Be Like Tike

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Yes, the season has begun. I have, however, failed to choose my NBA team. So far I have profiled the Wizards and the Bulls, but I have at least eight more teams that I want to get around to before making my final choice. I will try to avoid letting current results affect me, but, honestly, I can not ignore the events of the league. With that said, I will give them as little weight in the process as possible and allow the same factors – namely talent and storylines – that would have made my decision for me otherwise to do the same now.

With that said, the Boston Celtics are obviously one of the stories of this pre-season. With Danny Ainge deciding that he could not continue being Executive Director of Basketball Operations for the Celtics and keep rebuilding, the Celtics dumped all of the young talent that they had accrued over the last four or five seasons.  All of those players turned into Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen. Putting those two stars into a lineup along with Paul Pierce obviously creates one of the Biggest Threes that the NBA has ever seen. Garnett, who became sick of losing in Minnesota, seems to be re-energized now (see his 22 point, 20 rebound game last night) that a title is potentially in his sights.  Allen, meanwhile, is one of the elite three point shooters in the league, while Pierce is the same elite slasher that he has always been.

The coexistence, or potential lack thereof, of these three superstars is undoubtedly one of the most important stories this year as they will be attempting to restore the Celtics’ dynasty.  As has been noted, the three superstars balance each other out extremely well while the rest of the team could be extremely weak, with Rajon Rando and Kendrick Perkins holding the other two spots in the starting five. Also, the team is reportedly hustling harder than it has any right to, with the three superstars and all of their teammates diving after every loose ball and hustling on pretty much every play. If the superstars are hustling and can pull whichever other two players are on the court with them at the same time to somewhere near the same level that they play at.

The team is going to be run by Doc Rivers, however.  The coach has appeared more and more clueless in the past few years and could eventually end up pulling this team down.  Of course, how talented of a coach do you really have to be when you have Garnett, Pierce, and Allen as three fifths of your starting lineup?

This team is very interesting as they are trying to live up to a dynasty and create one of their own, but they are everyone’s hot pick this year.  That makes them extremely unattractive to me as they will be receiving enough undue hype from ESPN, Sports Illustrated, Bob Ryan, Dan Shaugnessy, and various other sources.  America will eventually become as inundated with Celtics coverage, particularly if they are very good or very bad, as it is with Kobe coverage right now.

Also, Bill Simmons covers the Celtics.  I can not write the 5,000 word columns that he pops out on a weekly basis and I do not know nearly as much about Celtic lore as he does.  I feel almost as if I would be infringing if I picked them.

The Celtics are the hot pick for the rest of America, but I doubt that they will be the team that I end up picking.  Also, I dislike Boston sports entirely too much to choose the Celtics.  I am sick of  hearing about the Patriots, the Red Sox, and even Boston College (even though I sort of like them).

Whether I pick the Celtics or not, they are an experiment on a grand level as they will end up showing how much winning truly does matter to superstars who have become accustomed to losing situations and just how much being a superstar matters to each of the Big Three. I do not, however, believe that they will end up being my choice.

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