Celtics' Path to Banner 18: Dominance Over Mavericks

 

Dave Clarke: Missing the point! The Celtics are up 3 0, and I have the triumphant return, the prodigal son, Robert Kelly, back on the podcast. Bob, since you've been gone, shout out Kelly Clarkson, since you've been gone, they said Kyrie just needs to play well. That didn't matter. They said, ah, it's gonna be tough.

Dave Clarke: Without Kristaps Porzingis in there, that didn't matter. They said, if they start a comeback, if they start a comeback, his team will fold. That didn't, that didn't do anything. They said, Jayson Tatum, you know, he's affecting the game, but can he really properly score? Didn't matter. I said Luka's bitchin a lot to the refs, and on national television, he really spiraled, in that sense.

Dave Clarke: Really, really spiraled. Really lost, mentally the game for himself. Everything, essentially, people were banking on happening to the Celtics. An implosion, a meltdown you know, all the wrong decisions happened to the Mavs, and the blow by highlights of Luka Doncic over the last few games, everybody can just get by him.

Dave Clarke: my favorite highlight being Kyrie gets completely spun around in the high post, and JB just gets the ball in the corner right behind him, and he's completely just missing, trying to turn around and, like, defend, and JB just, just wets it. It almost seems to me like there's no circumstances.

Dave Clarke: Maybe the next thing will be Mercury's in retrograde. If it wasn't in retrograde that the Mavs will win. Maybe the next thing will be uh, oh well Kyrie's gonna shave his beard, that beard is bad luck. So that, that, that's gonna, nothing makes this Dallas Mavericks team beat this Boston Celtics team because they're too good.

Dave Clarke: They're too good. Their defensive stats have been absurd. And uh, I, I mean, I, I, I just want to give you the floor here because We haven't heard from you or your perspective across the playoffs, across the whole series. Where do you stand on the narrative, the national narrative, that, you know, maybe they didn't play anybody, some people are pushing back on that.

Dave Clarke: Where do you stand on the teams that we've played, what this championship means? Because I personally am still delighted. Like, suck it, nerds. Sorry we're the best team. That's sort of where I stand.

Bob Kelly: It's funny, I saw a story today. Saying that the Bucs handed the Celtics the championship when they botched the Drew and Damian Lillard trade.

Bob Kelly: And I'm just like, man, they really just, they have to find something to take this championship down and away from us. They can't let us just, just steamroll to a championship and only lose one game and not be considered one of the top teams in NBA history. It's kind of annoying to me. Two games. Two games, sorry, two games.

Bob Kelly: No, man, it's It's, it's wild to see them take exactly what everyone said that they couldn't do and turn it right on the head, and I think last game is the perfect, you know, the perfect epitome of the entire thing, because if you look at it, the Christops being out, that's what everyone said was gonna be.

Bob Kelly: It was

Dave Clarke: almost a perfect storm, you know, and in fact it was, it was all the things that they said this Celtics team, makes this Celtics team fold. It was all the things all at once, especially the Lob City portion of it, because everyone was

Bob Kelly: like, Oh, the Lob City is going to come back because they don't have the Mavericks.

Bob Kelly: We've been shutting them down literally for three straight games. Luca, to me, dude, he can't play a wicked defense that dude. He cannot play defense. They just literally attack him the entire game.

Dave Clarke: I mean, like the thing is, like, you can you can sort of hide him against, say, because, you know, it was weird, like we didn't talk about this, but it was weird when they played the.

Dave Clarke: The, the Timberwolves, because it was like, wow, it's like, their backcourt's weirdly light, the Timberwolves, like, they were built specifically to beat the Nuggets, and they almost beat them around early, because they had this, like, sort of Twin Towers approach, where they were just throwing bodies at, at Jokic, and they were sort of, you know, they were making it work, and Anthony Edwards was making it look like there weren't backcourt deficiencies, because he was playing out of his fucking mind, right?

Dave Clarke: And, When it was Luca and Kyrie, they sort of two manned him, like, they sort of, they, it was, it was similar to, uh, what Ray and Paul did to LeBron in, in 08, you know, they sort of just like, just cut him with a thousand knives, like, death by a thousand cuts, right, and they just did that to Anthony Edwards, and it worked, because he's 22, and he's gonna be great, but like, I mean, those two are veterans, and they're, and they're killers, you know, so, I don't think it hurt his stock at all, I mean, I still think overall his stock went up, but that's, that's another conversation for another day.

Dave Clarke: It. They're not able to do that against the Celtics team because we can switch onto them. A guy that can guard both those guys whenever we want. It's like, oh, he's trying guard literally every position, get something on Tatu. He's kind of getting something on Tatum. He's kind of getting Tatum, but Tatum's ego's out of it.

Dave Clarke: His ego's been removed from it, which I appreciate, and goes like, all right, hold on. Let get him real quick. And then you don't hear from Luca for, for eight minutes. You just, it's like Drew's just like, I got him for for a second. It's fine now. When they were making these huge, this huge push, this huge comeback.

Dave Clarke: We just kept our poison, kept doing that. We were like, all right, it's okay. Like one of these rotations will slow him down. You know, it's all right. Al was still playing, like when they would get to switch on Al, he was still just like playing like he was in a finals game. You know, there was no, I mean, yeah, there was a mismatch and he got got a couple of times.

Dave Clarke: Don't get me wrong. But like, there was no, like, Oh, shit, you know, like, he just blew by, like, he was just still trying, he was still had his hand, like, you know, up the whole way when one of the guys blew by him, and he still affected a bunch of Luka's shots, you know? He just looked like a guy who was playing his fucking ass off in a Game 3 of a Final Series, you know?

Dave Clarke: And, yeah, Chris Taps is missing, and that hurts, but at the end of the day, the matchup between Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum, compared to Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving, is lopsided. It's, it's lopsided in our favorite. I mean, you can say if you want that it's because of how good the whole roster is. And it is, it is like, I think that this series would be closer if we didn't have.

Dave Clarke: A big Chris Stapps Borzingas game, a big Drew Holliday game, a big Derek White game to like throw into the mix. You know, we might go to six or seven, but at the end of the day, I think our two best guys are just playing better than their two best guys. Kyrie Irving mailed it in for the first two games, and even though he had a great game three, It didn't fucking matter, because the Jays both fucking broke 30 points, you know, so our guys are just better than their guys, and as far as the national narrative goes, as you were saying, why can't people just accept that?

Dave Clarke: We did a show about how it was unfair to put Luka over Tatum in the ringer rankings, and I'm seeing nothing to dissuade me from that, to be honest with you, because has Luka been better offensively? Absolutely. But he's a liability. He's a liability on the defensive end.

Bob Kelly: Complete liability. And it was on display for almost the entire game.

Bob Kelly: You know what I mean? And not the entire, not only the entire game, but the entire series. Like from, from moment one, that's been the biggest thing the Celtics that have attacked is They just attacked him. We, we get him on an island and that's what we do every single time. It seems, except for game one, where Porzingis took over for a while.

Bob Kelly: It seems like that's been our, uh, strategy the entire time. Attack Doncic, attack Irving, and those are the guys that we go after. He's also

Dave Clarke: too small for like all of our guys. I

Bob Kelly: think what it's doing too is it affects them offensively because especially Doncic has, has I've been trying to exert so much defensively that it affects him offensively.

Bob Kelly: And even where he scored, I think he had like 37 in game two. It was the quietest 37 I've ever seen from Udoka. Oh my god. Absolutely true. I agree so hard. It's so hard. It's

Dave Clarke: such a fucked up thing to say. Tatum does that sometimes too, right, where you're like, he had fucking 35, like where? I don't even remember that.

Bob Kelly: And it's, it's, it's been like that the entire series. I think the Timberwolves were giving the Celtics much more of a run for their money in this series had they beaten Dallas. Because I just feel like we match up with Dallas so well because of the guards that we have, man. And because, especially D.

Bob Kelly: White and Drew, they can D up on both those guys and stay in front of them pretty much. Our

Dave Clarke: switches are crazy. Like, we can switch. The only liability in switches are when Orford's on the floor and they switch him to the perimeter on a Luka or a Kyrie, but he even did like a little bit better than he was doing, say like this time last year or like round one last year against the Sixers when Harden was cooking him.

Dave Clarke: But he just like, he's been playing great, like it almost like the more minutes like sort of benefited him, you know, like strangely enough, even though his age, but he's been, he's had a great finals. He's had a great playoffs if you ask me. But I think. Any other switch of our first six, maybe possibly seven guys is just fine.

Dave Clarke: Even Hauser had a couple decent defensive moments and he's had a couple of really big offensive moments. Like he had, he's, he's basically the Eddie House of this team. Like he's, he's hit a bunch of big shots and he had that one that made him, you know, made the rounds as a highlight because he didn't take it down at all.

Dave Clarke: He just like caught it, shot it, which was like, it's like the most white guy ass like skill move, but like it, it was like very cool. And like, yeah, like he's just doing his thing, you know, like he's, he's out there, he had a stinker of a game too, but he, you know, he's, he's contributing. Pritchard, I mean, Luca licks his lips every time he sees Payton Pritchard and he absolutely murders him, but Missoula was doing, and we, you know what, we should come on to talk about Joe Missoula because I, I do have some apologies to make, I think.

Dave Clarke: Mazzullo was reacting to that, to those switches and that happening, like he would get switched on to Pritchard and it was like night and day different from the Miami series last year where Jimmy would obviously be just 100 percent ready to victimize Payton Pritchard he would get switched on to him and then Mazzullo would just let that happen for, you know, minutes at a time and it would just be a murder that you were watching, just over and over again, just, he would just kill Payton Pritchard one after the other, after the other, after the other.

Dave Clarke: And now, in this series, you know, Pritchard would get switched on to Aluka and it happened a few times more than I would have liked in game one, but he actually missed the shots, like, he just wasn't making the shots in the mismatch, so it didn't really matter, uh, that was just lucky, I think, but in game three, like, he got killed a couple times, and then Joe just made a switch, you know, and like, what was nice is you have the Jaylen Brown or Drew Holliday.

Dave Clarke: Or, to a lesser extent, Derek White, to switch on to a guy like that. You know, you can just be like, fuck it, just go get him. Also, when Porzingis was out there, and this is why I was worried about going into Game 3, blow bys weren't really an issue, because if Porzingis is standing around the rim, like, what's Kyrie Irving gonna do when he gets there?

Dave Clarke: Like, I would, I would love to see it. I would, I would love to see what the idea is that he hasn't thought of because it reminded me a little bit of when, uh, LeBron James figured out Rajon Rondo's driving ability and then he was never the same. Do you remember that, that series? When, like, Rondo would start driving and LeBron was like, Every time he goes up, I'm going to absolutely clear him the fuck out.

Dave Clarke: Right, and it's going to be a fair play because I'm just like more athletic coming from the other direction. Because Rondo was like using his athleticism to sort of get by people, but he was always laying it up. He was like never really dunking it, right? It was always very soft around the rim. And LeBron just started getting up there and just absolutely swatting all of his shots.

Bob Kelly: And he couldn't hit free throws.

Dave Clarke: And he couldn't hit free throws, and even if he did go to the line, he couldn't hit free throws. And then the rest of the league was like, you know, Rondo's layups take so long. They take so long in the air. And he basically had to just become an all assist guy after that because he was not scoring, you know, with anyone around that could actually make a play on the ball.

Dave Clarke: And that's what Porzingis was doing. He was just like, are you going to try and score or are you going to lob it? Because either way, I'm going to be in that space. And he would just fill the lane, jump up and just swat it away every single time, pretty much. Derek White had a few trailing, you know, and the switches are just so, you know, Appetizing now.

Dave Clarke: Like they can't really hurt us in any serious matchup, uh, type way. But onto Joe. I mean, he's, he's honestly improved so much. He's really honestly improved so much. I love his

Bob Kelly: press conferences too. He doesn't take, he doesn't, he doesn't say shit. You don't fucking weirdo to anyone. Yeah, he doesn't, he say shit

Dave Clarke: to

Bob Kelly: anyone, man.

Dave Clarke: He's a real weirdo. Like, have you seen the Joker memes?

Bob Kelly: Yeah. Yes.

Dave Clarke: It looks good Dude. Dude really thinks he's the joker. He is like, aren't we all villains in someone's story? Now listen, he's kooky. But, he's been making the right plays, the right switches, the right rotational minutes, in the finals. There's, there was moments in the, in the rest of the playoffs where I was still a little bit like, Joe, can you just stop eating crayons for me, buddy?

Dave Clarke: Like, just make the, make the right calls at the right times. He's been very unafraid, and he did a really good job in that run, in game three, to, to call timeouts, and he, and he was liberal with them. And that was the right thing to do. He's like, alright, I guess we still don't have it. Let's go, let's get back.

Dave Clarke: That's the right thing to do. You know, he's like, all right, you're still not executing. Let's talk about it again. And just use the timeout, you know, just like you control the game. You control the game. You control what you're doing. You can't control the crowd. You can't control what the other team's doing.

Dave Clarke: Just control what you're doing in that situation. And I, you know, I always think about what you said. I was thinking about it throughout that, that, that portion. You always were, would reference Doc Rivers, play defense, your shots will fall. Lay defense, your shots will fall. You were you were saying that all the way through the Warriors series, the last time we were talking about this finals, uh, this team in the finals.

Dave Clarke: And, it was echoing in my head when when It's like, uh, you know that episode of The Office when it's like, you miss 100 percent of the shots you don't take. Wayne Gretzky, Michael Scott. Because you said it so much on the show, I now hear it as your quote, not Doc Rivers quote. So Okay, I'll take that. Now I hear your voice in my head going like, just play defense, your shots will fall.

Dave Clarke: And that's what they did. You know, they went out there and they were like, we're just gonna keep being a problem for them on defense. If we do that, they'll cool off sooner than later. And then we're just gonna, we're just gonna make big shots because we still have a lead. And they did not let it get into their heads.

Dave Clarke: They weathered the storm. They had poise. They had grace. They had all the things we were bitching, moaning, and complaining about they didn't have. And honestly, they proved us wrong. And I think Joe Mizzoula proved, proved me wrong in particular because he's gotten better. Actually not wrong. Cause he was, he sucked as much as he said, as I said, he did when, when I said that he did, but he's gotten a lot better.

Dave Clarke: And I have to give him credit for that. Right. What's your, what have you been your impressions of Joe?

Bob Kelly: Yeah, I think game three is kinda a good, like, he balanced the equation out, finally, for those timeouts, and I think that game three was a solid picture of that, because That, that game in the past, we lose that game almost every single time, you know what I mean, in the past few years, or at least, at least it would have gotten a lot closer than it did.

Bob Kelly: You know what I mean, like, cause that game was never really in question, they made kind of that comeback, I think, but we ended up winning by.

Dave Clarke: In game three.

Bob Kelly: Yeah,

Dave Clarke: probably like eight

Bob Kelly: points. Yeah Yeah, it's like eight or nine, but in the past seven seven Okay in the past that game definitely is way more in question I never really had a doubt that we were gonna win it.

Bob Kelly: I was pretty confident too, which is strange Yeah, even even You know what, I think we're up, we're now up 21 at some point in the second quarter. And it's just like, for the Celtics to blow that lead, and us not lose confidence, shows you how much better Joe Mizzou is. I could

Dave Clarke: see it in their body language though, you know, you could, like the, the Jaylen Brown specifically, but also to a certain extent, uh, uh, Drew Holliday and Jayson Tatum, they just didn't look like they were like letting it get away from them.

Dave Clarke: Like, Drew Holliday was still just communicating. And his alpha sort of presence across the whole finalists has been really, really nice and refreshing to see because he's just like, it's fine. He's so loose. He's so loose. They're thinking defense first every time. Yeah. They're thinking defense first every time, which is you and I had a conversation.

Dave Clarke: Conversation about how heartbreaking it was to lose Ima, Ima oca because he made them think defense first every single time. But Joe's got 'em thinking that way now again, or, you know, the players realize that that was the fucking magic cocktail, uh, that that worked in the past, but they did it in reverse order.

Dave Clarke: They didn't get to the finals. Right? This must have always been the plan, and I honestly, I think it's fucking genius, because when they got to the finals against Golden State, they were exhausted, and it's because they played lights out defense for three series before that, right? They just got there by playing defense.

Dave Clarke: You remember they fucking, it was the KD can't do shit against Jayson Tatum series four against Brooklyn, like, we just clamped them up. That's what we did. We fucking clamped them up. I was there. We fucking saw it. We saw it with our eyes. We did that to every team all the way through. We did that to the Sixers.

Dave Clarke: We did that to the Bucs, if you remember, and it was exhausting. It was the most exhausting series. It was exhausting. I was tired. I was tired. So I can't imagine how the players felt, and they looked clearly tired by the time they got to Golden State. So what did they do this time? They were like, we're just gonna blow everybody out with our offense, and we'll have that defense as the final arrow in our quiver when we get to the finals.

Dave Clarke: And we'll be so Rested, by the time we need to play it because they won every game in every series in five games or less. And there was, and in these finals, it couldn't possibly benefit us more because we go every, we go to two full rest days. I mean, if that isn't good for the Al Horford's of the world, this is set up for us to win.

Dave Clarke: I don't blame the conspiracy theorists, quite frankly.

Bob Kelly: And it's what I think. Another way you could look at it too is the way that they've been, the quality of the shots that the Mavericks have to fight for every single time down the court versus the quality of shots that we get just based off of like our ball movement and stuff like that is, is Night and day, man.

Bob Kelly: Like, I feel like the Mavs are working We're not giving them any easy

Dave Clarke: They're

Bob Kelly: working so hard for those extra shots, especially the extra guys.

Dave Clarke: Especially game one, I thought. We really succeeded in that in game one. Like, they had to work so hard for every Look, and like, every time Luka would cash, tell me if you felt this way.

Dave Clarke: Every time Luka would cash, I'd be like, yeah, I'll settle for a fucking layup. We're up 13. Like, Luka can have those, he'll get those so he can have those, but he never started just going fucking lights out from three, we just didn't let that happen. We ran him off the three point line every single time, we would like double team him or like set little screens or whatever it was, and they were setting a lot of fucking illegal screens by the way, over the course of those three games that they were getting away with, and the team didn't get rattled by that either.

Dave Clarke: But no, the Luka hard shots thing is what I want to stay on, because we, we just didn't let him ever get comfortable, and all the points he got were the points we were all okay with. You know, the ones we could live with. That's why you're talking about a quiet 37. Because you're like, every time you would score, you'd be like, all right, I'll live with that.

Dave Clarke: You were doing the math in your head of like, how much we were up and like, what, what they needed in that situation for momentum. And you'd be like, that's fine. With the kind of the exception of the big comeback against, uh, in, in, in game three like that, we had to stop some bleeding for sure. tourniquet well.

Dave Clarke: And, how did we do it? We went at him. We went at him and we made him make stupid mistakes. Because honestly, they were like, Luka Doncic has to beat us. Like let's go. Are you gonna? And he couldn't. It was just too much for him. He couldn't. That's just the truth. And, you know, you can talk about him bitching or whatever, and I know that is a thing, but what really matters is that he couldn't get it fucking done, dude.

Dave Clarke: And Tatum did. So, sorry. I mean, I still think Brown's probably finals MVP. I don't know your thoughts on that, but overall, like, where is your Lucas stock right now? Like, how do you view the market there? And like, uh, did his stock against our guys make you see our guys any differently?

Bob Kelly: So, what's funny is, like, you know, coming into the year, me and you, personally, compared JT.

Bob Kelly: And Luca a lot. Yeah, we had a whole time.

Dave Clarke: We had a, we did almost a whole episode on it.

Bob Kelly: And it, it's funny that now we're at the point where they're playing in the finals and JT is not really playing up, up to the standard that we expect from him. You know what I mean? He's not hitting his threes, his jump shot's a little off, but he's still affecting the game in a positive way.

Bob Kelly: Quite

Dave Clarke: frankly, Ben, his scoring has been atrocious in the finals. Isn't

Bob Kelly: that exactly? What we said was the reason why he is above Luka, and it's coming true right in front of our eyes, bro. Yeah, you're absolutely right. We talked about the reason why this dude is so much different than Luka is because Luka affects the game with his scoring.

Bob Kelly: The ball has to run through him at all times, and it does. For him to be effective, he needs to have the ball in his hands, and JT is not that. You know what I mean, JT? Yes. Yes. He's gonna catch shade from the Boston sports media, whoever, for not scoring 40 a night. But when you watch the game, you notice JT on the floor on defense, you notice him get grabbing those rebounds, boxing out, doing those things that, you know, don't really go noticed unless you're actually watching the game.

Bob Kelly: Luka is the exact opposite. Where it's like, once he's out of it, bro, I, I've never seen A superstar jogged down the court, bitching at the refs as much as Luka does, in the NBA finals. And this is the thing

Dave Clarke: we used to fucking, we used to clown on Tatum for.

Bob Kelly: Kill Tatum

Dave Clarke: for, kill him

Bob Kelly: for.

Dave Clarke: Like, we were the, as a fanbase, we were harder on him than the Mavericks fanbase seems to be on Luka.

Dave Clarke: You know, like, that's why you're fucking losers, by the way. But like, the, you know, they would constantly just be like, Defending him and being like, he's still this, he's still that. And like I was saying to Mike and Ray the other day, and I think you'll relate to this too, it's like, you can't bitch at the refs and talk shit to the crowd, right?

Dave Clarke: And additionally, if you're talking shit to the crowd in Boston, like, yeah, cool, bro. Like, you're talking shit to the first four rows. They came in their little Patagonia vests from the financial district to watch the Celtics versus the Mavs, like, in first four row seats. Go into the nosebleeds and say that.

Bob Kelly: Yeah, for real.

Dave Clarke: Just, just, let's just see. Let's just see what happens, because you won't, because you're not about it. You know you're safe out there in the court. You bitch into the refs and you're, you're a little bit of a Hold me back bro. To be honest, you know, you're a little bit of a ho hold me back guy.

Dave Clarke: And my guys went out there and just took care of business. Like they, I at points, you and I have been mad at them about like, not being like a little bit more agro to the other teams. A lot, like, you know, a lot, a little kg went a long way with us, right. Where he would get into it with guys and you'd be like, yeah, fuck yeah.

Dave Clarke: Kg like, talk that shit. Like, get into their heads, like talk, talk your shit. Right? We, we've been mad at them for not being more like that. But you know what? They're still cold. That's what they've turned into. They're, they're fucking, they're just getting the job done now. JT's been significantly better with the refs.

Dave Clarke: Wouldn't you agree? Yes. He still says some shit because he's the, you know, he's the best player on the team. He has to, right? Like there's certain times where it's like, guys, but he still gets back up to court. And now there's highlights that exist of Luka bitching to the referees instead of getting back.

Dave Clarke: And I was whamming a fucking three in their faces. And that's embarrassing guy. You, you can't, you can't be playing like that as, as the superstar on your team, you're walking in the footsteps of giants. Giants, best player on team in finals. That is a short fucking list, dude. You know, that Michael Jordan, Akeem Olajuwon, fucking Paul Pierce.

Dave Clarke: I know I said him third, but it's a Boston sports podcast. Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O'Neal, like these are names of guys, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, these are names of guys that were the best player on a finals team that lost finals, you know? That, that, but you, they don't have highlights like that. Luka's young, dude.

Dave Clarke: He's 25 years old. Like he'll be back, but he's got to get some shit out of his game, bro. He's got to get some shit out of his game. This reminds me, you know what it reminds me of, honestly? And I would, I would, I would maybe put an asterisk to say that I'm not comparing him to LeBron on skill, but honestly, he's pretty good, so I, who cares?

Dave Clarke: It reminds me of when Dirk took it to LeBron in that finals. And LeBron was like, it was a make or break summer right after that. You remember this, right?

Bob Kelly: Yeah.

Dave Clarke: It was, it was, I got to go get a post game. I just got shown up in front of the whole world that I didn't have, I have no post game in. For a guy my size, playing at the three or the four, swing man, any, any of those like outside wing positions, Dirk Nowitzki was able to just like get me switched on to him in the post and kill me, just kill me, right?

Dave Clarke: So he left, went away to the foreign lands of. The deep jungle, to learn the ancient ways of the post game, and he came back a better player, a more complete player. And I would advise Luka to look at that, and also Luka maybe a little bit about his, how he approaches the game of basketball, as far as like, you know, what he's asking for from the referees, the fans, the universe.

Dave Clarke: You know, he might have to have a little come to Jesus moment with himself, don't you think? Well, I agree,

Bob Kelly: because if you look at who's favorite to win the MVP right now, it's Jaylen and Drew Holiday, I'd say those That's my

Dave Clarke: list, but Drew, for me, I personally, I would pick Drew at this moment in time. I would too, I would too.

Dave Clarke: I actually think that the finals MVP matters less to this team than like we've seen in bygone days. I don't think it really matters who gets it. And I think that they should be telling each other, it doesn't matter who gets it, when they shouldn't be thinking about it, because who gives a fuck? The Larry O'Brien, that's what we do here.

Dave Clarke: That is what matters, yeah. There was a team in 2008 we watched win, where I would argue that Kevin Garnett was the most talented player on that team, or the best player on that team. I would also argue that he was the best player in that finals, to be totally honest with you. But when Paul Pierce got the Finals MVP.

Dave Clarke: I was 100 percent fine with that. I just was. Because, of course, it's Paul's team. He deserved it. But it didn't matter as much, you know, it became this other thing, uh, in the, in the interim. Don't you think? Like, the, the, the internet era is a little too obsessed with the finals MVP. We hang banners here.

Dave Clarke: That, that's what we do. We hang fucking banners. Hopefully 18 of them. Yeah, that's what I'm saying, bro. Like, this fan base, winning titles is the most healthy thing that can happen to a fan base. And there was a level of toxicity in the Boston Celtics fanbase after 16 year drought that needs to be washed away, like a cleanse, a baptism, back into the annals of the success that we, we're uncomfortable when we're not winning titles because we're a title winning franchise.

Dave Clarke: It's very strange for our identities. Look at how weird all the Patriots fans are going. They're going weird as fuck. They're getting, they're, they're, they're staying up late at night convincing themself that Drake May is going to be the next Tom Brady. They're, they've lost their minds. They're

Bob Kelly: carving shit into the fucking wall.

Bob Kelly: They're going to make him

Dave Clarke: fly. Yeah. Exactly, Bob. You have a particularly keen insight to this kind of stuff. But as crazy as you might be, not as crazy as thinking Drake May is going to turn your franchise around. Do you know what I mean? That's true. And we're, and we're sitting here looking down the barrel of, of a potential, Banner 3 0 up.

Dave Clarke: Very good percentage chance. And I just want everyone to like relax after that and enjoy it. Enjoy it. Because we're still gonna have a really good team next year, right?

Bob Kelly: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. This isn't going away. Especially when you look at The way that this team has been built is built for that future success.

Bob Kelly: We already signed Drew to a long term contract, so this isn't going on. I'm glad he's

Dave Clarke: locked up, he's great.

Bob Kelly: Yeah, so, and I can't talk about how important that dude is to everything. The two moves I love him so much. The two moves this team made by bringing Chris Dobson and getting Drew Holliday this off season were Above and beyond the most important things, how this team is built, and you can see it just over those first three games, I mean, you look at, I

Dave Clarke: know we've had I would argue that, I mean, we can see that Drew is, far and away, the most important, uh, season acquisition, because Chris Tass has barely fucking played in the playoffs.

Bob Kelly: But even in that one game, you saw how much he meant to that team in their regular season. Oh, no, I know. You know what I mean? The game won that first

Dave Clarke: half was unbelievable. I'm convinced that, I know this is a hypothetical, there's no way for me to prove this, but I'm convinced if we had a fully healthy Port Zingas, we would have beaten anybody coming out of the West after what I saw in, in game two, uh, in game one.

Dave Clarke: It's like, it's like, that was crazy. Like, he came out and just went bananas. Like, he went absolutely fucking bananas. It was one of the most fun things I've ever experienced. I got to the bar late to meet my buddy and it was like, it was, I was like trying to find parking. It was like seven to four. And then it was like close, close, close.

Dave Clarke: 14 to 16 at one point. And then Porzingis just came out like a fucking man possessed. Like he was just flying through the fucking air. And honestly, they were, you're right, they were huge minutes. They were like, they were some of the hugest minutes of the whole season. MVP. Even If he played like that in one more game, he gets finals MVP.

Dave Clarke: Agreed. Or even close to that, like he gets finals MVP, no question.

Bob Kelly: And it's just, for those two guys to make this big of an impact on this team, it really does show you how good of a GM Brad Stevens is, man. I swear to God, I'm not, I'm not worried about the, the compilation of this team whatsoever moving forward, you know, in any way like us having to resign Jay or having to do this, Brad's gonna figure it out, and Brad, we trust, man, because this team was put together so perfectly for this fucking run that it didn't even matter that we didn't have poor Zingas throughout this playoff run, but it shows you from that game one how much of Easier, a, a 15 and two record in the playoffs.

Bob Kelly: How much easier we could have had it if we had this entire squad together,

Dave Clarke: if Virginia was in the playoffs. Like I, I think that might've been the worst if he participated in any of the series after he got hurt. That might've been the worst thing for the NBA imaginable, because like it would've just been like, there would've been no drama, like everyone would've been looking at the Celtics and being like, oh, no.

Dave Clarke: There's no way that they're going to lose to anybody because like all those and I was saying this on the on the pod was really helpful like all those teams in the west killed each other you know like they were really just absolutely beating each other up over there like those are hard fought series they just were match up wise like everything and like the reason that the Mavs got to us like they weren't they were the pacers of the west now granted the west is a lot better They really shouldn't.

Dave Clarke: Like they, they were really, Ben benefited from the fact that like a very kind of tired and discombobulated timber will's team came outta that nugget series. 'cause they had to give everything to win that. And it was a great series, but they left everything on the, on the court.

Bob Kelly: And the fact that the Nuggets lost that series, I think that, that, that only team that

Dave Clarke: would've given the , I think the nuggets would've absolutely crushed the Mavs, the, the Nuggets would've walked the maps.

Dave Clarke: I think they would have absolutely dog walked them, to be honest.

Bob Kelly: Well, they had, they would have no one to deal with Jokic. Would they put Cleaver on him? I mean, look at what Porzingis was able to do to them. I mean, I

Dave Clarke: guarantee you Jokic would have absolutely just had the easiest time. And I, you know, we got killed.

Dave Clarke: Me and Ray were on, uh, me and Ray were on maybe like three or four days before the final started. And I was like, yo, not for nothing, guys. But like. I know that your, I guess round one and round two performances hinged on the, the real breakout performance of your, of your rookie big, right? And everybody was like, really?

Dave Clarke: What the fuck is that guy's name? Who? Naz Reed? No, no. The big No, no, the big guy on the maps. The, the tall, the center cleaver. Is it, no, is it Kleber? Why can't I fuck around?

Bob Kelly: Oh, I, Derek Lively.

Dave Clarke: Lively. Lively. Everybody was saying like, oh, Lively's had such a crazy game against, against the T or series against the T wolves, he's so good, he's this, he's that, and I was like, guys, if, just so you know, if Porzingis is out there, Lively is gonna get killed.

Dave Clarke: Like, if Porzingis is even at, like, 90%, and what I said was, and this was apparently inflamed the comment section of the internet, I said, I can think of maybe five or six centers better than Kristaps Porzingis. I can think of probably 25 better than, than Lively. And that's no shade to him. He's young. He's going to get better.

Dave Clarke: But right now, it's not going to go well. And man, we must have made it on the Mavs TikTok because they came from my head. They came from my head about their boy Lively. And I just did a victory lap. with all of them after Chris Taps just fucking swallowed him. I went through like every comment. I was like, what's up?

Dave Clarke: What happened? Oh, shit. Was I right? Like, sorry, buddy. Like, it just it was so satisfying to watch because that's not fair to build that kid up like he's 20. He's 20 years old, he's gonna be really good, and he had a, and he had a breakout, a breakout series but that's, come on dude. With how Porzingis has been playing this season, just tell me you didn't watch any games in the regular season without telling me.

Dave Clarke: You know what I mean? Like, it's, you have no idea what you're fucking looking at. That's the problem. It's these motherfuckers that tune in for the playoffs. Yeah, he wasn't ready for this at all. That's not fair, though. I'm not clowning on him for that. I'm just, I was just letting people know the facts.

Dave Clarke: Like, these are just, these are facts. Like, I'm sorry that it annoyed you, but, and I know that's the internet, I know that's the culture we live in, but facts don't care about your feelings.

Bob Kelly: Well, that's how you know that that team just wasn't set up for the success, because you look at their pieces around them.

Bob Kelly: I can't think of, I can think of like, Five to six Mavericks. Anything past that is tough for me to put, uh, I would have to look up to see who else is on their roster, who gets playing time, who gets significant minutes. The Celtics, man, I guarantee you go up to a casual NBA fan, they can name seven to eight people off this team.

Bob Kelly: Cause, the, like, Think about Drew Holiday. So our starting five is Drew Holiday, All Star, Tatum, Brown, Kristaps, Champion,

Dave Clarke: by the way, Al Horford, Jaylen Brown, Al Horford, former third overall pick, Jaylen Brown, former third overall pick, Jayson Tatum, former third overall pick, uh, uh, Drew Holiday, former champion, former All Star, All Star.

Dave Clarke: Also Derek White, doesn't actually have that many accolades, but like, I would give him like most improved player, maybe like breakout player of the last two seasons. Bald Derek White, bald Derek White, super saiyan, super saiyan Derek White when he went bald, right? Best blocker in the NBA. You know, I, I agree with you.

Dave Clarke: I think we're more famous than them. I totally agree. I think Luka has like a worldwide following. Like, I think that, uh, across the world, he's lumped in with like the, the kind of Neymars and the, and the, uh, the Mbappes and like those type of guys, the early Hollands of the world, like the kind of international stars.

Dave Clarke: So that might, that might make up some numbers. But I do agree with you that I, I, I admittedly didn't know a ton about about the Tim Hardaway juniors of the world. Uh, you know, uh, they're, they're 17 million and below players. I was, I was definitely left familiar with, I'm obviously quite familiar with Kyrie Irving.

Dave Clarke: And I do think we should come on and talk about this because quite frankly, I'd like to take this opportunity because I, I think you can, Vouch for the fact that I, I didn't turn on him post Celtics as hard as the rest of the greater Celtics fans, right? I, I always sort of stood up for him as like a baller.

Dave Clarke: He's always been a baller. And it wasn't until he started saying like wildly anti Semitic bullshit that I was like, all right, I'm done. I'm out on this guy. Like, fuck him. Like, that's bottom. You know, I can't do this. And I really appreciated that he, has turned it around, made it about basketball, put his head down, showed us all what kind of a player he is, which is, again, a baller.

Dave Clarke: But in saying that, you can absolutely suck my nuts, dude. I'm so glad you're here to see this team that you tried to fucking derail. You tried so fucking hard to derail this team. You thought that you were big enough to to knock this train off its tracks. You did think that. We know that you thought that.

Dave Clarke: You knew what you were doing when you left. You thought you were bigger than that arena. You thought you were bigger than that logo. You thought you were bigger than that crowd. You thought that you were better than those people in those moments. And I'm talking directly to Kyrie Irving right now. You have a problem with thinking you're better than people.

Dave Clarke: And I think this, I believe, You, you've made a change for the positive. I believe that in my heart. I think it shows that how you've carried yourself and purported yourself across the playoffs. But I just want you to know this is a hard lesson doled out to you, courtesy of the city of Boston and the Boston Celtics.

Dave Clarke: So from me and the entirety of the Missing the Point podcast, I just want to say from the bottom of my heart, Kyrie Irving, hold those L's. Hold those L's. Hold them in your hands. Put them in a bag. Carry the bag around with you. Sisyphean.

Bob Kelly: He still hasn't beat us since he stepped on the logo. That streak is still intact.

Dave Clarke: Chef's kiss.

Bob Kelly: Yeah.

Dave Clarke: Chef's kiss. You shouldn't have done that. You shouldn't have done that.

Bob Kelly: It's beautiful. It's, it's, it's one of my favorite things, this whole thing. I hope we sweep them just so we can keep that going.

Dave Clarke: Oh, we're gonna sweep. That's for fuckin sure. But that brings us really nicely on to, uh, uh, Prediction for Friday.

Dave Clarke: We're recording this on Thursday. The, uh, Game 4, I would say pretty likely Final, but, you know, maybe a Gentleman's Sweep. I wouldn't mind going back to Boston. It'd be the most game I would be most okay with losing. It depending on the manner in which we lose it. Because I would love to see them raise the banner in Boston, uh, like we did when we beat the Lakers.

Dave Clarke: It's just nicer, you know? Yeah, yeah. But we, I don't feel, I don't feel any kind of way about winning in Dallas, you know what I mean? Like, I don't, you know, I'm not, I'm not trying to like, Oh yeah, we fuckin did it on Dallas's court, it's like, you're not a rival of ours, like, we have, we have one rival, and it's the Los Angeles Lakers.

Dave Clarke: That's it. Like, that's, it's just us and them. That's the level, people don't understand that, but it's true.

Bob Kelly: I don't think it's coming back though. They had to pull off that comeback yesterday. The fact that we went on, you know, they say it's a game of runs, every single time, the Mavs have any kind of, uh, Momentum or anything like that, we make that important defensive stop and end that run every single time.

Bob Kelly: And it just seems like they always take the bad shot, and we always end up capitalizing Jaylen Brown yamming down on people. Did you see that

Dave Clarke: dunk, dude? Holy shit.

Bob Kelly: That was my

Dave Clarke: favorite moment, I think, of the entire playoffs. Because he took off from forever away, and I was really worried. I was like, ooh, shit, he took off, like, pretty far out.

Dave Clarke: Like, I don't know if he's gonna make that. And he had to, like, Summon the fucking courage of the gods and like, and he made like a yelling noise and then just like slammed it down, like slammed it down. And I was like, yes,

Bob Kelly: yes. I think the Celtics want to sweep just to end, they, they're smelling it, bro.

Bob Kelly: Real

Dave Clarke: professional playoff performance if they sweep, you know, like they really just came in here and they just took care of business, dude. Like it's, I mean, what, what, what else can you say about a team like that? Like, I think if we sweep. And you look at this playoffs from like a zoomed out perspective, like, I don't even think any of the, any of the gnarky little comments are gonna matter.

Dave Clarke: I don't think what people say is gonna matter. I think they'll be like, oh, this team, and I will be like, doesn't matter, we were the best team by like a mile. We were the best team by like a million miles. It wasn't close, we fucked everybody up. Because, that's, and we did it all season. I know people have been saying that, we did it all season.

Dave Clarke: And then we did it all playoffs, we lost two games. If we sweep these fuckers.

Bob Kelly: Yeah, we better not revert. So that's the thing that scares me is like, I just don't want, which I don't think will happen, which is why like, I feel like You know, like we, we want to talk about ways they could lose and things that could happen, but I don't see this team falling back into those bad habits.

Bob Kelly: I mean, they already

Dave Clarke: didn't,

Bob Kelly: right? Like, like if they were going to do it, they would have done it last night. So it's just like, you know, I, I want to sit here and be like, well, you know, we could do this or, you know, this bad thing could happen, but I just don't see that happening. I just, it'd be so hard to imagine them.

Bob Kelly: for an entire game or uh, for an extended stretch even. Then reverting back to those old bad habits that, that kills them. You know what I mean? That's when the Celtics start losing games. And that happened in the regular season. Any game that they lose, they always revert back to those bad habits of the isocentric.

Bob Kelly: You know, your turn, my turn. There was a little bit of

Dave Clarke: JT, like step back threes, and then there was a mic'd up moment. Did you catch this? Where he called himself out. He was like we gotta not settle for bad like step back threes and I include myself in that like I know that I do that too and I was like oh he said it he finally said it he knows but you know what dude like honestly I'm just, I'm gonna be a little easier on him because he, like, acknowledged it.

Dave Clarke: Cause I just always thought, like, it could be the worst case scenario, he could just, like, have convinced himself that, like, he's this, like, absolutely lethal three point shooter, and he just isn't statistically. And that's just the best way to, you know, like, you just look at Steph Curry's numbers, right?

Dave Clarke: And, like, that being the, like, the benchmark now. And you're just, like, the advanced analytics on him, like, where he's able to shoot from and still have it be a high percentage shot, like, what a, what a good three pointer is, is just different now. And he's also six foot fucking two. 10.

Bob Kelly: Yeah.

Dave Clarke: You know, and

Bob Kelly: like, he's such a good rebounder now.

Bob Kelly: Yeah, yeah, that's the thing. I'm like, dude, just be

Dave Clarke: 6'10 bro. This is all anyone's ever been saying and he's like doing that now. He can play the 5. Yeah. Dude, I was calling for a small ball lineup with him at the 5 for the entirety of like the experimental Miami series where it didn't matter and we were always gonna win the series.

Dave Clarke: I was like, dude, play a small ball 5. Let's just see. Let's just fucking see because like, I don't. I think Chris Stapps is gonna make it through the whole playoffs, and like, lo and fucking behold, he goes, he goes down in the Cleveland series, and I'm like, ugh, okay, uh, I, I wish we had have experimented with a little bit of a small ball lineup, but we didn't, and we never really needed it.

Dave Clarke: Instead, it was like, we're gonna do a little bit of Xavier Tillman, I guess, in game three against the Mavs, and I

Bob Kelly: was like, I was even out there.

Dave Clarke: Like, I, I, I was just confused and like, he was kind of fine. He was kind of fine. Well, they were leaving him open all game. And I think that your deep role player, when you get on a run, I mean, I've, I was thinking that in the back of my mind, I'm like, there's going to be a moment where they leave him open, leave him open.

Dave Clarke: And if they, if the Celtics are smart enough, and I think the Sam Cassell's of the world are, someone's going to be like, yeah, they're sagging off you, but just wait, you don't have the green light quite yet. When you hit your three, it'll be huge. It'll be huge.

Bob Kelly: But just

Dave Clarke: wait until you have all the fucking time in the world.

Dave Clarke: And when you do, shoot it and shoot it with the confidence that we're all behind you. And like, that's how you coach. That's coaching a shot. That's one big three that you coach into it. And the 08 Celtics were the absolute best at this. They were, they were a big shot team. And you remember this, right? Like they were, they were like a, like they were a bang team and like.

Dave Clarke: I loved that about them, you know, like we would just hit big shots at big moments and man did they, did they remind me of, of, of the finals of yore, uh, in moments where they hit big shots down the stretch and the guys who hit big shots down the stretch were Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum, you know, and like, that's, that's just the way it is.

Dave Clarke: And it was the most important stretch of our whole career. Our whole Jaylen and Jayson era, I would say. It was the most important nine minutes of the last ten years of Celtics basketball. Fourteen years of Celtics basketball. Isn't that wild?

Bob Kelly: And it never really felt in question, which is the craziest part.

Dave Clarke: It almost felt weird. It felt like I had My brain sort of, it wasn't the excitement of 08, or even the surprise of two years ago, you know, the kind of like It's like,

Bob Kelly: it's a cocky feeling, isn't it? Yeah, I'm a little bit like,

Dave Clarke: yeah, you're not coming fucking near us. I was, I was texting in the Discord ludicrously early, before the comeback, I was like, print the t shirts.

Dave Clarke: Print the fucking t shirts, dude. Like, put, put, like, put the hats, put the Celtics logos on the hats, buy the cigars, plan the parade route. This is fucking over. And then we, they started to come back, and I was like, oh shit, probably shouldn't have said anything. But we still won, so it was fine. They're also unjinxable.

Dave Clarke: They're also unjinxable. They're too good.

Bob Kelly: They're just too

Dave Clarke: fucking good. I can't affect them. There's

Bob Kelly: too many big moments where it's like You know, in a basketball game. No, we've

Dave Clarke: graduated. They've graduated. They've graduated. They did the work

Bob Kelly: and they're here now. In a game, there's always those big moments where like, you know, uh, game one specifically, I remember there was a moment, it was like, the Mavs were up 13 to 7 or something like that.

Bob Kelly: Yeah. And they had a chance to extend it out to a 10

Dave Clarke: point lead. They were really good at not going down too much for the whole season. To

Bob Kelly: that 10 point lead and all of a sudden, boom. They make a turnover, we go down, hit a three, and all of a sudden it's a three point game instead of an eight point game, and those are the moments that in the past wouldn't go in our favor, and instead of it being a three point game, it would be an 11 point game, and all of a sudden we'd be building uphill the entire way for the rest of the game.

Bob Kelly: We'd be the team on the comeback. This year, It's the exact opposite, where it's like, instead of an 8 point game, it's a 3 point game, or in the last game, the comeback, instead of, uh, you know, a 3 point game, we're still up by 7, or we're still up by 8, specifically because of, like, a defensive stop, or, you know, good ball movement.

Bob Kelly: That's the thing that, uh, I think it is going to take us in this next game is that ball movement, man. It's so pretty, even without Chris Stoppes. I mean, coming out of this, coming out of the first half, Yeah, four or five passes on each possession, which is like, Oh, it's great when they

Dave Clarke: do that. That reminds me of like, oh, Brad Stephens style ball when they go into that mode.

Dave Clarke: And coming out in the second half of the last game of game three, I mean, they played some of the best basketball the whole year. You know, they just went, they just popped coming out of the second half and built that huge leap. And the, the comeback just wasn't as good as that. You know what I mean? I mean, yeah, it happened at a more inopportune time for our, for our, uh, designs on winning the game.

Dave Clarke: But man, didn't they also just seem like completely unaffected by the crowd?

Bob Kelly: Like, I just, at

Dave Clarke: any point, I just didn't see them rattle from the crowd, like, even a little bit. Maybe some of the circumstances got in their heads a little bit in moments, but they shook it off, but the crowd just didn't affect them.

Dave Clarke: The crowd was pretty loud from what I was hearing on TV. What did you think?

Bob Kelly: Yeah, they, they, they get quiet fast, though. Dallas crowd. Dallas crowd gets quiet pretty quick, man. Losers. They do. It was, it was, in

Dave Clarke: the aftershow, they had Tatum on, and, uh, Chuck was like, is this Boston? Like, there were so many Celtics fans cheering for Tatum on, uh, on, on the, on the NBA after show.

Dave Clarke: And I was like, oh shit. I was like, we travel good too. We're everywhere. We're like a virus. You just can't get rid of us. We shoot us. We show up in random cities. Luckiest people on earth. Luckiest people on earth. Don't step on it. All right. Well, Friday, game four. We'll have to react to it. Uh, win or lose.

Dave Clarke: Maybe there's more basketball to talk about after this. Or maybe we have to go into the long hot summer, but uh, for myself and the real BK Bob Kelly, this has been Missing the Point.