Celtics prospects heading to summer league with new goals, new perspective

Jordan Walsh streaked down the left sideline, caught a pass, and launched a 3-pointer. As it bounced off the rim, he let out a frustrated growl, bent over and grabbed his shorts, regained his composure, and got back to the drill. 

Such is life for a barely 19-year-old trying to balance the wide-eyed amazement of getting to play basketball at the Boston Celtics practice facility, decked out in green, while trying to get good enough at the game that he’ll get to run drills here regularly. 

“It was good,” Walsh said, fresh off his post summer league practice session on Saturday afternoon. “It was way more competition stuff than I thought it would be, which made it even more fun for me just to be able to get up and down, play with those guys and get a feel for them. That was amazing for the first day for sure.”

The frustration gave way to a smile as he talked to reporters. The Celtics will soon be leaving for Las Vegas with Walsh, JD Davison, and a collection of players who will be more auditioning for other teams than trying to impress Boston. 

Walsh knows he has work to do.

“I know I’m not a perfect player. I know I’m going to miss shots and mess up,” he said. “But the fact that I can mess up like that and still be here and have the support of the staff and people like Brad who believed in me and gave me the chance to be here, that’s the biggest part. So I’m gonna keep living through those moments and working through those moments to get better.”

Davison will also be trying to show he has enough to warrant a closer look from Celtics brass. He is coming off a nice debut season in Maine, and the Celtics might have some need for point guard depth. Davison has to prove that he’s able to do that at the NBA level, and part of that involves getting louder. 

"I started working on it once I got here last year,” Davison said. “Summer League you're trying to talk with everybody. You know me, I'm kind of a quiet person. Just watching guys like (Marcus) Smart, he's a more talkative guy in the gym, every day. So just watching a guy like him and just being a backup to him has helped me out a lot.”

One of the things the Celtics will be watching for in Vegas is how players get through the frustration of failing. Not only are guys young, but the environment also isn’t necessarily conducive to fluid basketball. A large percentage of summer league participants are trying to show off for agents and other teams, so motives interfere with development at times. Things are going to go wrong. 

“They’re going to fail and we're going to fail too as a staff,” said Celtics assistant and summer league head coach Tony Dobbins. “We're not going to do everything right, make every play call right. Every game plan is not going to be perfect, but that's the thing that I told them earlier. It’s like, we are excited to be here, to work with you, to invest in you. And we can't guarantee how many minutes you’ll play or how many points you'll score, but we can guarantee that everybody from a staff perspective is totally, totally focused on helping you improve.”

Dobbins is new to this whole thing, too. He has survived a couple of coaching staff overhauls, beginning on Brad Stevens’ bench, staying with Ime Udoka, and then sticking around in this summer’s assistant coaching shuffle under Joe Mazzulla.

“I'm just trying to take full advantage of it and enjoy kind of seeing a different side of coaching than I do during the season,” Dobbins said. “But also, I think it's an opportunity for me to be in a better position to help Joe. … Ultimately, the goal for everybody is to be better for the franchise. If everybody improves a little bit, then the franchise improves.”

It is very easy for a coach like Dobbins to get caught up in the grind of trying to unlock whatever Boston needs to win a championship. He is enjoying this opportunity to see the other side of NBA life. 

“It's a cool experience just to be a part of this organization,” he said. “While it’s a business and while it's a high-pressure situation, it gives you good perspective to see a guy like Jordan, who was dreaming about this moment -- like he's been dreaming of this moment his whole life, and I get a chance to be a part of it, that's pretty special. I don't take that for granted. So for me, that's what makes it exciting.”

Here is the full summer league roster:

Here is the full schedule (all times Eastern): 

• Saturday July 8, 3 p.m., NBA TV
• Sunday July 9, 7:30 p.m., NBA TV
• Wednesday, July 12, 10:00 p.m. ESPN 2
• Friday, July 14, 7:00 p.m., ESPN 2