However, now is not the time to think about next year; next week is. Now is the time to think about what Perkins' absence means for Game 7 against the Lakers, and what adjustments need to be made.
The bad news is obvious. Perk is our best on-ball defender in the post, and while he hadn't consistently delivered his best work on that end this series, he had done a decent job on Pau Gasol (with Kevin Garnett sliding over to guard Lamar Odom when Andrew Bynum was out of the game, which was more often than not due to Lakers' young big's own knee injury). In addition, Perk is a reliable big body, of which we are now down to just three -- making foul trouble a real danger for Game 7. With Boston weakened on the front line, LA will probably look to dump it into Gasol more often in the hopes of getting Rasheed Wallace into foul trouble. The Lakers are best when the offense runs through Gasol, but they are sometimes reluctant, for some reason, to exploit him. But even Kobe Bryant should see that foul trouble to Wallace would be so detrimental to the Celtics that he can't help but go to Gasol early, and thus the Lakers offense may be more effective by accident.
There is some good news, or I guess at least a silver lining. For starters, Wallace has actually guarded Gasol fairly well in this series, although he has had trouble doing so without getting into foul trouble. If 'sheed can force Gasol to catch the ball off the block and contest his shots without fouling (content to live with the results of a contested shot) -- things Perk does extremely well -- then we may not miss Perkins at all defensively. If, however, Wallace gambles for steals and blocks in his typical fashion (which is okay when we're less reliant on him for minutes than we will be Thursday night), we could be in some trouble. Either way, I look forward to seeing, at least once, Gasol fall on his ass and then look up helplessly at the official when 'sheed breaks out the "pulling the chair" move.
Offensively, the news is better. There's a John Hollinger column on ESPN about how the Celtics are better off without Perkins, but I'm not an Insider and am not particularly inclined to go around searching for it. I have seen bits and pieces, however, from various blogs, and Hollinger has at least one thing right: Wallace is a much better offensive player than Perkins. Perk's offensive limitations allow the Lakers to guard Boston's starting unit close to 5-on-3, with Bryant backing well off of Rajon Rondo and whoever is guarding Perkins ignoring him unless Perk is standing within five feet of the basket. Wallace's range, which extends out to the three-point line, should unclog the paint for Rondo drives and Paul Pierce isolations, and keep the Lakers honest on pick-and-rolls with Pierce and Ray Allen. I suspect that LA will be more than happy, at least initially, to roll the dice with Wallace bombing away, and so he'll have to knock a couple down for this advantage to really bear fruit. (Fortunately, Wallace expertly didn't waste any of his makes on a lost cause in Game 6!) We don't need the 29 points on 5-for-7 from deep that he gave us in a January win at Toronto with Garnett out (though we'll take it), but the zero points on 0-for-6 from three-point land from Game 6 won't do, either. I'd love to see 'sheed step inside the arc for some of his offense, but at this point, I consider that something of a lost cause.
No matter how well 'sheed plays, however, he, Garnett, and Glen Davis are probably going to need help handling Gasol, Bynum (if he plays), and Odom, particularly on the glass. Last night, that guy was Shelden Williams, and he was, well, terrible. That leaves one other possibility: Brian Scalabrine.
When Shelden is playing regularly, like he was at the start of the season when Davis was out with a hand injury, he's a better option than Scalabrine. He's stronger, a better rebounder, a little more athletic. But he's out of rhythm now, and his performance in Game 6 was bad to the point of being painful to watch. (His play in four minutes in Game 2, his only other action of these Finals, was not much better.) I know Scalabrine hasn't played since March 28 and has barely even dressed for any games during the playoffs, but at this point, if Scalabrine can simply catch the ball most of the time it lands in his hands, he'd be an upgrade over Shelden.
Look, I know this isn't ideal, but there was a time, before we got Wallace, that this wouldn't have been so ridiculous a suggestion. Last year, Doc Rivers tabbed Scalabrine eight times as a starter; five times when Perkins was out and three when Garnett was out. In one of the former, against Phoenix, with Garnett guarding Shaquille O'Neal, Scalabrine held Amare' Stoudemire to 0-for-7 from the field, actually outscoring the five-time All-Star 4-to-3. Scalabrine defends and rebounds with every ounce of his by-NBA-standards-underwhelming ability. If he sees the court on Thursday, there won't be anyone on it playing harder than Brian Scalabrine.
Scal also has the ability, when left open -- and he gets left open a lot -- to knock down an open three or two. It's asking a lot of a guy to step in after not playing for two-and-a-half months and hit jumpers in Game 7 of the NBA Finals, but six or nine points from Scalabrine could be absolutely huge.
Heading into Game 6, there was a lot of chatter on the Internet about how, if Boston won the series, who would win the MVP was still an open question. Scalabrine will never be mentioned in that discussion. But in a series in which the best two players are wearing purple-and-gold, it may take a solid, if unspectacular, performance from a forgotten role player to push the team wearing green-and-white over the top.
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