Fixed the title, sorry about that Joe. I even looked it up and then still spelled his name wrong.
Joe Mazzulla, come on down.
- Thread starter chilidawg
- Start date
Players seem to be all on board the Mazzulla train:
https://www.celticsblog.com/2022/9/26/23373498/boston-celtics-media-day-joe-mazzulla-jayson-tatum-jaylen-brown-marcus-smart-al-horford
https://www.celticsblog.com/2022/9/26/23373498/boston-celtics-media-day-joe-mazzulla-jayson-tatum-jaylen-brown-marcus-smart-al-horford
Mazzulla seems to be viewed as a coaching phenom.
This is interesting:
View: https://twitter.com/wojespn/status/1574966534837260288?s=20&t=t-SsXCElxaHU3OtYq1pLCg
Adrian Wojnarowski: The Celtics are seeking permission to talk to Clippers assistant Jay Larranaga about joining interim coach Joe Mazzulla’s staff this season, sources tell ESPN. Larranaga spent nine seasons with Celtics before joining the Clippers in 2021.
Larranaga's time as a Celtics assistant goes back to Doc's final year, and he stayed throughout the Brad Stevens coaching era. Mazzulla came on board during Brad's final year, so the two have a season of working together.
Larranaga would be a lower profile addition than someone like a Frank Vogel - I don't think there will be rampant speculation about whether Larranaga will get the job if the Celtics struggle.
Are we also seeing a pivot away from Pop influence? Udoka came from Pop and brought another pop guy (Will Hardy) with him. Both are gone now, at least for this season.
Who will Mazzulla's top assistant be?
Some background on Mazzulla.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/09/28/sports/dont-know-much-about-joe-mazzulla-lets-catch-you-up-new-celtics-coach/
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/09/28/sports/dont-know-much-about-joe-mazzulla-lets-catch-you-up-new-celtics-coach/
FWIW Larranaga apparently declined the offer.
View: https://twitter.com/sichrismannix/status/1575303145873412117?s=46&t=r651i7OhJes-m25lYJBo1A
Brogdon has nice things to say about his coach:
“I thought he was excellent. I thought he was composed [and] I thought he had some great out-of-timeout plays.”
“He’s not a yeller; he’s not a screamer,” Brogdon said of Mazzulla. “He’s very deliberate; he’s very direct. He’s not a guy that’s going to over-talk you and tell you too much because he wants you to go out and have a clear mind. He’s going to be very direct and very honest with what he expects from you, which I think is everything an NBA player wants in a coach.”
https://www.celticsblog.com/2022/10/2/23384339/joe-mazzulla-boston-celtics-malcolm-brogdon-jaylen-brown-charlotte-hornets-preseason-game-win
“I thought he was excellent. I thought he was composed [and] I thought he had some great out-of-timeout plays.”
“He’s not a yeller; he’s not a screamer,” Brogdon said of Mazzulla. “He’s very deliberate; he’s very direct. He’s not a guy that’s going to over-talk you and tell you too much because he wants you to go out and have a clear mind. He’s going to be very direct and very honest with what he expects from you, which I think is everything an NBA player wants in a coach.”
https://www.celticsblog.com/2022/10/2/23384339/joe-mazzulla-boston-celtics-malcolm-brogdon-jaylen-brown-charlotte-hornets-preseason-game-win
Nothing but positive comments about Mazzulla from anyone, but some to a lot of that could be a "rally around the flag" kind of thing. What will be interesting is to see how the team handles adversity or reacts to a controversial decision by Mazzulla.
(That said, I think Celtics management views Mazzulla as a future great coach, and I think there is some truth in the player comments that he has handled the sudden transition well.)
(That said, I think Celtics management views Mazzulla as a future great coach, and I think there is some truth in the player comments that he has handled the sudden transition well.)
I was impressed by how comfortable he seemed to be experimenting with a lot of lineups and combinations. If there was a knock on Ime, it might be that he didn't seem that strategically flexible, at least relative to other good coaches.
I know some of that was trying to establish a clear culture and roles in year 1, but something still felt a bit different.
Nice piece on how Mazzulla is incorporating some different defensive looks to suit the skills of the different bigs. Kabengele comes across as a guy who is really focused on learning.
https://www.celticsblog.com/2022/10/2/23381897/celtics-working-with-traditional-defense-in-early-practices-al-horford-robert-williams-luke-kornet
https://www.celticsblog.com/2022/10/2/23381897/celtics-working-with-traditional-defense-in-early-practices-al-horford-robert-williams-luke-kornet
Don't think it's crazy at all: he got a lot of credit for the actual schemes they were running last year.
Still very early.
To be fair to Ime, he had to start with a team that had a very weak bench anchored by Josh Richardson, Dennis Schroeder (who was not a fit here), Enes Kanter/Freedom (who was awful), and two all out first round busts in Langford and Nesmith. And he had to figure out how to incorporate Grant Williams and Peyton Prichard as well. And Ime implemented a new system that started Horford and Robert Williams in tandem in order to ensure that the team's best 5 players got the most playing time.
Mazzulla's task is both easier and more difficult at the same time. The difficulties have been noted in this thread and elsewhere, but he is starting with a lineup that is much more of a finished product and yet has room for organic growth as well. There will still be growing pains, especially with R Williams out for the first 2-3 months, but having Brogdon first off the bench will be a marked improvement over the team's roster this time last season.
Mazzulla's task is both easier and more difficult at the same time. The difficulties have been noted in this thread and elsewhere, but he is starting with a lineup that is much more of a finished product and yet has room for organic growth as well. There will still be growing pains, especially with R Williams out for the first 2-3 months, but having Brogdon first off the bench will be a marked improvement over the team's roster this time last season.
It’s a delicate balance in grading an NBA coach. How much do you weigh X’s and O’s versus team building, commeraderie and a singular focus over 82 games? Wasn’t Ime near the bottom or the league in quite a few stats yet he was a very good leader of his team? Personally, I’d weigh the latter more heavily in this league.
The test for this coach is managing all of the personalities over a long season and making adjustments in the playoffs to what you see teams doing. There are only questions at the back of the roster — by using Mazzulla we made the start of the season as easy as possible. Only time will tell whether he can get them through a period of bad play or when there’s some inevitable tension about Smart shooting too much or whatever requires him to maintain control of a bunch of players.
As a first time head coach, I think he's in a much better situation this year than Ime was last year. This is a much better and more cohesive team and Joe was part of the coaching staff that helped them get there so he has a ton of inside information about what makes this team tick. It's hard to imagine a better situation for Joe to get his first shot as a head coach.
Going to make a prediction that might end up looking horrible:
Within 2 months, we will prefer Mazzulla as coach to Ime.
Ime did some great work fixing the culture, and I think a lot of that is now pretty burned in, particularly on defense. l
The team needs continuity there, which they'll get, but I think it also needed a bit more ooomph/creativity wrt Xs and Os, especially if TL will miss a lot of games. I'm higher on Mazzula's ability to do that than I am on Ime's.
Within 2 months, we will prefer Mazzulla as coach to Ime.
Ime did some great work fixing the culture, and I think a lot of that is now pretty burned in, particularly on defense. l
The team needs continuity there, which they'll get, but I think it also needed a bit more ooomph/creativity wrt Xs and Os, especially if TL will miss a lot of games. I'm higher on Mazzula's ability to do that than I am on Ime's.
I think that prediction is bold (so I bolded it), but not crazy.
Utah wanted to hire him to become Will Hardy's top assistant.
The Celtics (and Ime) made him Ime's #1 even though he was the only (originally) non-Ime guy on the coaching staff.
His first year coaching with the Celtics was with Brad Stevens, who knows him well. With Ainge still here, too.
The people who have worked with him love him. The players seem to be on board with him (though some of that could be a circle the wagons thing).
I think the Celtics see him as a future great coach, and with the Ime thing they decided the best thing to do was move up his timetable.
My main question regarding Ime’s coaching was the playoffs. I felt like he didn’t make a lot of adjustments and the team suffered for it. There were a lot of runs that he did nothing to change to combat and he left some obviously horrible lineups in for way too long on a number of occasions. It’s one thing when players aren’t hitting shots.. it’s another thing putting in five players out there that aren’t working together and letting it run for 5 minutes. Hopefully with the addition of Brogdon there will be less bad lineup choices, but I’m interested to see what happens with Mazzulla in the playoffs and if he’ll have a different style and approach there.
The regular season can only expose his holes while he won’t be able to be fully critiqued until he faces the pressures of playoff adjustments versus playoff coaches. As much as I’m rooting for Joe I’ll be holding off crowning him until the real season in the spring is well underway.
I meant in terms of a head coach. It's true with the loss of Hardy + Ime there may be some overall brain drain.
I think Joe Mazzulla had his head up his ass today, and the Celtics will be lucky to get out of this final preseason game without seeing their championship aspirations take a hit in a meaningless game.
Mazzulla decided that in this game, the final preseason game, he would play his starters like it was a regular game. That didn't make a whole lot of sense to begin with, but to do it on a slippery floor in Montreal bordered on the idiotic. Especially since the Celtics players themselves were not locked in, delivering by far their worst performance on both ends of the floor.
Malcolm Brogdon played 14 minutes in the first half and then exited the game with a sore leg that the Celtics claim is nothing serious. Assuming that it true, it is good that he did, because Mazzulla probably would have run him out there until he got a serious injury.
Late in the third, with the Celtics ahead, there was a weird sequence where the refs called a weak tech on Tatum who already had one, throwing him out. This led Grant to pick up a tech and then the Celtics to get a third for delay of game. Toronto tied the game up at the free throw line.
At that point, one would have thought that Joe would take the hint that this was a fucked up game and pull the plug, but he didn't, playing every other starter late into the 4th.
Marcus had a guy fall on his leg in the third quarter and limped around walking it off before stayong on the floor. Then, in the fourth, he goes down without any contact on an out of bounds play. Finally leaves the game. Apparently all that happened was he slipped on the floor? But why put your starters at risk on a bad floor they will never see again.
I have KC Jones 1987 vibes about this guy, all of a sudden.
Mazzulla decided that in this game, the final preseason game, he would play his starters like it was a regular game. That didn't make a whole lot of sense to begin with, but to do it on a slippery floor in Montreal bordered on the idiotic. Especially since the Celtics players themselves were not locked in, delivering by far their worst performance on both ends of the floor.
Malcolm Brogdon played 14 minutes in the first half and then exited the game with a sore leg that the Celtics claim is nothing serious. Assuming that it true, it is good that he did, because Mazzulla probably would have run him out there until he got a serious injury.
Late in the third, with the Celtics ahead, there was a weird sequence where the refs called a weak tech on Tatum who already had one, throwing him out. This led Grant to pick up a tech and then the Celtics to get a third for delay of game. Toronto tied the game up at the free throw line.
At that point, one would have thought that Joe would take the hint that this was a fucked up game and pull the plug, but he didn't, playing every other starter late into the 4th.
Marcus had a guy fall on his leg in the third quarter and limped around walking it off before stayong on the floor. Then, in the fourth, he goes down without any contact on an out of bounds play. Finally leaves the game. Apparently all that happened was he slipped on the floor? But why put your starters at risk on a bad floor they will never see again.
I have KC Jones 1987 vibes about this guy, all of a sudden.
I think you need to stop looking for the worst in a preseason game. How would Mazzulla have known in advance the floor would have been shit? Did he leave guys in too long once it was realized a thing? Maybe, but that's debatable. How often does Marcus look like he suffers a season ending injury only to hop up 15 seconds later? [insert coach] will call bad games, and I don't even think this is one of them. Brogdon has never played a full 82, max 75, 64 since his rookie season, so you can't blame Mazzulla for leaving him in.
Also, the dude was preparing as an assistant coach less than 3 weeks ago. Did you give Ime the benefit at the end of doubt in these parts around mid season(serious question, zero snark). Lets give Mazzulla a chance, a dude who had no offseason to prepare to be a HC, at least a few regular season games
His presence from the sideline is nil. It’s preseason so it’s not really important but the ridiculous tech and ejection of Tatum at least deserved some reaction by the head coach; instead he was invisible. It’s unimportant in this game, but let’s hope he can be more of a presence once the season starts. I mean, I don’t need the coach to be overly aggressive but Mazulla has come off as so passive that it feels like the Cs don’t even have a head coach..
I don't think he could have known, but one thing a coach should do is react to unanticipated situations. Another thing a coach should do is have concern about his players' health. He failed on both counts. In a game that meant nothing - and that his own players treated as a game that meant nothing. None of that is good.
It's just one game, and no one can be a good NBA coach without having an ability to learn on the job and from mistakes. But the importance he assigned to a game that meant nothing, and the obvious split between coach and players (who were clearly not invested the way Mazzulla was) is not a great sign.
I could see this team having several guys among the minutes leaders at their positions and being worn down come playoff team. I could see Mazzulla riding Al, oldest player on the team, harder than Ime did last year, and not having him at his peak in the playoffs.
I'm not predicting those things. But 24 hours ago I would have said that the Celtics, as an organization, know better than that. Last night suggests maybe they don't.
Here is Karalis game summary:
https://www.bostonsportsjournal.com/2022/10/14/bsj-game-report-raptors-137-celtics-134---cs-wrap-up-preseason-with-weird-loss-
Mazzulla coached this one like a guy who had a plan in mind for what he wanted to accomplish, and when the situation did not unfold according to plan he refused to adjust, putting his players at risk and possibly losing one of them. For nothing.
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In re: Knowing about the surface.
After Smart slipped and fell in the 4th, while the crew was mopping the spot, GWill suddenly ran in between them with a towel,
got on his knees, and started wiping it himself, ostensibly to make a point.
Semi-Unrelated: A Toronto player standing there watching suddenly started pointing at Grant animatedly and looking around wildly, apparently to get a tech called? Tool.
Marcus left courtside before the game ended and was seeing clutching his left hip area and stumbling a bit to that side. This despite staying in for awhile after the fall; Jaylen didn’t come out until Marcus came out.
I think I only kept watching to make sure GWill and White didn’t get concussed or die or something. There was some morbid fascination with listening to the announcers excitedly talk up the excitement of overtime basketball even though the guy with the Dick Vitale schtick had broken character before regular ended and intoned in a very serious voice that he didn’t like to see OT in the pre-season.
I don’t claim to know the right decisions because I don’t know what the goals were. Somewhere along the way, though, the whole thing got dumb.
After Smart slipped and fell in the 4th, while the crew was mopping the spot, GWill suddenly ran in between them with a towel,
got on his knees, and started wiping it himself, ostensibly to make a point.
Semi-Unrelated: A Toronto player standing there watching suddenly started pointing at Grant animatedly and looking around wildly, apparently to get a tech called? Tool.
Marcus left courtside before the game ended and was seeing clutching his left hip area and stumbling a bit to that side. This despite staying in for awhile after the fall; Jaylen didn’t come out until Marcus came out.
I think I only kept watching to make sure GWill and White didn’t get concussed or die or something. There was some morbid fascination with listening to the announcers excitedly talk up the excitement of overtime basketball even though the guy with the Dick Vitale schtick had broken character before regular ended and intoned in a very serious voice that he didn’t like to see OT in the pre-season.
I don’t claim to know the right decisions because I don’t know what the goals were. Somewhere along the way, though, the whole thing got dumb.
If you’re going to criticize Mazzulla you have to do the same to Nurse whose starters played similar minutes. I didn’t watch but how slippery was the floor for them to continue on with a preseason game?
LOL @ Karalis being confused by a preseason lineup. Slow news day?
FWIW, minutes might have been similar, but Nurse started pulling his frontline guys earlier than Mazzulla did. For the second time this preseason, the Raptors' bench feasted on Boston.
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Siakam got zero minutes on this floor. Tatum played 29 of 34 minutes until his stupid but perhaps fortunate ejection from the game, incicating that Mazzulla planned to go much longer with him.
No kidding. We've gone from the Celtics don't try or care enough to they're trying too hard.
I don’t understand how anyone could watch this preseason and not be blown away with Mazzulla. This team looks elite offensively, the pace is light years above last season, though obviously it’ll slow some in the regular season. The ball movement, the creativity schematically is….unlike anything I ever thought I’d see with this team.
And we know what they can do defensively, and we know Mazz is the guy who came up with the scheme.
And we know what they can do defensively, and we know Mazz is the guy who came up with the scheme.
My comment was specifically to do with the game yesterday. I don’t understand how anyone can assume that because a coach does many things well, he must be perfect and beyond criticism.
There’s a difference between criticizing last night, and saying you’re now concerned about him as a coach and that he’s giving KC 1987 vibes.
The offensive scheme and creativity is really impressing me. Looks like a completely different team on that end than even the one that blew the doors off the league last spring. That one did good stuff using elite talent to get teams in rotation, but this one just has a lot more actions and little wrinkles it's doing.
I get the frustration in leaving guys out there, and I probably wouldn't have done it. But it's not all costs and no benefits: there is a lot of stuff they need to keep working on, they're improving at it, and Toronto brings enough intensity (even in preseason) that you can work on the offense for real.
Siakam wasn't available.
My guess is that Mazzula wanted to give the starters some run since it would have been almost 2 weeks since they played minutes (most didn't play v CHA) until the season opener v PHI.
However, when JT slipped on the floor he should have known the conditions were suspect and after Smart slipped, I wanted all of the starters out, which happened about a minute later.
My interest piqued…I haven’t had the opportunity to watch the preseason at all, so excited to see continued evolution.
Agree with the observation that even with the teams success last season, the offense seemed to have to work off talent more often than I would like. That’s a solvable problem with the right coaching.
I like that he has goven a serious look to White starting with Rob out. In terms of offense that is better than starting a Blake or Kornet or Vonleh or even Grant. On the other hand, Toronto kind of murdered them on the glass and the Celtics defense was not effective. But this was also just a preseason game. I assume that is the lineup until Rob is back, which I think is good.
Its as if we didn't learn anything from last season with Udoka. I loathe bringing up the past but if last season didn't teach Cs fans that anxiety-fueled small sample sized hot takes are to be sat on rather than shared with the world, we are beyond hope.
Mazzulla is the guy and like Udoka before him, its almost certain that Brad Stevens will give him more rope than you. Deal with it and maybe give the person a chance or at least a month before you proclaim things a disaster in the making.
Edit: There is no prize for being early.
Mazzulla is the guy and like Udoka before him, its almost certain that Brad Stevens will give him more rope than you. Deal with it and maybe give the person a chance or at least a month before you proclaim things a disaster in the making.
Edit: There is no prize for being early.
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Please do a post on what is permissible to say and when, as well as who appointed you arbiter of these things.
You don't even know and most likely couldn't guess what my opinion of Mazzulla is, and your post had nothing substantive to say beyond the drive by STFU, if you call that substantive.
I am sorry my post, not in response to anyone in particular, struck a nerve. I also am not an arbiter of what to post and have never claimed that role. I don't want it at all.
That said, this place used to self police emoting posts and people making up narratives in their head based on anecdata. We haven't of late and our output is suffering.
In short, if rotation decisions in one preseason game for a first year head coach who essentially fell into the job are giving you enough bad vibes to rage post paragraphs, expect pushback.
FWIW, HRB raises a good point about Nurse also keeping in his starters. Clearly the coaches are trying to get ready for the season. Nurse didn't fall with the last raindrop and did the same thing.
That said, the floor was an abortion. I don't know the explanation for sure, but it seems like one of those "don't play basketball in a hockey arena" situations. And if you've ever had to coach or play on a floor with mad condensation like that, it's horrifying. I had to move a practice to one half of a gym because guys (kids) kept going down hard. Took us like four brutal falls before finally pulling the plug because we had shit to work on. Everyone seems fine, so hopefully Nick and Joe learned a valuable lesson for the next time they are in this situation.
I do get Eddie's concern, but it should probably be pointed at both staffs, not just one.
The game...well the rest of it was a mess too. Reffed like a bunch of the guys from the crowd threw on whistles. Toronto is long and played like they had something to prove. The Cs treated it like a game-speed walkthrough (which it is) and had some of their ball luck run out (looking at you Howser). My only concern is that we are going to have some games where we get eaten alive on the boards. Hoping that Joe can game plan some team rebounding shit, since "let's stick another tall guy out there who sucks" isn't the play IMO. Other than that, ball was still zipping around ok. Tatum and Jaylen still have guys bouncing off them. The former still needs a pep talk about how to handle not getting the whistles he wants. They look fine to me.
That said, the floor was an abortion. I don't know the explanation for sure, but it seems like one of those "don't play basketball in a hockey arena" situations. And if you've ever had to coach or play on a floor with mad condensation like that, it's horrifying. I had to move a practice to one half of a gym because guys (kids) kept going down hard. Took us like four brutal falls before finally pulling the plug because we had shit to work on. Everyone seems fine, so hopefully Nick and Joe learned a valuable lesson for the next time they are in this situation.
I do get Eddie's concern, but it should probably be pointed at both staffs, not just one.
The game...well the rest of it was a mess too. Reffed like a bunch of the guys from the crowd threw on whistles. Toronto is long and played like they had something to prove. The Cs treated it like a game-speed walkthrough (which it is) and had some of their ball luck run out (looking at you Howser). My only concern is that we are going to have some games where we get eaten alive on the boards. Hoping that Joe can game plan some team rebounding shit, since "let's stick another tall guy out there who sucks" isn't the play IMO. Other than that, ball was still zipping around ok. Tatum and Jaylen still have guys bouncing off them. The former still needs a pep talk about how to handle not getting the whistles he wants. They look fine to me.
As to the bolded, I will just note that I am more invested in the C's.
I think that when the game turned into a circus with the bizarre ref show Tatum ejection... that might have been a good time to empty the bench even if he hadn't before.
so right. Mazz was trying to get some work in for the starters. BUT the criticism is fair, extended minutes on that condensation floor for a preseason game wasn't clever by either coach.
Heck if that was a regular-season game I'd be in favor of Mazz immediately pulling the starters with a floor like that.