2018 Boston Celtics offseason

The idea that you wouldn't take LeBron James, the best player in basketball this past year (including these playoffs) and over the last decade and a player whose performance level hasn't declined one bit during that decade, and a player who you've bent over backwards to praise all playoffs, unless "he signed a mid level exception for a year or two"-- you don't see what's ridiculous about that?

I don't really care to continue this discussion, but this is a really, really bad take.

I agree with your opinion on Rozier and to me the biggest problem with Rozier is how many bad drives he takes. However I expect him to be able to fix those issues. It's not that he can't finish, it's just that he usually takes poor angles and try to layup over like 3 dudes. On top of that, he's either too far from the hoop or he's right under it, he struggles to find that sweet spot. I expect him to get better, his problems aren't too damning like Smart's herky-jerky Skip to my Lou on xanax moves that can't get past anyone. Rozier can get open so he should be fine with some further coaching.

Would like to use a point of reference for the all-time greats and how long they lasted, but LeBron is in complete unknown territory officially.

There's really only 2 other players that compare to LeBron physically in their careers, and that's Magic Johnson and Michael Jordan.

Both players were retired by their 34 season (Magic retired unofficially before even then). They both came back when they were really old, but let's throw that out.

LeBron will probably remain great for one or 2 more years at most and then who knows what after then. Not to mention the reduced minutes he's going to require in order to stay in shape for the playoffs.

Just no. You have Hayward, Kyrie, and Horford on good deals right now for max money. I'm good with that. This team has *just as good of a shot with or without LeBron James.*

That's my final take.

“Practices are going to be super fun, going to be super competitive,” Rozier told Gonzales. “You know what we’re expecting. We’re not expecting nothing less than a championship. But I don’t want to get too much into that. But next year, I think the league is on watch.”

Read more at: nesn.com/2018/06/terry-rozier-sends-clear-message-to-rest-of-nba-ahead-of-2018-19-season/


Not a guy who wants to leave town. Love it.

 As far as you can be sad for a professional athlete getting paid what they do to play a game for a great living, I am sad for IT. He laid it on the line for the C's when maybe he should not have and it is quite literally costing him 100 million dollars!! Maybe the injury would have been just as bad if he didn't play but either way he is out many many millions. 

 Sure he might still have a chance to earn a lot of that money in the future but I doubt highly that he will ever come close to being the player he was with the C's last year. Thus in the end it could cost him more money than any athlete I can remember. 

I wouldn't be surprised if he only gets a mid level exception deal for a prove it season but he has let it be known that he is a starter not a sixth man so his landing spot is limited if he stands by that. I wish him luck.

Rozier was shooting 42.1% from the field and 37.2% from three before his bad last game. He shot 38.1% from three on 5 attempts per game during the regular season in 80 games. So you prove my point by strictly focusing on only his shooting numbers as not impressive.

16.5 points, 5.3 rebounds,  5.7 assists, 1.3 steals and 1.2 TOs per game. He had the third best WS/48 on the team during playoffs, he had the second best boxscore plus minus and the number one offensive boxscore plus minus on the whole team during the playoffs. Which given his shooting is kinda weird right?It proves my point about how well he runs the offense. He had the 4th best defensive boxscore plus minus on the whole team, even though a bunch of you want to pick on his defense repeatedly. Thats not impressive? Compared to what? I just want to hear you say it, because I know who your comparing him to and thats why I'm doing this. Its not fair to Rozier for you to say he was over hyped and not that impressive when you're comparing him to Irving. One of the top offensive players in the whole league.

A lottery pick has different value depending on the draft. Last year you were looking at tier two and top of tier 3 at end of lottery. This year your looking at tier 4 guys. Last years draft had the most tier two guys ever, along with two tier one guys. It was a very deep draft at the top. That was my whole point in breaking down Robert Williams. Getting him isn't getting a lot frankly. Better than just letting him walk, but its not getting a lot. Those guys have good upside but are super risky. 

I don't want to trade Rozier, he's the one I want them to keep long-term, over Smart. My point was simple, if you won't pay him its better off trading him, even if you don't get lot. I'm not talking about a late first either. One year of Rozier playing limited minutes won't have a huge impact. Come playoff time when Brown and Irving are averaging almost 40 minutes a night, Rozier won't have a huge impact splitting minutes with Smart. Not over a good player like Larkin or another player you could bring in or draft. Thats what limited minutes do, it limits the impact a player can have. Its why I trade Morris if you do keep Smart and Rozier. The impact he could have over Semi in 10 to 15 minutes a night is rather small. Play Morris 30 minutes and that gap starts to get really big. Plus it opens up maybe some minutes for Smart at SF during the regular season, but those will disappear in the playoffs. Nevermind Rozier getting more minutes increased his play. He can be streaky and needs a good amount of playing time to not only reach his potential, but to be fully effective.

Yeah. Rozier can get to the hoop better than anyone on the roster other than Kyrie, that's a huge skill. His finishing needs work, but I still think he takes some bad drives for a guy his size. Those 2 issues are different, I fully expect him to get better at the first, however the second one could be a bit harder to eliminate. Like I said, he sometimes lays it in either too far from the basket or right under it, he looks like a work in progress. But I'm very confident about his future given what he already accomplished and for the fact that he can get past guys. That's huge and honestly you can't teach that, so with Rozier you're talking polishing some rough edges to get a really special offensive player.

He way over-valued himself from the get go and basically made Danny want to trade him. Now I’m not so sure he gets dealt if Kyrie doesn’t become available but it would have been interesting. No chance he was getting max money here. But I do feel bad for him. I hope he gets at least a 50m deal.

Simple no Smart gives Rozier major minutes long-term. I never said he'd have no value, just not enough to make keeping him for only one year worth it given his current value. Thats going off the assumption both Smart and Rozier are back next year and Stevens splits minutes between them. Which seems like a fair assumption given the information we currently have.

RJP really? I'm on record saying we'll get a lottery pick or more, I just don't think that's a ton in this draft. You think that is. Unless you can get up higher in the lottery than I think, or someone falls a ton. Both seem very unlikey in this draft. This whole thing is because I see Roziers value as worth a tier two pick, not just a lottery pick. At the same time you need to think long-term with this team. Rozier is too good and his value too high to just let him walk in a year. The Thunder didn't get great value for Harden, but it was still better than just watching him leave for nothing.

I would be very surprised if Thomas got more than one year at the mid-level exception. Honestly, wouldn’t surprise me if he ended up needing to settle for something near the veteran minimum.

Now the media is going to run as far as possible on the Kyrie comment about being present and not thinking about Boston long term.

Not trying to start a debate on it as it seems too logical being one of the top players in the league at 26 that he will get the max and stay but anything is possible with trader Dan. In retrospect it was genius of him to move IT when he did last year and a lot of people were mad about that. IT wanting the brinks truck to backup was a problem and getting rid of that problem along with getting Kyrie, genius. As was the trades involving Pierce, Garnett, Rondo and acquiring IT for pennys on the dollar.

Those are some pretty impressive trade results and they don't even include the deals that created the first Big 3. GM's must be leery when he calls, they should be.