Celtics Lab NBA Basketball Podcast

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A look back at 2020-21, and a glimpse at the Celtics' future Jun 09, 2021

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With some time to have thought about both, it's time to reflect on the 2020-21 Boston Celtics and how the team's major front-office shakeup will affect its future. With longtime team president Danny Ainge stepping down from that role in favor of (then) head coach Brad Stevens, the Celtics have as much on their plate to work on as they have at any point in the last two decades. Head coaching searches, potential further moves in the front office, bringing back some players and perhaps shipping off others -- the list is truly ponderous when you get down to brass tacks. And we can't forget about the season that was given how much of an imprint it will have on everything moving forward! To that end we brought in two of our best experts on the landscape of the league and Boston's financial situation, Michael Scotto and Yossi Goszlan of HoopsHype. They join your usual hosts Alex Goldberg, Cameron Tabatabaie and Justin Quinn in sizing up the season past and how it shapes the needs of the Celtics in the present -- as well as what might be coming down the pike. There's a lot on this podcast to wrap your head around, and we'll go further in-depth on a lot of these topics as the offseason dictates, but let's all get our collective bearings after a tectonic shift of sorts within the wider Boston landscape.

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CLAB 48: Boston trades Ainge for Stevens as top exec as Danny steps down Jun 02, 2021

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The Boston Celtics followed up a disappointing first-round exit at the hands of the Brooklyn Nets in the 2021 NBA playoffs with a truly major shake-up internally, easily the biggest set of changes the organization has seen in nearly two decades. The announcement of longtime Team President Danny Ainge's retirement and the elevation of Head Coach Brad Stevens to the position of Head of Basketball Operations not only radically transformed the Celtics organization at a critical moment for their aspirations of chasing an NBA-record 18th title. It also raised a host of questions about the future and direction of the storied franchise. Who will replace Stevens as head coach? Did Ainge make the right call? Is Stevens the right man to replace him, and who else might have been in the mix -- or perhaps should have been?

In this episode of the Celtics Lab, we talk about the tumult currently in process within the organization and what we think about the future of the club under its new structure. Join hosts Cameron Tabatabaie, Alex Goldberg and Justin Quinn as they get down to brass tacks about the future of our favorite franchise in light of the earth-shaking news.

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CLAB 47: On not 'keeping it hoop' Jun 01, 2021

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Former Boston Celtics and current Brooklyn Nets star Kyrie Irving poked the third rail of Boston sports ahead of his first appearance in front of fans since leaving the team in free agency by (rightly and justifiably) asking for a response from the fans coming to Games 3 and 4 free of casual racism. In asking the fans of his former team to 'keep it hoop,' he seemed to breach his own social contract by symbolically stepping on the Celtics logo at midcourt, which may or may not be in some way tied to a fan throwing a water bottle and (rightly and justifiably) getting arrested and banned from the arena for life. In this episode of the Celtics Lab, we take a quick look at those events and the general trend of terrible behavior around the league, and try and make sense of our thoughts on this complicated set of interrelated issues. However you feel about Irving's choice of symbolism after Game 4, the trend of how players in arenas are being treated is a problematic and highly visible phenomenon the NBA needs to find ways to address more effectively. We aren't sure if upping the ante with increasingly aggressive criminal charges is the answer, but ignoring the problem certainly isn't the answer either.

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CLAB 46: Easy series, hard conversations May 28, 2021

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When Boston Celtics fans were hoping for a distraction from the turd of a series their banged-up Celtics club was producing vs- the Brooklyn Nets in the East's first round, they probably weren't looking to get sucked into the city's sordid history of fraught race relations nor the reprehensible behavior sweeping the league at the moment.

But former Boston point guard Kyrie Irving said some things, and some well-respected Celtics said some things in response, and suddenly not just Boston but much of the NBA more generally is debating what ought to be done about fans acting like sociopaths in the league's recently reopened arenas. Joined by Off the Glass' head honcho and "Brooklyn Buzz" podcast co-host Nick Fay, we dive into some difficult but important basketball-adjacent issues on this episode of the Celtics Lab. With the NBA forging ahead in one of the most difficult years in modern history on a number of levels that affect fan engagement in live game action, it may be time to re-assess how the league and we as fans come together to enjoy sport. And things much bigger than it, while we're talking about it.

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CLAB 45: Finding some positives in a Game 1 loss to the Brooklyn Nets May 24, 2021

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prospects for winning even a single game of the matchup diminished, it would be easy to doom and gloom about the Boston Celtics' 104 - 93 loss to the Nets Saturday night. But despite the sting of defeat, there were a fair amount of positives to take from the contest -- and the potential for an upset win or two are still out there if with fewer chances to accomplish them. To take stock of what we saw and bring in an opposing view on the series, we invited the editor of our sister site Nets Wire to come on the Celtics Lab podcast, and to that end Ajayi Browne had plenty to say about the series so far. We get into Robert Williams III's big game, where the Celtics could have done better, and even take a look around the league's other postseason games to close things out. In a season of soured expectations and countless setbacks, there's been some real value in riding out the storm to see who has the chops to grow with the team moving forward.

Join your usual hosts Justin Quinn, Alex Goldberg and Cameron Tabatabaie for a deep dive into the positives -- really, there were some -- coming out of Game 1 against the Nets.

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CLAB 44: The Big Ticket in the Hall of Fame with Sopan Deb May 19, 2021

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Whether the Boston Celtics win or lose their play-in tournament game against the Washington Wizards, it's safe to say it won't affect the legacy of recently-inducted Hall of Fame Celtics legend Kevin Garnett. So in the spirit of sports positive inspired by friend of the pod the Riffs Man, we decided to take a break from focusing on the season at hand to pay homage to KG's career in the week of his induction to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. We are joined by special guest Sopan Deb of the New York Times, who talks all things The Big Ticket with us after penning an account of the start of Garnett's career. We even try and prognosticate what might be coming down the pike in the coming offseason for the Celtics. Join hosts Cameron Tabatabaie, Alex Goldberg, and Justin Quinn as we honor KG in this most recent episode of the Celtics Lab.

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CLAB 43: Celtics mutual aid rehumanization therapy session with the Riffsman May 12, 2021

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It can be easy to lose sight of the things that matter in moments of crisis, and in a year and counting of a global pandemic, it can be even easier to forget we're all profoundly impacted by it.

The 2020-21 Boston Celtics are dragging themselves across the finish line of perhaps the most difficult season in the seventy-year history of the NBA, missing key players to injury, personal tragedy still fresh for many players on the team, and just starting to get their bearings after getting harder by COVID than any other team in the NBA. Yet somehow, fans and media alike have taken this team trying to make it through the day like the rest of us and put them on a pedestal, forgetting their humanity and everything Boston's players have accomplished both on and off the court. To that end, we linked up with friend of the pod and Celtics fan fixture The Riffsman to talk the season so far and more importantly the Peoples Tommy Point Charity Drive For 18. Countering the negativity with a drive to help the Celtics -- and Marcus Smart's YounGameChanger Foundation, specifically -- The Riffsman dives into all things Boston with us in this episode. To find out more about what the Peoples Tommy Point Charity Drive For 18 is and how you can help or just to lift the funk hanging over many Celtics fans of late, make sure you listen to this pod.

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CLAB 42: Where will the Cs be seeded, and what could it mean for their postseason? May 06, 2021

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While the fourth seed and home court in the first round is not out of reach, is it still a realistic target? What would Boston likely be up against if they slip to the sixth seed -- or worse, the play-in tournament? Is there a scenario that could realistically see the Celtics bounced before they even sniff the actual playoffs? And just what is this team's realistic ceiling, given what we've seen? This episode, hosts Justin Quinn, Cam Tabatabaie and Alex Goldberg are joined by special guest and Celtics Wire alumnus Q. Albertie Shiron of SLAM! to talk postseason seeding and its potential impact, exploring all the possible permutations of the end of Boston's season.nWe also dive into the week that was, given the history that was made and the play that often went with it to make one want to avert their eyes. Press play on the player embedded above or subscribe on your favorite purveyor of podcasts to hear all this Celtics content and more.

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CLAB 41: Mapping out the Boston Celtics' stretch run Apr 28, 2021

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There's ten games left in the Boston Celtics schedule, and after witnessing their lackadaisical effort in the team's 119 - 115 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder Tuesday night, one might be forgiven if one thought the team's players wish it were fewer. But the Celtics still have time to build some chemistry and rhythm heading into the postseason, and exactly 10 games to accomplish it. Who do they face, what are the contexts that matter about those matchups -- and most importantly, who do we expect to win the final 10 games of Boston's season? For this episode of the Celtics Lab, we dive into all things stretch run for Boston, putting the schedule under the microscope for some fine-grained analysis. Join your hosts Alex Goldberg, Cameron Tabatabaie and Justin Quinn as they parse the final phase of the 2020-21 NBA season from a Boston Celtics perspective.

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CLAB 40: Setting expectations for Jabari Parker as a Celtics player rehab project Apr 20, 2021

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The Boston Celtics have made something of a name for themselves as a good landing spot for players whose career has fallen short of where expectations had at one time had them pegged, with head coach Brad Stevens getting a reputation as the sort of coach able to get a little more out of such players than his peers. Now, the team has decided to sign former No. 2 overall pick Jabari Parker to a two-year deal in the same sort of mold as we once saw for the Jordan Crawfords and Evan Turners of the league. What should we expect from Parker given how hard injuries have impacted his career, and just how real is the imagined capabilities of Boston as a potential career rejuvenator? This week's edition of the Celtics Lab asks exactly these questions, with hosts Cameron Tabatabaie, Alex Goldberg and Justin Quinn diving deep into the data and narratives surrounding the modern-day Celtics mystique of career rehabilitation. We find some nuggets of truth to it, some glaring exceptions, and discord about who should even be considered such players. Plug in your aux cords or earphones and press play, this edition of the lab sets the table for the Jabari Parker in Boston.

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