BGleas

If anything the NBA is the standard for player marketing.

I agree. You want to build your team around a core of Vic, Bogdanovic (sp), Sabonis and whichever point guard you get, in this case Rozier. I wouldn't give up Sabonis if I was the Pacers, just saying if I'm the Celtics that's where I'm starting. I think the Celtics would say no to Turner, but I could be wrong.

It's not a bad offer, it really made me thing, but ultimately I don't think I would do it from the Celtics perspective, nor do I think Ainge would do it. The Celtics don't really need Turner, they already have Horford, Baynes, and Thies, and they drafted a one and done kid in the previous draft who is an athletic big that they like. I think you could debate who the best player in that trade would be between Turner and Brown, but Collison is clearly the worst, so between that and the Celtics not really needing Turner, I don't think they would do it. With that said, I do think that was an interesting offer. When I thought of Rozier to the Pacers I did think any offer would have to begin with either Turner or Sabonis, but including Sabonis would be crazy for the Pacers.

I said it last summer, but I think Terry Rozier would be a good fit for the Pacers, and certainly an upgrade over Collison. There are rumblings that the Celtics are open to trading him, as he has not handled going back to the bench too well. I just don't know what the Pacers would have to offer? Other good thing about Rozier is that he actually plays better off the ball, so he'd pair well next to Oladipo. I just don't know what the Pacers would have to offer?

Kyrie has played solid defense since he’s been in Boston. He plays major minutes on the best defensive team in the league. Also, Cleveland did get worse when Kyrie left. They weren’t nearly as good last season as they were the previous three seasons. If Kyrie had been healthy the Celtics would have won that series. Should we focus some of this discussion on Vic maybe too? For a #2 pick you could call his career a disappointment prior to last season. He was unable to gel with Westbrook when he had a chance to play with another All-Star and I believe was coming off the bench some his last year in Orlando.

I don’t know, his teams have done nothing but win the last 4 seasons, and it will be 5 this year, including a title in which he outplayed a 2-time MVP. He is a scorer, but he’s an efficient one. Both Vic and Kyrie are great players.

Vic was great down the stretch, Kyrie hit 4 threes down the stretch too. Vic is an all-star he should make those plays, just as Kyrie did/should. Good win for the Pacers and was a really fun, entertaining game to watch. Both teams are clearly in the top 4 of the East and it should be fun to watch all year. This was 1 of 82.

I should have clarified better, I meant the tops of the conferences. Completely agree that the West is deeper and the East has a big drop after the first 4-5 teams. But, I think you can argue that the East's top 4 is a stronger collective 4 than the West's. Again of course, Golden State is clearly #1, but I think Toronto and Boston, especially once they all gel with Kyrie and Hayward back which is admittedly taking some time, are the 2nd and 3rd best teams in the NBA, and then it's probably a toss-up between Indiana, Denver, Utah and New Orleans for that next spot.

You could make the argument that the West is no longer the better conference, or at least that it's evened out to where there isn't much difference. Golden State is clearly the best team, but after that in the West Houston got worse, San Antonio got worse, at least until Roberson comes bask, OKC is overrated/worse. Denver and Utah are both a little better, as well as New Orleans and maybe Portland, and of course, the Lakers are the elephant in the room as they will improve, but they're not a dominant team, but the West IMO got worse over the offseason. In the East Toronto is clearly better, Milwaukee certainly upgraded on the bench and is better, Boston will be better as they gel with Kyrie and Hayward back, and I think Indiana is better simply due to Vic being more comfortable as a 'star', Sabonis developing and some of the moves they made to strengthen their bench. I do think Philly got worse. I'm sure it will change, most likely in the West, but if you matched up the top 4 current teams in each conference (Golden St., Denver, Utah, SA vs. Milwaukee, Toronto, Boston, Indiana) there's not much difference. Again, Golden State is the most dominant, but after that, you could maybe say the East has the next best 3-4 teams currently.

My freshmen year in college I had a game where I went 1-for-10 from 3. Not lie. I was 2-for-12 for the game overall.

I’m not sure Chicago isn’t a great defensive team, but they’re still NBA players out there playing live action, 14-24 is crazy. Heck, Oladipo took 24 shot overall from the field last night and made 9.

But very few guys can do it at that clip when you get the attempts up that high. I think it’s an amazing record, 14-24 is just insane shooting.

Funny story, I watched the brawl in the Celtics locker room. We had a home game and I had just walked the last of the media out to close the locker room to them, and watched the brawl with some staff and players. The Celtics next game was at Indiana and we were all stunned watching it unfold. On Pierce’s way out of the locker room to head to the airport, he was celebrating and dancing because he wouldn’t have to be defended by Artest the next night.

Agree! Only knock on Greek Freak is that the East hasn’t been great and I think they have a good enough roster and now coach, that if he’s a top 5 guy he should have Milwaukee in the top 3 of the East.

Yeah, I love Stevens and so glad the Celtics have him, but to rank him ahead of Pop is crazy.

I think the key word for both games was “home”. I didn’t see the Pacers game, so don’t really know what happened there, but the Celtics-Raptors game was a great game. It was back and forth all game, and one possession with a little more than 2 minutes to go. Typical NBA game where the role players for Toronto played great down the stretch (which explains the final score), not so much for Boston, and Toronto got all the calls (not crying about the refs, just the nature of the NBA, home teams get calls). No doubt, Toronto is infinitely better with Kawai. I’ve never been a big DeRozan fan, nice player, but not a guy who is going to win you a playoff series when you need it. Kawai is a huge, huge upgrade for them.

It will be tricky. Part of the reason these guys can command such lucrative marketing opps/shoe deals as rookies is that fans know these players from their year in college playing at Duke, Kansas, Kentucky, UCLA, UNC, etc. Are shoe companies going to give a lucrative contract to a guy playing for the Erie Bayhawks or the Iowa Wolves? I'm sure someone in the agent world will do the math, but what is the exposure of playing at one of these top, blue blood college worth in terms of future revenue? I could take 100K from Nike, play at Duke, and be a household name. What is that worth in terms of marketing dollars the next 3-5 years?

I don't disagree with all of that. As I said, I wasn't a Kyrie fan before. Even now, it's not like I absolutely love him or anything. His defense has been embarrassing at times in his career, though was much better last season. But at the same time, you're dismissing what he's done in the playoffs/Finals at the highest level. I don't know how to remove the LeBron factor, as clearly LeBron was the leader and reason they got that far three years in a row, but Kyrie absolutely outplayed Curry in that 2016 Finals. He had a 41 point game in Game 5 when they were down 3-1, he averaged 27 for the series and hit the game-winning shot on the road in Game 7. Outplaying a two-time MVP/3-time champion in Curry and beating him in the Finals isn't nothing. Again, the LeBron factor will also be the asterisk until he does it on his own, but you can't just dismiss it either. On the Celtics now, Hayward isn't close to being his old self, and I don't think he will be until next season, if at all. Kyrie and Horford at the leaders of that team. Brown is an emerging leader, and Tatum is going to be a flat-out star, but he's not a leader yet. Tatum has even talked about Kyrie helping his transition to the NBA. Kyrie absolutely led them the first half of last season, and remember many people thought they'd be a 6-8 seed team after Hayward went down, some even saying they'd miss the playoffs.

You're saying Kyrie hasn't shown he can carry a team, so I thought you were entering their pasts as part of the conversation with that statement, no? If we're looking at their entire careers, there is literally no comparison at all. Both were incredibly high picks drafted into bad situations where team success was limited, but Kyrie has been a star from day 1, Vic (again, who I love, so not really enjoying this topic) has had one good year. But, I guess the debate is who the better leader is, and who can carry a franchise. To be honest, I don't really know how to carry out defending Kyrie on this. He has a long list of career accomplishments, but there's a 'yeah, but' with all of them. Yeah, but his teams stunk his first three years. Yeah, but he had LeBron his next three years. Yeah, but the Celtics were still good after he got hurt, and their roster is better and they have one of the best coaches. The LeBron thing is weird too, it has both helped and hindered Kyrie's career. With LeBron he got to show what he could do at the highest level, and he delivered, but at the same time it stifled his development as a leader and playmaker. Kyrie is the best player on arguably the best team in the East, but with that here is a lot in his favor (great roster, best coach, etc.). Vic hasn't had long-term NBA success at this level, but he did carry a team last season to the playoffs that most didn't think would be good. Both have accomplishments, and both still have things to prove. If Vic continues on the foundation he set last season, both guys are in that second tier of NBA stars.

I hate to be in a position to not support Vic, because I'm a huge fan, but with that said, in 6 NBA seasons the only place Vic has led a team is to a first-round loss in the playoffs one time, granted that team did overachieve largely due to him. But, you could also argue that as a #2 overall pick that Vic had been a disappointment until last season. But, there's also no doubt that Vic was phenomenal last season. Kyrie is by no means a perfect player, and he's not the all-around player that some of the other top guards are, but he was a 5-6apg guy early in his career when he was surrounded by garbage, and then LeBron came which certainly elevated his teams, but also caused his playmaking to regress because LeBron dominated the ball. From a team perspective, Kyrie absolutely benefitted from having LeBron, as does anyone he plays with, but at the same time with Kyrie injured Cleveland got crushed in the 2015 Finals, with him back they won the title in 2016 with Kyrie outplaying Steph in that series, averaging 27ppg and hitting the game/championship winning shot. He did outplay Steph in that series. Being honest, I was not a big Kyrie fan before watching him more closely last season, and being really honest I still don't love his game. But, he is better than I previously thought, he cares more than I previously thought, and he's definitely in that second tier of NBA stars. He was a great leader of that team after Hayward went down and they went on that run of wins, he played a huge part in keeping the team together and playing well. But, If he wasn't surrounded by Danny Ainge and Brad Stevens and an overall stable organization like the Celtics, would I want him as my teams best player, the honest answer is no. If I were the Knicks there's no chance I would give him a max contract to be my teams best player next summer. But, with the Celtics, it works. But also being honest, if my goal is to win a title, I wouldn't want Vic as my best player either. They're both second-tier NBA stars, not guys that instantly make you a title contender.

I think he has been on that second tier (8-15) of star level. I'm not putting him in the LeBron, Durant, Curry or Kawai (when he's right) category, of course. He's certainly more one-dimensional than some guys (Vic, Greek Freak, etc.), but he is an elite scorer and ball handler. In his defense, he did average 27ppg in the Finals in 2016, including making the championship winning shot in Game 7. Also last season, while certainly more talented than the Bucks and Pacers in terms of the rest of the roster, Kyrie was the leader of a team that finished 2nd in the conference, and was considered a mid-level playoff team after Hayward went down 5 minutes into the season. Vic is certainly a more all-around player, no doubt, but Kyrie is far more proven at this level in terms of being a star and leading teams.

The Celtics just have so much length all over the court, it's pretty amazing what they can do defensively. I would agree on a few teams having a better individual player (Giannis, Embiid, Leonard), but mainly just because Kyrie looks to me like he's regressing. He's still an All-Star, but he looked out of shape and soft to me last night. His body looked like he hasn't been in a weight room in a while. The flip side is that I would not be surprised if in 2-3 years Tatum is a top 5 player in the NBA. He's a flat-out stud, and it's crazy that both Philly and LA passed on him.

I loved Rondo on the Celtics and agree on that comparison a bit, the issue for the Sixers though is that Simmons is either their best or at worst 2nd best player. It will be tough in this day and age to win a championship or even really compete for one seriously if your best (or second best) player can't shoot outside the paint. Rondo was the 4th or even 5th scoring option on those Celtics teams and was surrounded by HOF'er scorers. If Fultz can develop into a guard that you can rely on 20ppg+ from, to go along with Embiid, then it will work with Simmons as the distributor/swiss army knife guy, but right now Emiid is the only legit, consistent All-Star level scorer they have. Simmons is an All-Star for sure, but not a consistent scorer.

Completely agree on Simmons. I didn’t mean he isn’t a legit super star, he’s a phenomenal player. But his biggest weakness, lack of shooting, is a huge, huge weakness. Even with the great passing, court vision, length, etc., he’s manageable for good defenses with length because he’s not a shooter.

So, my one game into the season overreaction, the Sixers are worse than last season. When losing Illyasova and Belinelli, they lost the shooting that made them so effective the second half of last season. Unless Fultz somehow turns into a legit star, which I don’t think is going to happen, they have some real problems. Not enough reliable scoring and playmakers, and they don’t have a single guard, in a guards league, that scares you. To me Ben Simmons is weird. He’s a freak athlete, he’s incredibly skilled with the ball and he puts up monster stat lines, but as an opponent he doesn’t scare me at all. It’s sort of like Matt Ryan, he’s going to retire with huge numbers, maybe some better than Manning, Brady and Brees, but when playing the Falcons I’m not like, “oh crap, we have to go against Matt Ryan, we don’t have a chance!”