The Celtics are shattering your preconceived notions

The Boston Celtics weren’t supposed to be good. Preseason projections weren’t quite sure what to make of a team with so much uncertainty, but consensus had them right around .500 while acknowledging that a slow start would likely lead to a heavy gravity on their record as they chased a high draft pick.

Losing Jayson Tatum to an Achilles injury and letting previous rotation mainstays Jrue Holiday, Kristaps Porzingis, Al Horford, and Luke Kornet go meant this would be the first season Boston entered without legitimate Finals hopes in half a decade. Whether Boston should tank to take advantage of a gap year became a hotly debated question.

September discussion centered around three major questions. Would the team have the worst center rotation in the league? (Losing three good centers might do that.) How much could Jaylen Brown elevate his game as the unquestioned star? And just how hard would coach Joe Mazzulla lean into Mazzulla-ball (e.g., would we see them launch 60 triples per game) to compensate for a lack of star power on both ends?

Well, despite an 0-3 and then 5-7 start, the Celtics are currently 15-10 with a top-seven point differential in the league. An exhausted loss to Milwaukee last night ended what had been an impressive five-game winning streak against strong competition, including Cleveland, New York, the hated Lakers, and Toronto. Including victories against Detroit and Orlando, they’ve now notched at least one W against almost every team they’re battling in the Eastern Conference standings except Miami, whom they haven’t played yet, and Philadelphia.

This iteration of the Celtics isn’t scared of anyone. More importantly, they’ve proven they can beat anyone.

Let’s break it down through the lens of those preseason questions.

1) The center rotation will be one of the league’s worst

I have been a Neemias Queta fan since I first saw him at Summer League, and I highlighted his breakout potential before the season. So yeah, I never quite bought the narrative that Queta would be a flat tire.

Instead, Queta has emerged as an analytics superstar. All-in-one numbers like EPM consider him one of the most impactful role players in the league. He’s been an excellent shotblocker, reined in some of his worst fouling tendencies (although it’s still occasionally a problem), and provided far more offensive juice as an elbow screener, hand-offer, and hard-charging rim-running threat than he’d previously shown:

Overall, lineups with Queta are outscoring opponents by nearly 15 points per 100 possessions, a margin that would astonish anyone living outside of Oklahoma City. If he keeps playing this well, announcers and podcasters might one day even learn how to pronounce “Neemias” correctly.

So Queta has been good. I did have concerns with the backup situation, particularly given Queta’s penchant for fouls. Could the Celtics survive 20-25 minutes from Luka Garza, Xavier Tillman, or Chris Boucher every night?

The answer has mostly been no. Garza is shooting well but provides zero defensive presence whatsoever, and Tillman and Boucher have largely been out of the rotation. But Mazzulla stumbled upon a different solution, one that has keyed their hot 10-3 stretch: Super small-ball.

Jordan Walsh (lots more on him further down), Josh Minott, and even rookie Hugo Gonzalez have all earned themselves minutes at center. Walsh and Gonzalez are 6’6”, and Minott is 6’8”. None is over 205 pounds.

And yet, in lineups without any of their traditional big men, the Celtics are blasting opponents by nearly 13 points per 100 possessions. It sure as hell isn’t because of the defense, which predictably can’t rebound or stop fouling. But the offense is scoring a NOS-charged 138 points per 100 possessions in those times — Denver’s league-leading attack scores just 126 points per 100 possessions!

Will the small-ball lineups dominate forever? Probably not; the team is shooting a silly 47% from deep during those times. (We saw last night in a loss to a Giannis-less Milwaukee what happens when the shooters go cold.)

But an offense at those absurd heights can see a serious drop-off and still be elite. The starting lineup with Queta has absolutely dominated opponents all season; if Boston can survive without Queta, too, they will continue to rack up wins.

2) Jaylen Brown can’t be the #1 guy on a winning team

In seven games without Tatum last season, Brown averaged 23 points, six rebounds, and six assists on below-league-average efficiency (largely due to missing every three he took). I figured his counting numbers would climb some, but I worried the weight of all those shot attempts would drag down his shooting splits.

Not so! Brown is putting together an underrated case for a bottom-ballot MVP spot. He’s currently averaging 29 points (a career high, naturally), 4.8 assists (another career high), six rebounds, and a steal while shooting 50% from the field and 37% from three. As the only player on the team consistently able to get two feet in the paint, he’s actually leading the entire league in two-point attempts!

Brown’s shooting has waxed and waned over the years, but it’s a full moon right now. He has the green light to shoot from anywhere and everywhere, and he does. Look at this shot chart: