C's Let Another Big Personality Leave As Grant Williams Goes To Dallas In A Sign-And-Trade

 

    If you watched the Celtics over these past few seasons, the amount of endless talking to the referees, opponents and coaches was frankly exhausting. After shipping Marcus Smart-who was the worst offender of that nonsense-to Memphis a few weeks back, Boston followed that up by having mouthy forward Grant Williams go to the Mavericks in a three-team sign-and-trade deal which will give the restricted free agent what he wanted: a four-year deal worth $53 million. San Antonio receives forward Reggie Bullock from Dallas as well as an unprotected first-round pick swap in 2030 with the Mavericks. Dallas and the Celts will both receive two second-round picks and Boston also gets a $6.2 million trade exception. 

    This deal took awhile to come together since from all that we heard-Boston wanting a first-round pick for Williams-never seemed to materialize. The former first-round pick (22nd overall) of the Celtics in 2019 is a solid role player who will likely never be more than that in the NBA. His scoring and rebounding averages went up all four years in Boston though, culminating with 8.1 points per game and 4.6 rebounds per game in 2022-23. He is also a good three-point shooter (37.9% for his career with a high of 41.1% in the 2021-22 season). Head coach Joe Mazzulla began this past postseason by burying Grant which was a mistake since he had been a valuable part of head coach Ime Udoka's rotation the previous season when they reached the NBA Finals with Williams averaging 8.6 points per game in the playoffs. 

    I appreciated Williams' toughness, he was very dependable-appearing in 77 regular season games then 79 regular season games in the past two seasons-and he was not afraid to take on much bigger guys. He will always be remembered for talking trash to Heat star Jimmy Butler in the Eastern Conference Finals a few months ago which did not end so well but at least he showed a pulse which could not be said for most of his teammates. With that said, like Smart this seemed to be another Celtic who was completely delusional as to how important he truly was to the team. Couple that with the non-stop talking (and you can only imagine what he was like in the locker room, on the planes, buses, etc) and you can see how the Celts were probably ready to move on from him.

    This also shows (as if there was any remaining doubt), that Boston is putting all the onus on its two stars-Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown-to take over the main leadership roles on this team moving forward. Subtracting Smart and Williams from the equation means that there will be two less loud voices and big personalities to have to constantly deal with. Additionally, this frees up some money that can hopefully go towards that infamous supermax extension that Brown is eligible for but has not gotten yet from the C's. We wish Grant well in Dallas, Luka Doncic should be awesome to play with but good luck dealing with Kyrie Irving. 

Now They Are History: C's Laid An Egg In Gm. 7 Of The ECF Vs. The Heat, Losing 103-84 At TD Garden

 

    In a season filled with incredible highs and lows, it is only fitting that with everything to play for-namely a spot in the NBA Finals and a place in history as the first team in the league to ever recover from a 3-0 deficit-the Celtics fell right on their faces for the entire world to see. They shot an appalling 21% on 3-pointers (9-for-42) and yet they refused to ever change their gameplan even as it quickly became clear that those shots were not going to fall. Tonight at TD Garden in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals, they got off to a terrible start by scoring 15 points in the first quarter (tied for their lowest scoring opening frame of the year) and they never really recovered as the Heat blew them out 103-84 to clinch the series 4-3. Miami became only the second team ever to reach the NBA Finals as an eight seed after the 1998-99 Knicks. They will meet Denver-who has been off for roughly three weeks-in Game 1 on Thursday (8:30, ABC) in the Mile High City. Boston's superstar wing Jayson Tatum (14 points, 11 rebounds) sprained his left ankle on the first possession of Game 7 but that does not excuse the terrible performance by the rest of his teammates namely the Celtics' supposed other star wing Jaylen Brown (19 points, 8 rebounds, 5 assists, 2 blocks, career-high 8 turnovers) who was dreadful throughout most of this series. 

    Tatum admirably hobbled around for 42 minutes but with him at clearly less than 100%, the C's desperately needed somebody else to step up. That turned out to be guard Derrick White (18 points) who seemed to be the only Celtic who was not scared of the moment but still he is Derrick White so he can only do so much in this type of high level contest. After Boston (5-1) lost their first elimination game of this postseason and finished under .500 (5-6) at the Garden in the playoffs, I think we have to stop saying that the Celtics are the better and/or more talented team. Throughout this series, the Heat were the more poised, tough, smart and relentless club. In truth, it was not even that close when it came to those important facets of the game. Miami's superstar wing Jimmy Butler (game-high 28 points, 7 rebounds, 6 assists, 3 steals) was named MVP of the Eastern Conference Finals which in truth should have gone to small forward Caleb Martin (26 points, 10 rebounds) who was the most consistent player on the Heat all series long. 

    I am also done saying that Miami's center Bam Adebayo (12 points, 10 rebounds, 7 assists) is their second best player because he is not. Still, the Heat all know their role so despite his struggles for much of this series, they survived it because of guys like point guard Gabe Vincent (10 points) and forward Duncan Robinson (10 points, 2 steals off the bench) who always seem to make the right play. Meanwhile nobody else on the Celtics cracked double figures in scoring as point guard Marcus Smart (9 points), center Al Horford (8 points, 8 rebounds) and backup center Robert Williams (8 points, 6 rebounds) were all OK but ultimately not good enough. There is also a reason that teams are now 0-151 in NBA history when they trail 3-0 in a playoff series. It is supremely difficult to win four games in a row right after dropping the first three games. Boston was this close to making incredible history but now all that will be remembered is how poorly they played in Game 7 on their home court. 

    This was one last wretched performance as the C's trailed by as many as 23 points. Just like I will refuse to solely blame this loss on Tatum's rolled ankle, I also cannot totally pin this on Boston's rookie head coach Joe Mazzulla. However, if the Celts' front office decides to bring this jabroni back next season, I might puke. All you need to do is watch a clip of Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra-arguably the best in the NBA-talking to his team during a huddle or how he explains things in his post-game press conferences to realilze that he is an adult while Mazzulla is a green infant not ready for this spotlight yet. The easiest thing to do in pro sports when things don't go your way is to fire the head coach, however considering that Boston has had three different head coaches in the last three seasons (Brad Stevens, Ime Udoka and Mazzulla), do you really think that Stevens will want to fire another young head coach? 

    The more pressing matter is what to do with Brown who is now eligible for a super max deal. Boston cannot simply run it back with the same exact roster and expect things to change for the better. I doubt that they would be bold enough to shop Jaylen but you have to consider anything to make the team better no matter what it takes. This also flipped the narrative from last season's NBA Finals that Jaylen is the gamer while Jayson fades in the clutch moments. All I know is that like the Bruins in 2019-the Celtics could not have dreamed of a more favorable path to a title and yet they puked all over themselves when it counted most. In all likelihood, they would have lost anyway to the Nuggets in the NBA Finals but that is besides the point. They did not even give themselves that opportunity by burying themselves alive (going down 3-0) and coming back from the dead only to epically fail one last time. 

Everything Is Coming Up Celtics These Days As Al Horford Signs A Two-Year Extension With Them

 

    While the Patriots (6-6) stumble and try to stay somewhat relevant this winter, the Celtics (an NBA best 18-4) and Bruins (19-3-0, one point behind NJ-who has played two more games-for the top mark in the NHL) are both off to incredible starts to their respective seasons. That is actually one of the main reasons why I haven't written about either so far in these ridiculous campaigns: they have been mostly blowing everyone out so that gets pretty redundant and boring to discuss. Today at least brought some interesting off the court news for the C's as they signed veteran center Al Horford to a two-year contract extension worth $20 million. His numbers so far in 2022-23 are probably better than you realized: in 31 minutes per game, he's averaging 10.5 points, 6.3 rebounds, 2.8 assists and 0.9 blocks. He is also shooting almost 50% on three-pointers (48.8%) which is way above his career average from downtown (36.6%). 

    With news of the Ime Udoka scandal breaking right before training camp started, you wondered how it would affect the team but so far first-year head coach Joe Mazzulla's transition has been seamless thanks to his absolutely loaded roster. By NBA standards, Al is already very old (he turned 36 during the NBA Finals last summer) and this deal will tie him to the C's through his 39th birthday in 2025. While that might seem a little crazy, if you have watched the Celts lately, you noticed that Horford is still a starting caliber player on an NBA title favorite. With fellow big man Robert Williams perpetually hurt and/or coming back from an injury, you need to have a legitimate backup plan for him since I doubt that he will ever play anything close to a full season. Enter Horford who was a Hawk for nine seasons (after being the No. 3 overall pick in the 2007 Draft) then he initially came here in free agency in 2016. After three good years, he briefly went to the Sixers followed by a short but miserable stay with the constantly rebuilding Thunder.

    When Brad Stevens reacquired him for next to nothing two summers ago, we all laughed thinking that Horford was completely washed up but he has proven everybody wrong by putting together a really nice return season with the Celtics culminating in his first ever NBA Finals apperance. He is too old to play in back-to-back games (like earlier this week) but who cares? Al provides stability and leadership to a team that still needs it despite the fact that Jayson Tatum has become one of the best players in the league and Jaylen Brown is an All-Star caliber player as well. With so many big personalities (and egos), every locker room needs a Horford-a calming presence on the floor and no doubt behind the scenes as well. Other than winning that elusive NBA title, he has done and seen almost everything when it comes to the game of basketball.

    Of course, this being the Celtics and Boston in general, this what looks to be absurd regular season for the C's won't really mean anything if they don't go back to the Finals and complete the job that they weren't quite ready to do last summer against Golden State. Few players ever get that storybook ending in pro sports but it seems well within Horford's grasp meaning that the Celtics could finally earn another banner and therefore he would retire on top. Until then, we should appreciate the maturity, classiness and sheer dependability of Horford who seems to be unique in many positive ways when it comes to the normally drama filled NBA. Al appears to genuinely like being a Celtic too and from what we can tell, he enjoys playing here which you also cannot put a price tag on.