Celtics weekly update: January 27th



The Boston Celtics came back from 27 points Thursday night to beat the Orlando Magic 91-83. This is the third straight win for the Celtics without Ray Allen and Rajon Rondo. This is also the second straight win against Orlando, as the Celts opened up a can of whoop-ass on Monday when they beat the Magic 87-56.

The Celtics started off the week at Washington to face the lowly Wizards. They ended up winning this game by six but lost Ray Allen in the process. Allen sprained his ankle and sat out Monday and Thursday's games against Orlando.

On Monday the Celtics took on the Magic, who have one of the best records in the East. They started Avery Bradley and Sasha Pavlovic and still won by 31. The C's played great defense on Dwight Howard and closed out on the shooters. It also helped that Orlando couldn't hit water if they fell off a boat. The big thing that I took out of this game was the play of point guard Avery Bradley. He's had a tough start to the season mainly because he's been chucking from all over the court and he's not a shooter. This was the first game that I saw him play the position of point guard and not worry about his own shot. He pressured Jameer Nelson all game too. In my mind, he's one of the best on ball defenders in the NBA. If he can continue to play like this, then the Celtics bench will be much better off.

Last night's game was the most inspired I have seen the Celtics play all season. The Magic were rolling right through them and got the lead up to 27 points in the second quarter. The Celtics kept chipping away and got it down to 9 by the start of the 4th quarter. With clutch shooting from rookie E'Twaun Moore (4-4 from 3, 14 points) and the offensive wizardry of captain Paul Pierce, the Celtics pulled off the huge upset and ended up winning the game 91-83.

This brings the Celtics record to 8-9 and leaves them sitting in 8th place in the East. This also gave the C's two respectable wins so far in this young season. Friday night they play the Indiana Pacers, who they've already lost to twice. The Celtics historically have been terrible on the second night of back-to-back's but with these two wins against the Magic I think they're going to be fine. The Celtics should be seeing the positive side of the .500 mark very shortly, and I hope to continue to be the bearer of good news every Friday when I write a weekly update.

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Kevin Garnett goes wild in post-game interview

Sign me up. A bar fight? More like a magical choke job. Craig Sager had no idea that this was coming. KG just came up to him and started yelling and cussing from the get-go. I love the part when he asks Sager if he's ever been in a bar fight knowing that Craig probably has never been in a pillow fight before in his life.

KG usually has about one or two of these crazy interviews every season. An interview in which he still has to show the world that he's certifiably insane and let out everything he's been holding in for the entire season so far. I hope he keeps this up because the city of Boston has missed this KG. He needs to keep talking trash, keep trowing elbows, and keep reminding Craig Sager how much of a fool he looks like.

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Dwight Howard adds Celtics to list of teams he'd be willing to play for

Magics center Dwight Howard has slowly been expanding his list of teams he would accept a trade to or consider in his free agency this summer and Howard just recently confirmed that the Boston Celtics are officially on that list. 

When the Herald's Steve Bulpett asked Howard if he would consider coming to Boston to play for the Celts, Howard responded:

"Always. Always,” Howard told the Herald. “I’d always listen to a team like that. “My thing is I want to win. It’s not something like I’m doing this for money. I win. I want to do it my way.” 

“The first thing is basketball,” he said. “I want to win a championship, and it takes a certain type of team to win a championship. You know, there’s a lot of teams who are great during the regular season. They play well, but it’s different once you play in those playoffs, you know? It’s gut-check time. 

“Like I told the Magic, I just want to win. I don’t want a team that doesn’t know how you have to win in the playoffs. I want a team that’s going to go out every night and forget about stats, forget about who scores the most points or who is the fan favorite. Just go out and play, play for each other and play to win. That’s the only thing.” 

“You know,” said Howard, “you look at a team like Boston and look at a team like LA who’s won . . . especially Boston. Man, those guys came together and they didn’t care who scored all the points. They had done all the individual stuff. 

“You know, for me, I’ve done a lot of things individually, but I want a championship. All those accolades that I’ve got over the years, they mean a lot, but it’s just different watching teams hold up that trophy and knowing how hard you have to work to get it. 

“They have the championship mentality,” he said of the Celts. “It means a lot. Like I said, I like the team. They play hard and they go after it, and that’s what I like.”

Not really sure how realistic the Howard to Boston idea is (especially with the Celtics struggles early on this season) but it's comforting to know that he'll at least consider donning green. The thought of a new-age C's team built around Rondo, Howard, and Pierce at least provides a glimmer of hope for the future of this franchise.

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Andre Ethier calls in to WEEI to prank Dustin Pedroia

If you follow this blog or know me personally you'll probably know that I'm a big listener of the Sports Hub and not a big fan of WEEI, while Tay is just the opposite. While I don't like many of the guys who work for WEEI (with the exception of Michael Holly) I will admit that they do have a pretty impressive lineup of guests who call in every week, such as Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia. 

During Pedroia's weekly segment on The Big Show, Dodgers outfielder Andre Ethier, who was teammates with Pedroia at Arizona State, called in and posed as a fan (named Andrew) wanting to speak to the Sox' second baseman. From the very beginning it was clear that "Andrew" really wanted to get under the Pedroia's skin, which probably isn't a very tough task. To do so, Ethier said Pedroia wasn't very good and suggested that the front office trade him just like they did with shortstop Marco Scutaro, stating they could get by just fine with Nick Punto and Mike Aviles manning the middle infield. 

Pedroia, not knowing it was his best friend on the line ripping him, responded in typical Pedey fashion:

"Let me break it down for you, Andrew. I gotta couple of pieces of hardware that say I'm pretty damn good," he said. "I'm looking to hire someone to come and spray them down for me. Andrew, you gotta job?"

Pretty damn funny. If EEI could come up with more stuff like this and less whiney middle-aged men finding ridiculous things to bitch about maybe I'd consider giving them a spot on my radio's presets.

Audio after the jump:

Here's what is likely the world's most effective birth control method

Knights of Columbus! Not sure what this guy's goal was but I'm pretty sure he didn't accomplish it...unless his goal was to never have the need for condoms again. 

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Markel Brown's alley-oop versus Missouri was so damn good he got ejected for it

If you didn't catch Oklahoma State take down No.2 ranked Missouri tonight on ESPN you missed this incredible alley-oop slam thrown down by OK State's Markel Brown. The night's top highlight featured Brown rising above Missouri's Matt Pressey, my former high school classmate, and viciously slamming it before giving Pressey a "thanks for being a part of my new poster" staredown, which earned him his second technical of the night and an ejection.

But don't feel bad for Brown, his team still pulled off the upset and, hey, his slam was one hell of a way to call it a night.

[via CozSweaters]

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It's the offseason, but BigYankeeFan is still making awful YouTube videos

Back in October we showed you the embarrassingly bad video some guy by the name of Michael LaPayower, who goes by the nickname "BigYankeeFan", left on our Facebook page. Over the past few months we've exchanged some (not so kind) words with the man himself, constantly referring to him as a "half-retarded virgin"...which he's not exactly a big fan of. 

His videos (and, most likely, his life) suck but we really enjoy a good laugh and figure you do too, so here's his latest installment - an obviously shitty version of the Internet's newest fad, those mostly unfunny “Shit [xxx] Say” videos.

Sit back, watch, and go ahead and laugh your ass off at this guy's expense...because the only thing that's worse than a half-retarded virgin is a half-retarded virgin who's also a soulless Yankees fan.

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I'm pretty sure this is highly illegal

Correct me if I'm wrong here but I'm pretty sure at no point in time during a basketball game are you allowed to come off the bench and into play while the ball is live. There are no such thing as "line changes" in basketball. At least that's my understanding of the rules anyways. 

Apparently Jason Richardson learned his rules at a different basketball school because that's exactly what he did yesterday when he realized his Magic only had four men on the floor against the Celtics. J-Rich hopped off the bench and began to play defense, immediately stripping Greg Stiemsma of the ball. And he got away with it...some way, some how.

Who's awareness is worse here, Stan Van Gundy's for not realizing that his own squad was down a man or the refs for not spotting Richardson hop off the bench and jump directly into play?

Either way, the cheating didn't really help the Magic all that much considering they got absolutely smoked by a struggling & depleted Celtics team, 87-56. 

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