August 26 is National Dog Day, an excuse for all of us to post pictures of our good boys and girls on social media and, maybe, run out to the local shelter and save a life while we’re at it.
And if there's anything in this world the NBA loves more than anything, it’s dogs … but the on-court kind. Take as Exhibit A, this recent quote from Celtics draftee JD Davison when he was asked what he wants to show on the court.
“Really what I can do on both ends of the court. Just being a dog, a leader on the offensive end, being a dog on the defensive end, just leading my guys to a win, just being that leader on the court.”
A dog in this sense of the word is the player who’s willing to do the gritty dirty work in pursuit of a win. He’s the guy who will put his body on the line for the betterment of the team, floor burns be damned.
Boston loves dogs. Boston loves the divers and fighters and guys who will do anything they can to get a win. So, in honor of National Dog Day, here’s my Boston Celtics All-Time, All-Dog team, presented in current All-Star backcourt/frontcourt fashion.
BACKCOURT
Marcus Smart, KC Jones
Jones was Smart before Smart. Jones was such a dog that before he played for the Celtics, he tried out with the Los Angeles Rams as a defensive back and helped develop what we know as “bump and run” coverage.
Basically, he decided to hit people and when the coaches realized that wasn’t illegal, they rolled with it.
Thankfully for Boston, Jones eventually came to Boston and joined his college teammate Bill Russell. Red Auerbach said of Jones, “he didn’t come to play, he came to win.” Can’t describe a dog any better than that.
Smart’s desire to win might get him in trouble sometimes, but it burns just as hot. He’s not shy about giving up his body to try to gain an advantage, which was on full display in the Las Vegas summer league in 2015 when he dislocated two fingers diving for a loose ball.
Yes, he flops, but he flops trying to draw fouls and get calls against the other team. Sometimes they go a bit far, but the mental games end up paying off like they did against James Harden when Smart … ahem… sold a couple of offensive fouls in a shocking 2017 comeback win.
Smart’s dogged defense finally put him on top of the heap this past season, earning him his first Defensive Player of the Year award. With Smart, it’s maximum effort all the time, making him a true dog.
FRONTCOURT
Dave Cowens, Larry Bird, Kevin Garnett
Cowens was an animal. Paul Silas said of him, “I thought he was a wild man. I'd never seen anybody with that much talent play that aggressively.” Tommy Heinsohn called him “a bundle of energy and ferocity.” Cowens even described himself as “very much a Dennis the Menace on the court.”
The enduring image of Cowens, his signature play, is this steal, dive, and slide after the ball during the 1974 Finals. Look at the play more closely and you’ll see Cowens started on Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and then switched onto Oscar Robertson and then he poked the ball away.
Cowens had no off switch. He just went until he ran out of gas. That's what dogs do.
Bird had as much dog in him as he had talent, and he needed each of those attributes to make the other better. The combination manifested itself in the ultimate trash talker with an unstoppable motor. Bird liked to mix it up and be physical, which was a requirement of 80’s basketball where the word “spacing” hadn’t yet been invented.
When the physicality boiled over, Bird never ran and hid. He was in the middle of each dustup with the Pistons, Sixers, or whomever else wanted to throw hands with the champs. He did all his own stunts, getting dirty in the trenches, and standing up to whatever goons came his way.
No one was going to out-work Bird, either. A true leader by example, Bird set the tone for the Celtics by being the hardest working star in the league. In true dog fashion, these traits probably went too far at times … like when he ran a five mile race during a three day off stretch in the middle of the season, or when he got into a bar fight during the 1985 playoffs … but those are things you just have to accept when it comes to dogs.
Doc Rivers learned that lesson with Garnett. The most dog story of KG’s Boston career came during a day when he was supposed to be resting.
“Doc gave him a day off and said ‘you don’t have to do anything this practice. Just sit over there on the sidelines and let the other guys work,’” former Celtics forward Leon Powe told me for my book, the Boston Celtics All-Time All-Stars. “We start working, then we look back and we see, like, a shadow just moving up and down the court real fast. And we look back and he was mimicking what we were doing on the court… so Doc brought everybody in and said ‘everybody go home since KG doesn’t want to listen and take a day off.”
Garnett’s work ethic was so extreme that he couldn't just sit still for a day off. He was basically shadow boxing while the rest of the guys were working.
There was so much dog in Garnett that growling and barking were part of his game. The man crawled on all fours sometimes as he got ready for defensive possessions. I mean, he even started and ended his career with a team called the Timberwolves … How much more dog can one man be?
So there it is. On National Dog Day, in the dog days of the offseason, five Celtics players who make up a pack of dogs so vicious that animal control would be on alert in every city they visited.
So good luck, JD Davison. You have a lot to live up to.