It’s a new year, so we have a new Celtics mailbag answering all of your questions about what’s happened so far this season and what’s to come. Let’s jump right in!
Can you talk a bit about the types of things players say and call out to each other on the court? I think I hear Marcus yell “safe” or “stay” a lot? How much are we missing by not being able to hear on-court communication? — Anonymous
Most of the talking gets done on defense, where you’ll hear “safe” and stay” all the time. Typically, that’s a teammate telling an on-ball defender to stick to his assignment when a screen or cut action is coming his way. When a defender is in isolation, you will hear teammates on the second level of help yelling that or “You’re on your own!”
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If you ever want a full demo, watch a G League game when you can hear Mfiondu Kabengele. He is one of the loudest and most persistent communicators I’ve seen in my time around the league, running a rolling monologue throughout the game of defensive call-outs.
The Celtics usually call their switches “red,” which has often referred to when an offensive player cuts to the hoop and a defender will switch onto them and front the cutter so that the guy with the ball has to lob it over the top and make a risky pass. One of the main reasons the Celtics struggled to switch early last season was that they were inconsistent calling out when to stay as opposed to switch, so sometimes a cutter would just get left unguarded.
They cleaned that up after a few weeks and haven’t really looked back. But the best defenders are constantly talking, as you can see with Marcus Smart talking out his help position and calling for teammates to step into spots when he sees an action coming. Smart’s a great athlete and plays with incredible tenacity, but what made that defense so great last year was that he just wouldn’t shut up out there.
Do you think Kab or Davison could be useful for the C’s going forward in the season? — Victor
Right now, JD Davison has a clearer path to a role with this team based on opportunity ahead of him. He’s a crazy explosive ballhandler with good passing vision and aggression to the rim. The Celtics don’t have a guard who can finish over a big or speed his way past the coverage to get into space near the paint. Davison can take wide angles around screens, or reject them, and get downhill so fast that he draws extra help coverage and can make some spectacular passes as he outraces the double team.
Then while he can’t really finish over an NBA-caliber big yet in most situations, he can at least go for the floater or the poster dunk. He’s had a bunch of those in Maine and they are thrilling when they happen. There’s just so much ahead of him to be a sound decision-maker in the league and Joe Mazzulla isn’t going to put the ball in his hands unless there’s a dearth of depth ahead of him or it’s a blowout.
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For Kabengele, there are just so many bigs already on the roster who know the playbook and the reads that come out of it. He’s learning the second step of all the basics, figuring out the best screening angles so that defenders can’t just go under on him, or how to help off a shooter on defense without getting lost. The good news for him is that the contract guarantee dates for Luke Kornet, Noah Vonleh, and Justin Jackson are coming up on Jan. 10, so there could be some shuffling happening that could open up a full roster spot for him.
Kabengele is ahead of Davison in his development right now and with Boston’s resting program for Rob Williams and Al Horford putting the center depth to use, Kabengele could actually be the one to see minutes this year if Brad Stevens makes some moves soon.
Where does Smart rank among the league’s point guards at this point? The passes he’s pulling off on a nightly basis are unreal and his assist-to-turnover ratio is better than ever. — Anonymous
As far as pure passers go, he’s high up there. He’s 10th in the league in assists per game at 7.4 and seventh in assist ratio (assists per 100 possessions) for players above 20 minutes per game at 36.9 percent, per NBA Stats. He checks off the boxes for reads in the pick-and-roll, transition kick-aheads and vision out of the post. He’s finally mastering drop-off passes on the move and from the post, which is a big part of his assist numbers going up this year.
Mazzulla has built out a few plays that send cutters diving in from above the 3-point break when Smart goes to post-up, so he can thread a quick bounce pass past his man. That requires great timing and deft touch, especially since he’s short and has to get the ball under the defender’s hands as opposed to a big like Domas Sabonis who drops those passes over the top.
Breaking down the current passing landscape, there’s Nikola Jokic, Luka Doncic, LeBron James, and Chris Paul on the GOAT tier of choreographers. They can make basically every type of play that has ever been conceived, though they all set themselves up in different ways.
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Then there are two frameworks to look at the rest of the field with stars in one pillar and playmakers in the other. There are point guards such as James Harden, Trae Young, and Ja Morant, who are an entire offense unto themselves. Then there are players such as Smart, Darius Garland, Mike Conley, and Jrue Holiday, who are maestros reading the floor and can light it up, but are setting up other scorers for the most part. Smart isn’t quite on their level in the light-it-up department, but he has become so versatile in how he creates for others that he makes up for it to a degree.
Though Smart is toward the bottom of the top 10 in his overall output, he’s behind just Conley and Tyrese Haliburton in assist-to-usage ratio, per Cleaning the Glass. So as far as just being a passer, he could arguably move up to the third tier of the league’s point guards, alongside players like Conley and Holiday. These are guards who can do everything you ask from a point guard, but don’t quite throw the kinds of bullet skip passes across the court you see from Doncic or Harden, or completely contort a defense off the bounce like Paul.
But being a point guard is more than just your passing ability and game management. You have to be a scoring threat too.
When you consider pull-up shooting, explosiveness off the bounce, and finishing ability, there are a lot more guards ahead of him. Almost everyone who has been mentioned above plus Fred VanVleet, Kyrie Irving, Damian Lillard, Steph Curry, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and De’Aaron Fox are all ahead of him at this point. But considering his fit in the offense and role on defense and as a leader, he makes an impact comparable to some of these players.
Who knows how he would look if he were a high-usage guy who could take 16 shots per game, but he already seems to be pushing his limits as a scorer in his role already and is best suited for where he is now. He’s a good starting point guard who works for a team that runs through its wings, and he’s exactly where he needs to be.
Why don’t the Celtics have Rob Williams shoot (besides dunks and put backs)? What are they seeing behind the scenes? He shot 72% from the line last season, he seems to be able to put the ball on the floor — see last night vs Paul George — and he’s wide open at the top of the key constantly. Wouldn’t the Celtics become basically unguardable if defenders had to stay even a hair closer to him at the perimeter?
Williams has two shots in his bag that have shown up on rare occasions. The first is a pick-and-pop shot from 18 feet out, where he will flare on the roll to take a rhythm catch-and-shoot jumper out on the elbows. The second is to shoot out of the mid-post from around 12 feet.
The main reason we don’t see the latter is that he hasn’t built out a post-up game yet. He doesn’t have any dribble moves like a drop step or a reverse pivot to face up, so defenders would just lean into his body on a post-up and force him to keep the ball up over his head where he can’t do anything but pass it at the moment. We saw him drive straight at George and get bailed out by a foul call, but I’d like to see what happens when he actually has to get into a finishing move. He showed some of these skills facing up in the post in college, so there’s should be a next step to his game coming in the next few years if he can stay healthy.
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I’m not sure why they don’t mess around with him popping a bit on pick-and-rolls, but he’s just so dangerous rolling through the paint that he opens up space for others when he does that. Williams generally plays thinking about his teammates rather than himself, so he seems to prefer rim running because it’s either an easy lob for him or creates a pass to the weak-side shooter.
What lineup 1 through 5 is the best for the Celtics to actually push the pace? – RJ J.
This is a great question because there are a few ways to look at this. If you’re just talking about the best guys to play uptempo, it would probably be the current starting lineup. Or with Time Lord replacing Horford at the five. Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum are great about sprinting hard on leak outs, while Derrick White also loves a good track meet. Smart is the best on the team at threading bounce passes through traffic, so you want to get the ball in his hands in transition. Picking a five for this group is tough because Horford is so good at making quick inbounds off of makes and reading when to push the tempo or slow it down.
But that Clippers game showed how just inserting Williams into the second unit can turn them into a fast-breaking lineup. He is just so good at getting stops and quickly getting the ball up the court. So even though that lineup with Brown, White, Sam Hauser and the Williamses isn’t the ideal offensive unit, they are thinking run first and foremost. Having Rob Williams out there means fewer players need to crash the defensive glass and instead can leak out.
So while there is a lot of work to be done to be a reliable unit, the Brown-led second unit may be the transition specialist on the team by necessity.
Why won’t the Celtics trade Pritchard for Reddish? How come they won’t sign Harry Giles? If this guy did not get hurt at Duke, he was the #1 pick that year. Get him, Tatum likes him… – Phillip C.
Reddish has underwhelmed everywhere he’s gone for his effort and consistency, so I don’t see the Celtics taking away someone who brings those things to welcome that in. Stevens’ front office has prioritized personality fit and work ethic in its acquisitions over the past few years and he doesn’t fit that bill. Hopefully, he can rehab his image somewhere, but it doesn’t look like that’s happening in New York.
And Harry Giles has been out of the league for a few years, suffering a season-ending injury at the beginning of 2022 in the G League. It would be great to see him continue his professional career, but it doesn’t seem likely he’s going to be healthy enough to make it back to the league at this rate. It’s such a shame to see such a phenomenal talent be injured so many times, but the Celtics aren’t going to give someone a regular-season roster spot if they aren’t healthy, regardless of who their best friend is.
What’s the latest word on Jaylen’s next contract noting his current one is up summer ‘24? I believe if he makes one of the three All-NBA teams (gotta think that’s a good possibility the way he’s playing so far this season), this changes the math materially. Love to hear your thoughts. I recall a Hollinger piece from this past summer, but that’s likely eternity ago in the NBA. – Jamie D.
Brown is clearly a max player right now and is being underpaid. He is going to want a five-year, $290.3 million supermax extension this summer if he qualifies with an All-NBA berth this season. If he doesn’t make it, he could get a five-year, $248.8 million deal if he re-signs in 2024, when he hits unrestricted free agency.
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If he goes to another team in free agency, he is limited to a max of about $184.5 million over four years, which pays him around $3.6 million less per year on average. Considering he’ll be looking at something north of half a billion dollars in career earnings on either track, he could be willing to sacrifice that money to go elsewhere.
Though players rarely prefer fewer guaranteed years, a four-year deal would allow him to hit free agency for his (presumably) last big contract at age 31 instead of 32. The drop-off from your prime tends to happen around that age, so every year counts. He’ll likely push for a player option on the final year of a five-year deal with Boston, so he’d still be able to time his market to his liking.
It seems farfetched that Brown would get less than the max, but the question is how much will be guaranteed. His agent, Jason Glushon, has struck plenty of incentive-laden deals in the past few years, including Brown’s current contract. His current deal includes $2 million per year for hitting one of the supermax qualifiers (MVP, DPOY, or All-NBA), which Brown hasn’t hit. What will be his appetite for unlikely incentives in the future?
Brown’s injury history is a moderate concern, but there isn’t much to fear that his career could fall apart during this contract. He’s an All-Star and this is the price of those players. How could Boston get another player near his caliber if he leaves in free agency? Few stars in the league have had to deal with the rumors about their place in the franchise like Brown. Would Boston really test his loyalty?
The Celtics’ best hope may actually be for him to trigger the supermax, just so they don’t have to worry about him testing free agency. Because if he doesn’t want to sign it, it’s time to make the move they have passed up for half a decade now. I’d expect he’ll sign.
(Top Photo: Garrett Ellwood/NBAE via Getty Images)
