“Unfini18ed Business.”
That’s what read across the Boston Celtics’ warmup gear during the 2023 NBA Playoffs—their battle cries all season. The demons that the team’s core spoke of elevated a championship-caliber season to title-or-bust status. Boston was heavily favored to end their 15-year spell but lapses and mistakes led to misapprehension. It caught up to them throughout the postseason.
A historic Miami Heat team, yet again, held the Celtics at the brink in the Eastern Conference Finals. The downfall caused them to implode, going down 3-0 as they almost made history by rallying to game 7. If anyone was not letting that happen, it was Pat Riley, Erik Spoelstra, and the Heat. One of the NBA’s most famished, prominent, and desperate franchises faced excessive questions.
Last year was a perfect chance for Boston, but they dug themselves into too much of a hole time and time again. It had to leave one thinking: Will there be any changes at the helm for the core at all? And after years and years of lingering rumors, it finally happened. The Celtics traded Marcus Smart.
Smart went to Memphis as the Celtics completed their lasting pursuit of Kristaps Porzingis over the years. Handshakes almost came to completion with the likes of a separate three-team deal involving Malcolm Brogdon going to the Clippers. Instead, at the buzzer of Porzingis’ opt-in deadline for the final year of his $36 million deal, it was Smart who was shipped.
The setter of the foundation with Brad Stevens after Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett left in 2013. He was nearing a decade in green.
Why the Celtics needed a change.
After years of sitting on the fence, Boston moved Smart. Despite it being rumored more than ever, once Stevens stepped into office, it became the toughest decision and biggest swing the former coach has had to make in the role. The two were beside each other for nearly their whole NBA careers.
The Celtics desperately needed roster balance. Al Horford’s production in his second Boston tenure has been a miracle at this age with the heavy load he has had to face in their two deep runs. The second-ranked league leader in three-point percentage during the regular season’s legs went in the ECF as Horford went completely cold despite the crucial defense.
Robert Williams is still a major domino toward Boston reaching the summit in this title desperation. But he has not shown the capability of maintaining any sort of durability, as his health issues have not gone away. A strongly defensive frontcourt that had a bit of a ceiling.
Boston had a bundle of key complementary guards on their depth chart that happened to be inappropriately limited. It became glaring at crucial moments. Sixth Man of the Year Brogdon, Derrick White, who, in his first full season with the team, turned into Boston’s third-best and most effective player Payton Pritchard was also harshly placed out of the rotation after he was a key contributor for the C’s bench in their Finals’ run.
Mazzulla was alerted to his new gig just days before training camp last September and tossed in with Ime Udoka’s staff. On paper, the Celtics arguably had the best roster in the league. Mazzulla, despite being behind the bench for multiple years and knowing the core well, had not a lick of head coaching experience, let alone in the NBA.
The New-Look Celtics
Boston still had all the success, coming up a game short of a Finals return and maintaining a top record in the league throughout the year. The Celtics were one of the few teams in NBA history to be in the top three in both offensive and defensive ratings.
Besides some ignored timeouts that have been regularly animated by recent Boston coaches, the pressure was easy to identify. Having the team’s heart and soul over the two effective figures who thrived in that third option role, elevating the team in White and Brogdon, can be a difficult decision. Like during the plethora of occasions where Smart attempted to play as if he were on the level of the tandem.
In those nine years, Smart had great moments, excelling with the team. However, there were more than enough negative instances late in the game. A strong example many first think of is the Game 7 closeout against Miami in 2022. That Jimmy Butler shot it came down to? Smart was 0-6, closing it out down the stretch to assist on that 11-point coughed-up lead in the remaining minutes ahead of the Butler miss before icing it with free throws.
There were an abundance of glimpses during last season’s underperformance of a championship run, mainly vs. Atlanta and Philadelphia. Potentially, some partial guilt in the end-game decision-making was all tied to Mazzulla’s prematurity. He now has war-like reps under his belt following Boston’s run, as he now has help from beloved 2008 Celtics champ and coach Sam Cassell, with Bucks 2021 title assistant Charles Lee embedding that new philosophy.
Everyone knows about the Celtics’ historic standards. Here’s the thing: In five conference final appearances out of seven years and only making one NBA Final, at some point, change at the helm is needed. It was not going to be those rival outsiders self-proclaimed fairytales of a split coming to the statistically historic duo.
Tatum and Brown take on more appropriate leadership duties, with Brown also nearing a decade and Tatum entering his seventh season. Anyone who viewed Smart as a hurdle towards the tandem’s growth with those late-game common occurrences, even taking more shots than the two at times, that’s out the window. The shackles are now unlocked. All indicating reasoning toward experts around the league labeling the Celtics’ major transition as a ‘home run.’ A golden opportunity.
How their new pieces fit together.
Brown and Tatum adapt to the dogged leadership roles more now as they get the best help they have had as the main weapons in Porzingis. KP gives the Jays incredible firepower on all three levels, offensively giving Boston an elite shot-blocker and post-presence. His eye-opening defensive improvements will fit right into their switching metrics on that end, with some zone integration now.
Porzingis makes Tatum and Brown’s lives simpler than one could ever imagine, as they have never had that type of service in the front court either. He adds the exact elements and features that the Celtics and their historic tandem needed. Now, Boston has unreal flexibility, with all of their lineup combinations being title favorites again with a greatly balanced roster. This could be a scary trio.
It is safe to say that Boston needed this for their tandem to complete a likable big three. With the way the league is trending as teams added more talent this summer, with big threes escalating with potentially more, they had to move with the landscape.
The Celtics have been right there, nearly with banner 18 in their hands, for a long time now. An All-Star-caliber big man joins two of the league’s best players. The blockbuster really shows how hungry the Celtics’ franchise is to get the job done, with it certainly being felt throughout the organization.