Curran: The 2022-23 Celtics sadly proved 'anything' was possible originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston
I guess what's most shocking -- or should be -- is that a team with two All-NBA players, last year's Defensive Player of the Year, a former Rookie of the Year who is also this year's Sixth Man Award winner, an All-NBA second-team defender and four players in the regular rotation who were drafted in the top six (including three No. 3 overall picks) can turn in a performance like the Celtics did Monday night in Game 7 ... and it's ACTUALLY NOT A SURPRISE.
No level of underachievement and no level of excellence is beyond this team's capability.
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I wouldn't have been surprised Monday night if they beat the Heat by 25 and Jayson Tatum had 54 points. I’m certainly not surprised that they instead turned in a tentative, scared and -- to borrow Jaylen Brown's word from Saturday night -- "apprehensive" performance.
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Brown is in focus today. And he should be. He’s a very good player. An excellent scorer. But he's not one of the 15 best players in the league. The con that he is "elite" and right there with Tatum has thrived, and now that he’s been named All-NBA and is in line with the supermax contract that comes with it, that con will live on.
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But he's an inconsistent, easily distracted defender who too frequently gets pump-faked into the rafters. He makes some creative passes, but his decision-making is below-average. If they kept a stat for time spent in the air deciding what to do, Brown would lead by several minutes. He spends an inordinate amount of time falling, nearly falling and clanging into people, creating a danger to himself and others. He's extremely clumsy for an elite athlete. And too often he handles the ball like he’s wearing oven mitts.
He’s also a bit hard to trust in the clutch. To me, free throws are like a lie detector test. The number of free throws Brown misses -- especially short, especially in key moments -- serves as practically an announcement that he’s puckering.
Say this for Brown, though: He finishes like a champ. He’s one of the NBA’s best mid-range shooters and has been despite the team’s absurd, analytics-based request two years ago asking him to hoist more 3s and fewer mid-range shots.
He wants very badly to be good. He works very hard to improve. His handle at the start of the season was WAY, WAY, WAY better than it was in last year’s Finals. But as the season wore on, defenses ratcheted up and Brown was given less room to operate, that handle regressed and was exposed when pressure was applied.
Brown and Tatum can work all they want on their "bag." Combo dribbles, Eurosteps, step-throughs and spins can twist ankles and make people yell, "OHHH, TOO STRONG!!!" and make for nice highlights. But it’s driveway basketball. Worse, when you need 11 dribbles to set up a move to go past someone (or to set up a stepback), it's counter-productive to creating fluent offense. And with Brown and Tatum, that's the foundation of their game.
Do you realize Golden State’s Klay Thompson scored 60 points on 11 dribbles in a game in 2016? THAT was the style of play I thought the Celtics were trying to emulate and instill here. But it doesn’t look like that. At all.
The Catch-22 with both Brown and Tatum are their positives. They play almost every game. Basketball is obviously extremely important to them and they live it. Their conditioning and training is everything you want from your best players. They WANT to win. They are high-character people. They are 25-plus-ppg scorers, and that puts asses in seats.
But they are going to cost this team more than a half-billion.
Obviously you ride it out with a top-five player like Tatum -- who does everything at a high level on both ends -- and you wait for the improved on-court composure and decision-making.
Do you soldier on with the fairly overrated Brown, continuing to try and find pieces who will help the Jays flourish and ignore Brown had 68 assists and 66 turnovers in this postseason?
Do you figure that 2022-23 was a messed-up year because of the coaching change and give the whole group a pass and run it back, kind of like the Patriots are doing with Mac Jones and their offense post-Matt Patricia?
Personally, I think the Celtics can find and/or develop a player better than Brown, and I've thought selling high with him has been the play for a couple years.
But I think the team would be hesitant move him, because dealing with the criticism and rage over shipping out an "ALL-NBA PLAYER!!!!" might be too much.
If Brown stays and Tatum stays, I know the team we watch will win 45 to 55 games a year and make the playoffs. There's something to be said for the year-to-year "they'll get there" development process and watching it unfold.
But I'm skeptical they'll "get there" or "get it" after watching the last 20 games they played against the Sixers, Heat and Hawks.
These Celtics are capable of absolutely any kind of performance. Heroic or horrific.
Fifteen years ago, Kevin Garnett screamed "Anything is possible!!!!" while confetti fell. The same three words apply now. But nobody’s celebrating.
