I'll offer a slightly different take here: they reverted to their native selves. A lot of the improvement we saw from Jan-June was catching the bad O out of their system, but when stuff got tight they want back to their instincts, which are generally pretty gross on the offensive side.
You see this all the time in different walks of life: people can have a good spell of controlling their impulses, doing things a bit differently, creating space through deliberate mindfulness ... and as soon as things get tough they revert right back to who they were. It can be really heartbreaking to see in friends and family; its annoying to see it out of your basketball team.
I think this is exactly what happened, although fatigue could have been a contributing factor, part of the reason "things got tough."
I think this is the trap with Smart. If he's not your pointguard, you're (1) bringing someone in at PG who is probably the weak link in your defense, which instantly changes the identity and scheme of the team, and (2) you've got a below-average offensive player that most teams don't respect, allowing them to double the Jays and slow down the game.
Smart at PG transformed this team defensively, but maybe also capped it offensively? I think its fair to ask if there's any kind of starting lineup with Marcus Smart in it that gets you where you want to be both on both sides of the ball.
Since "where we want to be" is "two more wins than last season," I think the answer is obviously "yes." Parts of the playoff run were so frustrating because of your first point - the reversion to bad habits under pressure. But the good habits are less than 6 months old even today! Part of why the reversion happened was because of how recently in the past the bad habits were just how they did things. A deeper bench, another full year for Ime to implement his system, and the Celtics can improve by 2 wins.
No, my argument is that you can't know when obviously your team is going to be 2 wins from the championship ahead of time, so when you're in the mix don't be looking to duck the tax when you're a goddamn billionaire running around jabbering about Banner 18.
This is a pointless argument, because it devovles down to "Wyc should just spend like he has an unlimited budget every year." OK, maybe he "should." There's nowhere to go from there other than a broken-record of repeating the same criticism over and over again.
Do people really think the Celtics didn't really have much of a chance this season? The front office sure didn't act like it.
On January 7, the Celtics were 18-21 and appeared to be headed for the draft lottery. I don't think anyone saw them going 33-10 and then to the finals from there. Things looked a little better at the deadline (31-25), but that was based on one string month of play, which is still just one month.
They traded another first round pick before the season to flip Kemba Walker for 35 year old Al Horford.
The conventional wisdom at the time was that this deal was a salary dump. Kemba is coming off a season when he hit career-lows in games played, minutes, points and assists per game, assists per 36, PER, and assist rate, and his second worst points per 36 after his rookie year. And he is on the books for $37.5 million next year. The Horford deal did make sense as a straight salary dump.
What's fucking tedious is fans worrying over billionaire owners bottom line.
I'm not expecting Wyc to throw money around like a Lacob or Ballmer.
But, can he just open up the purse strings a little? Is that so much to ask?
But you very clearly
are expecting Wyc to spend like Lacob or Ballmer. Not for 2021-22, but going forward. Because you've said nothing at any point that suggests if the Celtics could have spent money and didn't that you would be OK with it.
Yes. They dumped Schroder (and to a much lesser extent Kanter/Bruno) into the Theis deal when they didn't have to.
A reasonable person could judge the Schroder trade as addition by subtraction. And the idea that the Celtics would have been well served by keeping Bruno and Kanter is, frankly, ludicrous. These were valueless players tossed into a deal for salary matching purposes.
They could've either kept Schroder as a bench player, or spun him as matching salary into a bench player who could play in the playoffs.
Or the could've used one of their TPEs to just take back salary for a bench upgrade.
Or they could've used the Fournier TPE to take back White, and maybe kept Josh Richardson if the Spurs deal were different.
One more guy could've come in handy in game 5 in GS, when you got zero from the three bench players who actually played.
This is all hypothetical, hindsight-biased wishcasting.
The bottom line: Whether he needs to or not, whether he should or not, Wyc runs the Celtics under some financial constraints. We don't know precisely what those are, but we do know that he will go above the tax line in some circumstances but not others. It is reasonable for people to be interested in the team to consider how to best use the resources that Wyc will make available. Doing so isn't worry about Wyc's bottom line, and spinning it that way is disingenuous.
Do we think that this year put the Celts in the realm of legit Championship level team or do we think that most around the league thinks this was a one year wonder team?
The reason I ask is in the context of veterans around the league. Are we a ring chasing destination for veterans or are we still down the pecking order in this regard?
I think it is pretty obvious that they are in the realm of legit championship team. If there was a one-year wonder aspect to this season, it was in getting to that level one year ahead of time after a below average first half.