cheek (and that's not tongue in cheek toilet humor either, until this parenthetical) maidens expire breath upon last breath on pillows soft as the lips' kiss bearing virginal true love, and do all and so behind a veritable thicketry of petal-adorned thorns.
I could go messianic and say dude is the savior Chi-town's been waiting for to step into the storied shoes, and I could point out that he follows the story-line almost to a T, coming into the league during an era of "super-powers," coming out gang-busters like India into the international market, awash in old and complex mythos that is at once highly derivative and the embodiment of original thought, all in one, quick, pillow'ed breath. Just like Jordan, Rose could emerge from the tussle as the dominant force in the league. I could talk those tones to death. I could even go new-traditionally and drop off some Basketball Reference knowledge. I could do all these things, and more. (But I can't get next to you), so, instead, we go to the video.
Oh, wait. You don't care that he won 2009's Skills Competition as a rookie! Try this one on for size:
And if you're not convinced, then I got two words for ya! Sick. Mix.
OtB is counting down the days 'til the NBA 2009-10 season tips off by ranking the top 50 players in the league. On Wednesday there are/were 13 days left.
When drawing up this list, I actually wrote about Rondo, "He’s not higher because it’s yet to be seen if he can lead (and if the team can allow him to lead) like he did in the playoffs." After thirty-seven days of writing up write-ups on the best NBA players (save this last baker's dozen), I'm not sure if I still agree with this ranking for Rajon. I was impressed enough by his play in the playoffs to pump up the volume and give him the coveted one-three spot. The numbers are there. Twelve points, eight assists, and five rebounds regular season? Solid. In the playoffs? Try out nearly 17 points, and just under ten assists and boards. That's epic. That's Big O numbers. Oh, and great defense. Heading into this season, though, I gotta say I'm feeling a bit hesitant about this position for Rondo.
Ahead of Paul Pierce? I just busted out that Pierce piece for the fortnight edition of Top 50, and if you missed it I compared Pierce and Kevin Garnett to British kings of old. Rondo? He's like Robin Hood. Sure, he's been lionized beyond the rep of Richard the Lionheart, but was he ever charged with the responsibility of leading a nation of men into battle? No. Robin Rondo might rob from the rich to give to the poor, but when you get down to it, he's leading a bunch of merry men living as vagabonds in the forest. Sorry, in the wood. Time will tell if Rondo matures into an imperial NBA power like his big brothers in arms. For now, Rondo retains the thirteen spot for the immense potential he displayed throughout the Celt's run to the Eastern Conference finals.
Danny Ainge, for some inexplicable reason, let leak during this offseason that Rondo might not stay with the Celts. I have no idea what that was about, but it could spell two different directions for Red Rondo. (Is it possible Rondo got on the Red Bull tip not to get under the skin of then opponents Chicago Bulls but rather to make a bid for succession of P-double's Auerbach certification of approval? Thin, I know, but athletes have been known to take advertising gigs for less. I've never understood the big deal with those green pieces of paper with Benjamin Franklin on 'em.)
Rondo could take the vote of non-confidence (Why, Danny, why?) as either motivation to light the league on fire this season, or he could take it as the first of many shots potentially coming his way as the future of Boston basketball. Boston's big three of Pierce, Garnett, and Ray Allen has become a big four with the addition of Rasheed Wallace. The loss of Leon Powe seems to signal a focus on the present rather than the future. Will Rondo get lost in the shuffle? He has the potential to be a break out star, but as always these things are delicate and depend on so many factors. It'll be interesting to see how they play out.
In sporadically regular installments, OtB brings you a long-form joint re: NBA and its ontological extension unto all of sport. Epochrypha: writings or statements of questionable authorship or authenticity, but always impassioned and always with an eye on the times we're spectating in. Enjoy.
Alright kiddies, temporarily suspending the "biweekly" label from Epochrypha in light of my recent track record. Things are just too helter skelter for the nonce, so maybe the twice-moonly moniker comes back in a fortnight or so. Anyway, all this talk about suspension has me thinking not about Rasheed but rather about Rondo. Why? Because he was assisted from the court Thursday night after scooting past the Bulls' defenders like Hermes (y'know, winged shoes) to the tune of 20-6-11 and 5 steals. It's a non-story. Not the ankle that he turned pre-post-season, he said, just sore feet. That's fine, but I was struck by the way he gamely put off the press. Above, you can check out the sublime David Aldridge reporting on the feet and the ankle. We also get a rare 2009 Ubuntu sighting, which has been rarely mentioned through the title defense run.
I have no problem believing there's nothing wrong with Rondo's feet (DA says it was just a bad tape job), but it does make me think about the Celtics tradition of mind games. They never played them like Phil Jackson does, with choice words seemingly dropped to the media. There's was more an intimidation through attrition. Attrition of one's sense of security, of one's sense of the reliability of reality, even. Look, there was a reason the old Boston Garden was so renowned. It was a bitch to play in for the opposition. The visitor's locker room was had the inverse Mark Cuban touch to it. Hissing pipes, no heat, the (non)works. And the parquet. The finishing touch, really. It had dead zones. The ball wouldn't bounce right in certain spots. And all the Celtics players knew it. And the visitors did not.
So, in light of the pitch perfect handling of the Garnett injury (there was no disappointing announcement until just before the playoffs, meaning there was no end of season let down in expectations and meaning that it served as a rallying cry heading in to the playoffs), I wanted to take a brief glance at the long Celtics history of fudging opponents' sense of reality.
A helping hand: I point you to Ishmael Reed's Mumbo-Jumbo. It documents (and re-defines the word as a verb) the spread of the Jes Grew plague. Via Rastafari Speaks: "When asked about the origins of the sudden explosion . . . an unnamed witness shrugged and said 'It jes grew!' . . . The Jes Grew epidemic was unlike physical plagues. Actually Jes Grew was an anti-plague. Some plagues caused the body to waste away; Jes Grew enlivened the host."
Forget Ubuntu. I'm saying the Celtics are employing all out Jes Grew tactics. What they're saying isn't what's real and we know it (and admire them for it). From Mumbo-Jumbo: "All that's all right, what you speak of, but that ain't all. There's more. And I bet that before the century is out ment will turn once more to mystery, to wonderment." This new batch of feints mean no opponent will know exactly what to expect. Will Rondo be off? Are they completely diminished by injuries? You can't go for the throat for fear it's all feigned. At the same time, you can't exactly get up for them because there're all these images floating around suggesting they're hurting.
Speaking of images, Rose with roses? Jalen, another Rose, with a nice one: "to appreciate the rose, you must appreciate the thorns." This ain't no american beauty. This is a modern day Eliot Ness, trying to take down the big, bad subterfugal (that's like centrifugal, a fictitious force) syndicate. Oh, and lastly? Another incongruity. This vid of Rajon Rondo advertising Red Bull? Obviously a gimmick (questionably) playing off the first round match-up. But more irregular? Rajon's lack of wings in the vid. Dude is straight sleepy. Get up for your promo, son!
So, in light of the pitch perfect handling of the Garnett injury (there was no disappointing announcement until just before the playoffs, meaning there was no end of season let down in expectations and meaning that it served as a rallying cry heading in to the playoffs), I wanted to take a brief glance at the long Celtics history of fudging opponents' sense of reality.
Forget Ubuntu. I'm saying the Celtics are employing all out Jes Grew tactics. What they're saying isn't what's real and we know it (and admire them for it). From Mumbo-Jumbo: "All that's all right, what you speak of, but that ain't all. There's more. And I bet that before the century is out ment will turn once more to mystery, to wonderment." This new batch of feints mean no opponent will know exactly what to expect. Will Rondo be off? Are they completely diminished by injuries? You can't go for the throat for fear it's all feigned. At the same time, you can't exactly get up for them because there're all these images floating around suggesting they're hurting.
