Welcome Back, Blogger

(A more humble man would welcome back his readers, but if you want a more humble man, go read The Sports Guy. Besides, if I don't welcome myself back, who will?)

My summer job has been over for a month now, which means yours truly's return to blogging about basketball in obscurity. When I left you, it was the eve of Game 7 in an incredible playoff series with Chicago. Boston triumphed there and took a 3-2 lead in the next series with Orlando before running out of gas and losing to the Magic in seven. While I hate losing a Game 7 at home, the loss to Orlando simply finalized what we'd known since a few days prior to the end of the regular season: that the Celtics' title defense ended when Kevin Garnett went down with a knee injury against Utah on February 19. It would have been nice to see the team maximize its potential, and without KG, beating Orlando would have accomplished that. But we were never beating the Lakers without Garnett, and the truth is that if Phil Jackson had to get his tenth championship ring as a coach - eclipsing Red Auerbach's nine - I'm glad he didn't do it against us.

While nothing like two years ago, when Danny Ainge traded for Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett to set the stage for the 2007-2008 NBA championship, it's been a fairly busy offseason for the Celtics. Let's start with...

The Curious Case of Rajon Rondo
My memory is a little fuzzy as to who said what and when, but some time relatively early in the offseason, we started to hear the Celtics front office grumbling about its young point guard's immaturity. Word of a potential attitude with Rondo was something of a surprise to me, though ESPN's Bill Simmons has claimed for a while that his sources say that Rondo's not a good locker room guy. About the only thing that was clear to me at the time was that the Celtics were not looking to trade Rondo, as had been rumored, since Ainge wouldn't badmouth a player he was trying to move.

Another possible explanation was that Ainge was trying to keep Rondo's value down for when his rookie deals runs out after this year. The Celtics have the option to extend Rondo now or wait for him to become a restricted free agent after the coming season, meaning they could match any offer made to him. Despite Rondo's agent's desires, however, the team has not talked about extending Rondo, and the badmouthing could have been an attempt to keep his value down.

This doesn't quite add up, either. If the comments negatively affect Rondo and the team tanks this year, then yeah, maybe we retain Rondo at a cheaper price, but we've also squandered our best remaining chance at a championship with the so-called Big Three. If Rondo turns in a solid performance in the face of the criticism, teams are going to pay attention to his performance on the floor, not what his old GM said a year ago. And it's not like Danny could periodically throw a public tantrum about Rondo throughout the season. I suppose it makes a little more sense if the plan is to renegotiate with him before the season starts.

The only way I can make everything fit in my mind is that Rondo actually has an attitude problem and Ainge decided this was the way to fix it. Even if other measures had previously failed, this is a risky proposition. Rondo's a moody, sensitive kid whose short career has seen him going from leading a terrible team his rookie year to running a championship outfit the next. He's constantly scolded that he must lead this team, and incessantly reminded that he's playing with three Hall of Fame-caliber players who each deserve the ball. His teammates tell him that they can't win without him; the media tell him that he can't win without them.

My point is that Rondo has had to go through a lot more, basketball-wise, than your average NBA point guard with three years under his belt. Not only does this make his attitude problems at least a little understandable, but it also - to me at least - cautions against being too critical of him, at least publicly.

Moreover, where's the upside? Rondo has been for the most part solid and occasionally spectacular since KG and Ray arrived. We won a title with him running the show two years ago and were well-positioned to contend for a second one last year before KG went down. We've already shown we can win with a problematic (if he is indeed problematic) Rondo; we don't know if we can win with a sulky Rondo. A weird move by Danny that could really hurt us but seemingly has comparatively little payoff if it backfires.

Subtractions
Four guys who ended the season in green and white won't be back this season. In order of importance:

Leon Powe
Of the four, Leon is almost certainly the one who was hardest to say goodbye to. Not only was he the most productive, he's a great story, a great kid, and universally loved by his teammates, the coaching staff, the organization, and the fans.

Basketball-wise, however, this was a pretty easy call. Truth be told, had Leon not torn his ACL in Game 2 of the Chicago series, he'd probably be a Celtic this season. But that injury meant that he won't be ready for at least the first few months of the season, and with Garnett more of a question mark than Celtics fans are comfortable admitting - and a need to limit his minutes anyway - Boston couldn't afford to head into the season without a backup plan in place and ready to go. That's particularly true given how tight the race at the top of the Eastern Conference will be with Cleveland and Orlando. That said, while it's hard to see how Powe fits in with the Cavs' deep frontline, something tells me he'll be heard from at one point or another this season.

Stephon Marbury
Frankly, it's too uncomfortable to write much about the offseason self-destruction of the mercurial man once known as the Starchild, one of my favorite college players ever. All I'll say is that while Marbury was ineffective last season much more often than not, he did show flashes through his rust that suggested he could be a serviceable backup with a little continuity from his half-season in green. His departure, coupled with the team's inability to swing a sign-and-trade for Marquis Daniels which would have opened up a roster spot for someone like Carlos Arroyo, means that who will play behind Rondo is still something of an unanswered question, and probably will be heading into the season.

Gabe Pruitt
I still think Pruitt could have stepped capably into that role, but I'm apparently the only one who isn't a blood relative who believes that. Pruitt never got much playing time and didn't do enough with his limited burn for the team to bring him back, and a February DUI didn't help, either.

Mikki Moore
A late-season acquisition to attempt to fill the role of P.J. Brown from two seasons ago, Moore rarely contributed anything more than six (sometimes frightenly quick) fouls to Boston. He recently signed with the Golden State Warriors for the veteran's minimum.

Additions
Four new guys, again in order of importance.

Rasheed Wallace
Wallace is the Celtics' main weapon in the offseason arms race that saw the rich get richer - Cleveland acquired Shaquille O'Neal, Orlando got Vince Carter, the Lakers signed Ron Artest, and San Antonio added Richard Jefferson. 'Sheed gives rise to the possibility that the 09-10 Celtics will be historically good defensively, and he is still a potent weapon offensively. Moreover, while casual fans know him as a volatile coach-killer who is always near the league lead in technical fouls, NBA insiders and die-hards know that his teammates almost universally praise his locker-room presence and basketball IQ (more than once, I've seen him referred to as the smartest player in today's NBA). And while he mailed it in with the Pistons last year, it says here that this was more likely a response that organization's curious roster moves, and not an indication that he no longer cares or has lost the ability to be an effective NBA player. It's hard to see him losing focus on a championship contender with veteran leadership, and he's not yet old enough for me to be convinced that he's washed up.

My main concern with Wallace - and this is something I'll tackle more in depth in a separate post about lineups and minutes - is how his presence will affect Kendrick Perkins. Two years ago, Doc didn't trust Perk in the clutch, playing James Posey at the 4 and sliding KG to the 5 in crunch time. Last year, Doc's hand was forced due to Posey's absence and KG's injury, and while it took Perk several games to step up after KG went down, he was arguably our best player in the playoffs. Wallace gives us a true backup at the four who can also guard the five, a big step up over last year, when Powe and Glen Davis were understudies to Garnett and Perkins, and often played together on a woefully undersized second-team front line. I expect Perkins to remain the starter, but 'sheed is too valuable to never play in crunch time, and he's clearly not going to take those down-the-stretch minutes from a healthy Garnett. How this affects Perkins, who seems ready to break out, remains to be seen. Like with Rondo, handling Perkins can be a delicate task.

Marquis Daniels
It's been confirmed for weeks that Daniels would be a Celtic, with Ainge waiting until he was convinced he couldn't pull a sign-and-trade (most likely with Tony Allen) before giving Daniels the biannual exception. While Daniels' natural position is 2, at 6-6, he's big enough to guard the 3, and as such, he gives us something of a true backup to Pierce, something we lacked all last year. He is something of a replacement for Posey from two years ago in that he can guard two different positions (2/3 versus 3/4 for Posey), but he doesn't have Posey's outside shot (which is largely made up for by Wallace's prowess from beyond the arc). On the other hand, Daniels can put the ball on the deck and create his own shot better than Posey could.

There's also a hope that Daniels' versatility means he can handle the ball with the second team, which means Doc could theoretically play him in the backcourt with Eddie House - although we need to find a small forward (Bill Walker, perhaps?) on the roster if that lineup is going to serve the purpose of keeping both Pierce's and Ray's minutes down, which should be a priority. Additionally, word from Indiana fans is that Daniels has a pretty bad handle, so any hope that he could serve in the backup PG role may simply be wishful thinking.

Shelden Williams
Williams is basically filling Powe's roster spot. I don't expect him to fill Powe's role, however; Doc often seemed undecided between Powe and Davis, whereas I think the majority of those minutes this year will go to Davis. As an insurance policy, however, Williams makes more sense than Powe because he's a bit bigger, which makes it easier for him to finish around the rim, where Leon struggled at times. Should everyone stay healthy, his biggest contribution may simply be keeping the pressure on Davis to continue to improve.

Lester Hudson
We acquired Hudson with the 58th pick in the draft, and he "beat out" Pruitt for the sixth guard spot, though I use quotes because Hudson played all of 44 minutes over three games in the Orlando Summer League before sitting the rest out with a broken finger. In reality, the team had probably simply soured on Pruitt. It's hard to complain about a player taken that late in the draft, though I would have preferred that the Celts take Marquette's Jerel McNeal or, better yet, packaged the pick with a future one to take Pittsburgh's DeJuan Blair, whose balky knees dropped him from the fringe of the lottery to the early second round, where San Antonio snapped him up. I know very little about Hudson, who played college ball in relative obscurity at Tennessee-Martin, but Ainge has made enough good decisions with second-rounders (Powe, Walker, Ryan Gomes) that he's entitled to a fair amount of deference here).

It's more than fair to say that the offseason was a successful one, though additional tinkering may be needed and how Doc allocates minutes remains to be seen. But the team is deeper and hopefully healthier, and that should mean another season with a realistic shot at a banner.

I'll be posting here and there over the next couple of months before getting into high gear again once the season starts. Subscribe to the RSS to be automatically notified when I post something, or check back often. And I'd love to hear your thoughts on Boston's offseason (or anything, really) in the comments section.