Boston has lost their mojo along with more than a couple of games recently. And they better find it before I go completely nuts.
It has to look better than this, more often than this.
It will be better. Mathematically, it has to be. The Boston Celtics have lost four of their last six games, but they shoot enough threes, have enough talent and play in a weak enough conference so that it will automatically be better. But in Boston, we’re not looking for automatic; this team is supposed to be more than that.
I thought we were in the clear. The back-to-back losses to the Magic and 76ers looked bad, but then the Celtics brought the hammer down on Indiana with a thirty-seven-point bludgeoning. No Kristaps Porzingis, no Jrue Holiday and facing a fully healthy Pacers team? No problem. Signature win.
But Sunday saw a return to ugly form, replete with wildly inaccurate three-point shooting from iso-ball possessions and such nonexistent defense that I considered calling the National Guard. There were cute bursts of energy and proof of the Celtics’ superior physicality to their scrawny Indiana adversaries, but nothing convincing. Nothing signature. Nothing that makes me think Banner 19 is actually in the cards.
What is this team trying to do? Drunkenly stumble toward a mediocre 54-28 record and be four-point home underdogs to the Cleveland Cavaliers in the second round? The Celtics’ inconsistency reeks of a post-championship food coma, and having run out of early-season adrenaline, they’re now falling to worse teams that want it more. That’s inexcusable.
After four days off, Boston just played six games in ten days, and their lethargy was palpable. Their two wins — post-embarrassment obliterations of the Bulls and Pacers — felt like market corrections, while the losses reflected their actual energy.
Derrick White is in a real slump, no matter what the box scores say; Jayson Tatum is unassertive and complaining; Payton Pritchard has been unable to summon his mojo when the Celtics need it most. And beyond his efforts, Boston’s bench is officially nonexistent.
These losses beg uncomfortable questions. Is the river finally coming for Al Horford, who was 1-10 from three on Sunday? Can the Celtics plausibly make a deep playoff run missing one, let alone two, of their starters? Are they still the prohibitive favorites in the Eastern Conference, as they were for the first two months of the season?
If I was forced to remove my panic hat and answer all of those questions logically, I would say… probably not, probably yes, and still yes. All of this will get better, because that is simply what happens when super-talented teams hit rough patches — just ask the Milwaukee Bucks. But it can’t just be better. It has to look better.
And that looking better has to start on defense, because I’m not sure what this team is trying to pull meandering around against skinny two-guards that should be getting bodied all the way to Waltham. T.J. McConnell should never have a clean layup. Bennedict Mathurin should not need one hesitation to get a clean layup. It’s hard to balance offense and defense in a five-man lineup when Pritchard needs to play 30 minutes to get us to 110 points, but if you’re not going to get a stop for an entire half, there should be clawing and biting, not confused, inconsistent sliding.
When you’re trying to pull off a title defense, above-averageness culminating in a respectable three seed is not going to fly. It’s so much harder than winning the first one. It’s impossible to get that dire, life-or-death feeling that pushed everyone to their maximums a year ago back. But the Eastern Conference smells blood in the water and a team that, with a few nagging injuries, has lost its world-destroying identity. They must get that back, and they must make it look as good as it can possibly be. Because right now, they aren’t scaring anyone.