11 things I’m thankful for

Thanksgiving is a time to pause, look again, and watch soccer be pleased about every thing that’s occurred within the final 12 months. It’s notably simple to give you a fats gratitude checklist for Boston Celtics followers who’ve had a heck of a basketball time of late. Listed below are some Celtics issues I’m giving thanks for earlier than the tryptophan hits.

1. The demise of basketball

Is Mazzulla-ball ruining the NBA? After all not, though it’d really feel that approach to the beleaguered competitors.

Joe heard preliminary criticisms that his groups have been taking pictures too many threes, and as a substitute of acquiescing to public stress, he cranked that **** to 11. The Celtics, as you’ve heard by now, are taking pictures greater than half their pictures from past the arc. Oh no, my eyes!

Amazingly, Boston solely has the third-best offense in the league right now, mere fractions of some extent behind the Knicks and the Cavaliers. These groups rank sixteenth and fifteenth, respectively, in three-point frequency. It’s virtually like there are multiple paths to creating good offense, and that basketball is as alive and effectively because it’s ever been!

Mazzulla has created a system that maximizes his personnel. No one and no course of is ever good, however we simply watched the Celtics raze the league to the bottom final season, and occasional sleepwalking apart, they appear poised to take action once more this 12 months.

2. Derrick White

We should always all be eternally grateful for Derrick White. It’s arduous to reconcile the man benched within the 2022 NBA Finals for being an offensive legal responsibility with the dude who seems to be like a long-lost Splash Brother (greater than 9 triples per sport this season!). He’s now in his third straight 12 months of setting a career-high for three-point proportion (41.5%), and it’s inarguable that he’s been a minimum of Boston’s third-best participant this 12 months — and analytically-minded of us may need him even greater than that.

He even has a brand new Sam Adams beer, which gave us this Oscar-worthy performance. Is likely to be a pleasant pairing with some turkey.

Photograph by Brian Babineau/NBAE by way of Getty Photos

3. The early return of Kristaps Porzingis

Porzingis had a powerful debut Monday night time, notching 16 factors and notably bettering the Celtics’ protection. The Celtics went 14-3 with out him this season, they usually cruised to an NBA championship principally with out him, too. However that’s not the purpose. Porzingis isn’t obligatory, precisely, as a result of the Celtics are so good that just about nobody is critical. However he’s insurance coverage and overkill, a security assure. He brings a swaggy element to this Celtics’ staff growing their range and effectiveness in equal measure.

I’m further grateful as a result of we weren’t speculated to see him till the subsequent main vacation, give or take a number of weeks. Seeing him seem weeks early as a Black Friday sale merchandise as a substitute of a gift beneath the Christmas tree was an sudden delight.

4. Steve Kerr and Staff USA

Whereas Celtics followers have been irritated with Jayson Tatum’s lack of taking part in time and Jaylen Brown’s snub, it stored them each motivated and (extra importantly) wholesome to proceed dominating this season. Not way more must be mentioned right here. Thanks, Steve!

Photograph by Noah Graham/NBAE by way of Getty Photos

5. The Jays, abiding

I’m grateful Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum have continued to buck compelled nationwide storylines that they will’t maximize one another, that they every want their very own staff to achieve full potential. They’ve by no means wavered in phrase or deed, and to see them destroy the league final season (and once more to this point this 12 months, give or take some shaky taking pictures to begin) regardless of so many defective narratives considerably restores my religion in basketball humanity.

6. The brand new NBA Cup court docket

Perhaps the NBA Cup courts aren’t to your style, however have you ever seemed across the league? In case you assume the brand new court docket needed to be one thing obnoxiously garish at baseline, the Celtics completely knocked it out of the park.

(I’m not grateful in any respect for this 12 months’s City Edition jerseys although.)

7. Payton Pritchard’s explosion

I predicted earlier than the season that Payton Pritchard would make a Sixth Man of the Year run, and to this point, that’s panned out properly. Vegas at present has him because the consensus favorite to win the award.

Between his end-of-quarter heroics and his absurd three-point gunnery, Pritchard is a hooper’s hooper. The basketball gods didn’t give him an alpha scorer’s physique, however he’s customary himself into one anyway. Nothing makes me fairly as gleeful as Payton sprinting round looking triples like his subsequent meal is dependent upon it.

Whether or not he wins the award or not, Quick PP has made himself right into a power to be reckoned with.

Photograph by Brian Babineau/NBAE by way of Getty Photos

8. The outdated guys

Al Horford and Jrue Vacation proceed to be the Celtics’ Flex-Seals. At any time when holes seem within the good ship Celtic, Mazzulla slaps an outdated man on it, and the issue is solved!

Horford’s potential to repeatedly faucet the fountain of youth every time the Celtics want him is nothing in need of miraculous. He’s been almost automated from three, an enormous improvement with Porzingis lacking a lot time to begin the season, and whereas he picks his spots somewhat extra defensively, he at all times rises to the event. Al Reliable, certainly.

Vacation has a little bit of a sluggish begin shooting-wise this season, and the protection may’ve slipped a tiny notch. However he stays each wildly overqualified to be a task participant and humble sufficient to cede occasional closing minutes to Payton Pritchard, if want be. That’s a uncommon mixture.

Any fanbase could be fortunate to have one among these guys to root for. For Celtics followers to have each appears downright unfair, so let’s toast the outdated heads within the room. *Clink*

9. Brad Stevens

Let’s not neglect the architect of this masterpiece. At the same time as he’s light considerably from the general public eye, his work speaks for itself, and we’d be remiss in not acknowledging his efforts (and the departed Danny Ainge) in maybe the best team-building train the league has seen in a long time.

Employees Photograph By Stuart Cahill/Boston Herald by way of Getty Photos

10. Banner 18 and continuity

Look, it’s a brand new season. I don’t wish to spend a lot time speaking about how friggin’ nice it’s that the Celtics are reigning NBA champs (though it is fairly nice!). However it’s tremendous cool (and tremendous uncommon) for a champion to convey again the very same core for an opportunity to run it again. Banners are eternally, however back-to-back rings create mythologies. You understand they need it.

I’m undecided what the longer term holds after this 12 months, when luxurious taxes, aprons, and typical NBA weirdness may lead to a Celtics staff with a minimum of {a partially} new look. However I’m grateful we’ve had this enjoyable, unbelievable Boston squad to cheer on for thus lengthy, and nonetheless somewhat bit longer.

11) You all

To not get too Hallmark-movie on you, however the readers make CelticsBlog tick. It goes with out saying that with out you, this web site wouldn’t exist. Thanks for being right here with us.

Glad Thanksgiving, everybody, and tell us what else you’re grateful for within the feedback!