MVN - Most Valuable Network

Agent Zero and Celtics Bench Support

The first game of the season was in full view Friday night against the Washington Wizards – a sell-out crowd, ESPN coverage on national television, and the suspense of the new threesome on the Celtics. The drama was heightened by none other than Agent Zero, a.k.a. the blogger and all-star guard Gilbert Arenas, who promised victory for his Wizards in the opener against the Celtics.

I’ve taken the liberty of placing Agent Zero and John Hollinger in the same corner as far as being disbelievers. After all, they are the ones on ESPN who thought it was nice that the Celtics improved their roster with Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen, but identified issues that the C’s would have to work out including that horrible bench and that chemistry thing that all good teams must develop. They were thinking that the Celtics haven’t proved anything more than on paper.

Finally we got a chance to see the Celtics play a game that counted on Friday. After the game was underway and the first game jitters had subsided, Celtic Nation was pleasantly surprised to find that the team in fact does have some chemistry and may in fact have a competent bench.

First, let’s review Agent Zero’s blog statement:

On November 2nd, we’re going to go into that building, we’re opening up Boston. Right now I’m telling the Boston fans: You guys are going to lose. It’s not going to be a victory for Boston. You might as well just cheer for me, because Boston isn’t winning in Boston for the season opener. I’m sorry.

Second, my second favorite bulletin board item for the Celtics locker room, compliments of a John Hollinger chat on ESPN Insider on 7/31

Steve (South Pasadena, CA): The last time KG teamed up with two potent wing scorers, he reached the Conference Finals in a much tougher West - and Pierce and Allen are arguably better than Spree and Cassell. Is the rest of the Celts’ cast that much worse than the Wolves supporting players were in ‘04? John Hollinger: Pierce and Allen are better than Spree and Cassell, but you’re forgetting that Garnett is worse than Garnett … he was the best player in the league, by far, in ‘04, and while he’s still top 10 material he’s not at that exalted level anymore. As for the role players — Wolves had Wally, the Mayor, Hudson, Gary Trent, Kandi Man, and a stopper in Hassell. That may not seem like much, but it crushes what the Cs have right now.

Well my Celtic friends, Arenas dealt with the chemistry issue by virtue of the Celtics making Swiss cheese of the Wizards by half-time. The Celtics scored more points in the second quarter than the Wizards managed in the entire 1st half. Boston went up 29-26 with 10:21 left in the 2nd quarter, and proceeded to outscore Washington 29-10 the rest of the quarter to end up with a 58-36 half-time lead. The Celtics played the Wizards even in the second half, although there was a brief scare when the Wizards whittled the lead down to 15 early in the 4th quarter, but the Wizards never really threatened while being subdued by a margin of 20 in this “guaranteed” victory by Arenas.

And about that bench . . . NBA.COM is now carrying an additional statistic in their box scores that is “+/-“. It is equivalent to the team points scored minus the opposition points against while the player is on the court. Incredible stat as it sums up whether the team gains or loses ground while the particular player is on the court.

I bring this up because the bench that is supposedly so thin for the Celtics, and was even thinner on Friday due to the 1-game suspension of James Posey, just sparkled during the season opener. The +/- stat shows that from top to bottom, the Celtics 9-man rotation with Brian Scalabrine, Eddie House, Tony Allen and Scot Pollard off the bench did their job.

The score was tied by the time this foursome came in late in the 1st quarter, and with House-Allen-Pierce-Scalabrine-Pollard on the floor, the Celtics increased the lead to 10. Sure, Pierce scored half the points during the run, but the bench certainly did their job. These bench players continued to hold service when they were in the game, leading to +/- totals of +8 for Tony Allen, +9 for House and Pollard, and +13 for Scalabrine, yes SCALABRINE!

Since I don’t think the first game will prove to be an aberration, and I don’t think Posey’s addition is going to hurt the bench, I really do think Mr. Hollinger will be eating crow along-side Agent Zero at the end of this year when Celtics lay claim to their championship aspirations.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 4th, 2007 at 7:02 am and is filed under Celtics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.