The Celtics Have Somehow Found A Way To Reach A New Level Of Basketball Futility

Steve Russell. Getty Images.

It doesn't take a basketball savant to be able to look at the Celts right now and conclude that they are playing arguably the worst basketball of the Joe Mazzulla Era. Actually, scratch that. It's not just the worst basketball of the Mazzulla Era, it's the worst basketball of any Celtics era, including the Rick Pitino days. Do you know how bad you have to be playing to be worse than the darkest time in franchise history?

That is currently what the 2024-25 Celtics are doing, and I promise you that is not being dramatic or an overreaction. It's the honest truth. As a reminder, if CJ McCollum makes this floater

the Celts lose back to back games to 9 win teams. So no, I am not being dramatic. Perhaps after they snuck out that win you may have thought to yourself 

"Well OK, this is rock bottom and the scare they need to get their shit together"

Oh you didn't think the Celts could go any lower into the depths of suck? You fool. How about losing on the road to a 9 win team that you just beat by 54 points a few weeks ago? A team that for the last few months has been near the bottom of the NBA in nearly every category? And not only do you lose, but you get thoroughly outplayed for 48 minutes while you had your entire roster available?

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We don't need to have the whole "panic" discussion. I've said my piece on that type of reaction to losses like this, there's no need to rehash it. 

But what we do need to have is a discussion around the fact that this team continues to play completely dogshit basketball. Inexcusable performance after inexcusable performance, we're at the point where there is no game on the schedule that you an deem "easy" right now. In no world should a healthy Celtics team be struggling this mightily with the worst teams in the NBA. This season, they are now 12-3 against teams under .500. Not a terrible record by any stretch, but a reminder, they went 29-4 last year. So far this season, you have teams like CLE (20-0) and NYK (17-3) that are handling their business around you, while the Celts for whatever reason cannot get their heads out of their own asses long enough to take care of teams who are actively tanking. It's both bizarre and maddening at the same time. 

So if you didn't think there was any possible way for the Celts to go any lower than that Pelicans performance, last night was a reminder that you should never underestimate just how pathetic this team can look when they play horrendous basketball in all aspects of the game.

Offense, defense, FT shooting, rebounding, ball movement, execution, it was all beyond terrible. They fucked around and found out, simple as that.

With that said, let us begin

The Good

- New blog rule. If you have back to back games against 9 win teams where you needed a prayer to win one of them and then got your dick absolutely stomped in the other, there is no Good section for you. No spinzone. No trying to distract you with some KP highlights, none of it. You have to earn that from me and right now, the Celts do not deserve it.

Play better and you will. Continue to screw around and pay the price. Their choice. 

The Bad

- Where do we even begin? Why is it that every one of these blogs recently has be asking that same question every time we get to this section? There's just so many places to start given how poor this team is playing at the moment.

Let's start with the backbone of everything. The defense. 

As we know, if you do not defend, you die. That has been true since the sport of basketball was first invented, and it is true here in 2024-25. You simply cannot provide zero resistance defensively and think that's going to be good enough to win, especially at a time where you cannot make a shot to save your life. With everyone healthy, there's no excuse to not show up against a team you just held to 71 points 2 weeks ago.

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What did we get? Horrendous effort and execution from pretty much everyone not named KP. As with most defensive issues, it starts at the point of attack. Neither Derrick White or Jrue Holiday are producing any sort of resistance on the perimeter. Guys are getting by both with ease and getting into the paint time after time after time. When was the last time you saw them get up in someone's airspace? Play with any sort of intense ball pressure? These are the two best defenders on the team right? So…where is it?

With Jrue's two most common matchups (Mitchell/Barrett), they combined to shoot 5-6 against him, and he forced 1 TO

With Derrick's, there wasn't one guy who had that type of success, but overall the players he guarded finished 5-9

If those two can't lock down the point of attack, everything falls apart. It's like a chain. The whole reason why the Celts defense is elite is there's nobody you could attack. Right now, you can attack every single player on the floor. That, is a problem.

To make matters worse, there were far worse defenders on the floor than the backcourt, which also cannot happen. Jaylen Brown can't be tweeting about wing players having their own DPOY and then put up arguably his worst defensive performance of the season. Scottie Barnes and RJ Barrett combined to go 7-7 while being guarded with JB. Again, this is one of your best perimeter defenders, and what kind of execution is this?

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Look at how he's "fighting" over screens. Do we think that's an acceptable effort level? Gambling for steals, leaving your man, overhelping, it's all piss poor execution.

Jayson Tatum, the other wing, was no better. Opponents shot a combined 8-12 against him in all of his matchups. From top to bottom, every single Celtic that stepped on the floor was dogshit defensively. That simply cannot happen.

Poor defense is like a virus. It spreads to all aspects of your game. If you can't get stops, it puts pressure on your offense to execute. Given the Celts are in a month long slump where they simply cannot make a shot, that only compounds things. Then, you start to press and get tense, which leads to mistakes. Next thing you know, you're letting the opponent feel good about themselves, and that's exactly what happened in this game.

From the 15-5 start because the Celts couldn't get a stop on one end and then couldn't make a bucket on the other, as the game went on it got worse and worse. In no world should any team the Celtics play start a second half 14-17. The Raptors had a 150 ORTG in the 3rd quarter. They finished with 54.5% shooting in the second half as a team, and went nearly entire quarters without missing a single shot.

I'll remind you, the Raptors are one fo the worst offenses in basketball.

Where's the pride? Where's the fight? Where's the resistance?

The Raptors took 28 FGA in the restricted area in this game, and 19 FGA in the paint (non-RA). They shot 64% and 63% from those two zones. For the season, they average 62% and 44.7% from those same areas. Another game of 60 points allowed din the paint, the last time this happened it was because Poeltl never missed and he went for like 35. This time he also didn't miss (8-8), but everyone else was getting into the paint and finishing with ease as well. When all you're getting is wide open layups, it's kind of hard to miss.

- I'm sorry, but the time has definitely come to at least explore going back to last season's sub patterns. I get the idea is that if you play Tatum the entire first quarter it helps him get into a rhythm, but that is not happening. He's shooting just 43/34% on the season in 1st quarters so far this season, and recently over the last 15 or so games, it's even worse

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In fact, his production and efficiency were higher with last year's sub pattern. Come out at around 6 minutes, and then return at around the 2 minute mark to finish the quarter and then start the 2nd with the bench unit. We would then see something similar in the 3rd/4th quarters

Now, he's playing the entire first, sitting the 2nd. Guess how that worked last night? A 5 point Celtics lead was gone in a flash, and by the time Tatum came back at the 5:35 mark, the Celts were down 2.

3rd quarter, same thing. Tatum plays the full 12 minutes, which means he needs to get his rest to start the 4th. What happened? A 6 point deficit turned into a 13 point deficit by the time he came back at the 7:59 mark. Then, once he comes back, he is not aggressive. Another 4th quarter of Tatum taking 0 FGA in the 4th quarter.

The point is, the data isn't really suggesting that this new rotation and sub pattern for Tatum is working. He's not really starting all that well and not having him on the floor to start the 4th quarter is a gigantic problem seeing as how the Celts are the worst 4th quarter team in the league (more on this later).

Now, you know what comes with this. The weirdos about Jaylen and the Tatum stans will say this is all Jaylen's fault and that he can't run an offense. Unfortunately for those people, the numbers don't really suggest that

A 124 ORTG and +9 net with Jaylen on and Tatum off is fine. More than good enough in terms of the bigger picture.

I have no idea what led to this change given how great they were last year. Maybe because KP was out? That makes sense I guess, but now that he's back there's no reason to not go back to last year's rotation that you know works.

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- Another reason for it? The starting 5 has to figure their shit out. They are legitimately the worst unit in basketball right now

If you want to know why the Celts are struggling so much, look no further than their best players. I mean look at those numbers! My brain can't really comprehend how that is even physically possible. As a reminder, this is the type of defense they were going up against last night

How did the starting lineup perform you might be wondering?

ORTG: 118.8

DRTG: 182.4

Net rating: -63.6

Please be serious, I am begging. Again, this was the fully healthy starting 5. Unfortunately it didn't matter what lineup was on the floor, they were pretty much all horrendous, especially defensively. See for yourself

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Just so bad across the board.

- There's a reason people say the margins are important. It's because they are important.

How do you lose games you shouldn't? You fail at the margins. Rebounding? TOR won 56-45 with 13 OREB and 11 2nd chance points. FTs? The Celtics went 9-18 (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) including missing 4 in the 4th quarter. Ball movement? TOR won that 35-24. How about transition? TOR won that 18-5.

You're never going to win an NBA game getting worked like that around the margins. I don't care who you play, that's losing basketball. 9 missed FTs? Is that a fucking joke?

- Looks like we're back to another Sam Hauser shooting rut, Over his last 6 games he's shooting just 36/31%, including a 1-6 (1-5) last night. There was a 3 game stretch to end December where he looked like himself, but ever since we got into January he's back to being a complete brick.

His struggles are impactful because these minutes usually come in non-Tatum shifts. When those happen, the shooters have to make their open looks in order to sustain things. Right now, nobody can make a shot. Hauser is just 3 for his last 11 (27%) in his last 3 games, and it's no surprise the Celts are 1-2 over that span. 

They cannot keep relying on Al Horford to be the only one from the bench to make shots. Payton Pritchard is pulling his weight, and Hauser's regression this season and especially recently has been brutal. 

- He doesn't deserve to be in the next section, but let's be very clear about something. Jayson Tatum punted this game. We know what it looks like when he punts a game and that's exactly what this was. No energy, no real interest in playing basketball, he was mostly horrendous. 

A 5-15 (3-9) in his 36 minutes with pretty poor defense to go with it, that was not the caliber of performance that is expected of the best player. To not be aggressive and take a single shot in the 4th is also on him. Not just Joe or the other players around him, but Tatum himself. He has the ball, he can decide to attack or to create, and these no shows in the 4th in these recent losses are inexcusable. 

He (and Jaylen) played like they were hung over, and well…..

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When your team is playing like shit, it's on the best players to lead and set the example. This isn't to say players should be robots, but they also probably shouldn't be staying out late the night before a game when the team is playing like shit. It seems like they thought they could just walk into TOR, make some 3s (8 of Tatum's first 11 were 3PA) and coast to a win. Instead, the opposite happened. Nobody could make a 3. Their legs were dead to the point where Tatum got stuffed by the rim.

Was it due to their festivities the night before? Who knows. But what I know is that you can't go out and have fun and then show up and throw up a stinker. That's loser shit not champion shit. 

The Ugly

- Which is why we're starting this section with Jaylen's overall night. You saw the defensive issues above, but things were even worse offensively. 

He finished 4-16 (1-1), and was a brutal -23 in his 32 minutes. Jaylen repeatedly found himself with possessions where it looked like his body completely forgot how to play the sport. Smoking bunnies, dribbling off his foot, turning it over, it was all some of the worst basketball you're ever going to see.

And let's face it. The execution and production in the shifts where he was the main guy were awful. Now part of that is guys around him were unable to make a fucking shot, but Jaylen also owns a fair share of that blame. He went just 1-7 in the 4th quarter, with most of those FGA coming while Tatum sat. Their lack of offense and execution on either end was a big reason the lead doubled before Tatum came back in. 

If we're going to talk about slumps, it's also hard to ignore Jaylen's play. Since he returned to the lineup on 1/5, he's shooting just 40/20% from the floor while his TOs have jumped to 2.8 a night.

The thing is, that 20% isn't coming off high volume. He's basically not taking any 3s anymore. Just 3.0 a game and 1 3PA last night. Over that 5 game stretch, he's averaging a -6.8 +/-. He's been awful, there's really no other way to describe it. Lackluster defensively and in a big time shooting/scoring rut. 

Is it a surprise that the Celts are 2-3 in those games? It shouldn't.

- The same thing can be said for Derrick White. His struggles are maybe the most impactful, simply because of how important he is to the equation. He's also fallen into another rut, and the results speak for themselves

Starting with that OKC performance, White is shooting 22/10% from the floor in those 4 games. 22/10%!!!!! Call me crazy, but those splits and 6 points a game is not going to cut it. He's now 3 for his last 29 from three over this span. How is that even remotely possible when the majority of his looks are clean?

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It's very clear that with every miss, Derrick's starting to press. Just watch him immediately after. His head is dropping. He's now aiming when he shoots instead of just letting it fly, and the results are a disaster. It's your classic case of a guy in a funk who desperately needs to see some shots fall. 

To make matters worse, Jrue is shooting 41/25% over this same timeframe. Add in Hauser's struggles and you can see what I mean when I say this entire roster is in a shooting funk right now. The problem is they are not defending at a level good enough to cause turnovers and easy baskets. You combine those two things and you get losses like this. 

- As I've blogged before, the Celtics are the worst 4th quarter team in the NBA. I'm not sure how this could even be debatable. In every single one of their losses, it's the same story

As I said, they are legitimately the worst 4th quarter team on the planet. That, is not the sign of a championship team. Championship teams play all 4 quarters. They raise their play in the 4th, they don't turn into complete assholes and blow game after game after game with poor late game execution. 

They all play out the same way. The Celts can't score, which makes them have to defend in transition, which they stink at. Then, even when they have a halfcourt possession, they either give up a layup or allow a million OREBs. Of the Raptors 13 OREB in this game 7 of them came in the 4th quarter. Sorry, that's pathetic.

So big picture, is there reason to "panic", not to any rational person. Take a deep breath. But at the same time the Celtics are playing the worst basketball we've seen in years. Until they cut the shit, things like this will continue to happen. We know the standard this team can play to, and we know how successful that standard is.

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It sure would be nice if they could play up to it.