NYT article on Jrue here:
How the Celtics’ trust in Jrue Holiday earned NBA championship No. 18. Most interesting part is the description of the 2-1-2 zone BOS breaks out, which I'll copy here for posterity.
But there was one defensive scheme that was entirely Holiday’s domain. The Celtics devised a zone defense with Holiday in the middle, and it was his job to determine when the Celtics would break it out.
If Holiday decided it was time to change the tempo of the game, he would turn to his teammates and mutter, “21 Savage.”
“I can’t remember if it was one of the guys’ favorite rappers, but I was like, ‘Let’s come up with a name just to make it fun,’ ” Mazzulla said. “Maybe it’s because Jrue’s a savage and he’s in the middle?”
Activating 21 Savage was Holiday’s responsibility. Sometimes Mazzulla would ask him during a timeout if they should go into it. Sometimes Holiday wouldn’t say a word, wait until the team gets on the court and then call it out.
It might last several possessions or as short as the first 14 seconds of the shot clock. The team just followed Holiday’s lead as he monitored the state of play.
“To be honest, we don’t even know what we’re doing out there,” Celtics teammate Sam Hauser said. “It’s pretty random. We just figure it out.”
The team trusted that Holiday had his finger on the emotional pulse of the game and counted on him to manipulate the opponent better than anyone else.
“It f—ed up the offense, really,” Holiday said. “Even if we go on a run, they call a timeout, they’re trying to adjust to what we’re doing. So we throw something different at ’em to mess them up too.”
According to teammate Al Horford, the 21 Savage zone works because Holiday is so effective at cleaning up teammates’ mistakes.
“It’s communication and some instinct, to be honest,” Horford said. “If there’s a breakdown or a mistake, he’s covering it up and then we’re reacting off of it and it’s just automatic. We’ve done a good job of trusting each other and instincts just take over.”
If someone was out of position, Holiday would jump in quickly to cover for them and then the rest of the defense would revolve around him. As offenses have increasingly become more read and react, Holiday helped the Celtics’ defense do the same.
“I think it just opened up his creativity and his instincts to do things that, just in the course of the game, he has the ability to do,” Mazzulla said. “When Jrue’s at his best, he’s not thinking. He’s just instinctually reacting and he can change a defensive possession and change an entire game.”
I'm going to hate seeing him play for another team when the taxes get to be too high.
