Celtics practice notes: Joe Mazzulla's growth, Derrick White the role model, Jrue Holiday's transition

Joe Mazzulla is learning. 

A lot has been made about how comfortable he seems in his own skin as he starts the season as the official head coach (unlike beginning last year with an interim tag) with time to prepare and experienced voices on his side. But his self examination has led to a change in his approach as well. 

As I’ve mentioned before, the intensity of practice has been noted from day one, but the content of the practice has drifted away from individual drills to a more group-oriented setting. 

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“It’s five-on-five when we play in the games, not one-on-one. It’s as simple as that,” Mazzulla explained after the team’s Monday practice. “How can we put ourselves in more situations where we simulate game-like environments based on different coverages and how we play off of each other? So I thought that was the most important thing on the offensive end headed into this year.”

It’s a change that's being felt by the players.

“It's a lot more work, like more diligence to our craft,” Payton Pritchard said. “A lot of times over the years before, we did more individual-type work, but now it's more teamwork, which is nice. I think that will pay dividends in the future.”

Mazzulla admits that this is part of growing and “getting better at things,” but an unusual schedule has allowed for him to change his approach as well.  

“I think for a long time training camp ends the first game of the preseason, whereas like training camp for us, we wanted to cover the whole month,” Mazzulla said. “So using the entire month to simulate different situations during the season, and then work on different stuff. So I feel like by the end of our training camp we’ll have gone through small pockets of the season, which will help us.”

The team gets to put this into practice again tomorrow after a long layoff. Boston plays New York Tuesday night before finishing the preseason on Thursday in Charlotte and coming back home for another five days off before the regular season begins. It’s still unclear what the Thursday plan is, but fans at home tomorrow will get to see all of the regulars. 

Mazzula says he’s looking for “a relatively good mindset, competitive nature. Really good carryover from the objectives that we want to emphasize during the game, and a heightened awareness to situational basketball on both ends of the floor.” 

Mindset is another one of those buzzwords for Mazzulla. After the team seemed to let their mindset wane for stretches last season, Mazzulla is hoping his approach this year helps prevent that. 

The philosophy is if they keep their focus on the right things throughout games, they can fix the frustrating things that have plagued them in the past. Mazzulla is certainly teaching x’s and o’s, and players have noted that they're learning new things in the stated quest for the team to find a curveball. But along with that is learning how to keep their wits about them as the season marches on. 

“Can we just bring the right mindset every single day. That’s the most important thing,” Mazzulla said. “How are we approaching it? I think that's more important than anything else and then the season will teach us things that we need to prepare for throughout the year. So the only thing we can worry about is how we approach every day and, for the most part, we've done a good job of that.”

DERRICK WHITE, ROLE MODEL

D’Angelo Russell said on Sunday night that he wants to start doing all the little things on the floor that contribute to winning. 

“My inspiration is Derrick White. I want to be Derrick White,” he said. 

"I think it's just him -- his character, his personality,” Jrue Holiday said of his new teammate. “Seems kind of quiet, but when he gets on the court, he really makes a lot of loud noise. So I know people always talk about defensively how obviously he's blocking shots, he blocks shots at the rim or even out out at three. Getting steals, playing great defense. But offensively he's reliable. He's always played very, very solid, knocking down threes, very reliable shooter. So he's just more than reliable, someone you can always go to when you need him.”

White is still in talks about a contract extension with Boston, but he hasn’t seemed to be affected by any of the off-court business. White continues to do everything asked of him on the floor.

“It’s just humility, body language, and his dependability. You can rely on him every single day,” Mazzulla said of White. “He understands it’s not always going to go his way and he always has really good body language. He’s one of our intangible leaders because he kind of brings it every single day and we can heavily rely on him in those areas, so, that’s a great goal to have, to be someone like him. I still think he’s underrated from a defensive standpoint because of how good he is, and hopefully if he continues to grow offensively we can see a different side of him as well there.”

HOLIDAY’S ADJUSTMENT

Holiday’s offseason didn’t go the way he thought it would, and the adjustment of moving to Boston hasn’t been the smoothest. 

The newest Celtic is still looking for a place to live, but the housing market hasn’t been friendly and some possibilities have fallen through, so he’s still trying to figure out that part of the transition. 

The good news for Holiday is that the on-court stuff is coming a little more easily, thanks in part to some familiar faces in assistant coach Charles Lee and new Maine Celtics head coach Blaine Mueller, both former coaches with the Bucks. 

"Having those two guys really helped me,” Holiday said. “Charles has always been the type to be very teacher-esque. If I have any questions or anything like that, I could always go to him. But he's always quizzing me on plays, he's quizzing me on schemes. What we want to do defensively. Literally just walk up to me and ask me a question about something and I have to answer. So always just keeping my mind going, my mind engaged.”

For a player dealing with the swirling after-effects of a trade, someone like Lee keeping him focused is a good thing. 

“He’s just loud. He’s very loud,” Holiday said. “He kind of talks a lot. But Charles’ presence, I feel like it’s always felt and always heard. Everything that he says, kind of how he presents things, I kind of call him a teacher because when he talks you always have to pay attention. He’s always kind of like hinting at the answer but kind of using your brain to think and really just think the game. So him being over here just makes it more natural for me.”

Add to that some stiff competition at practices and the basketball side of things has gone as well as possible for him.

“It’s been fun,” he said. “You see the top dogs going at it, Jaylen (Brown) and (Jayson Tatum) going at it. Then you might see Payton and JB going at it, you’ll see D-White and me going at it. So it’s obviously an environment for winning. It’s an environment to have a competitive nature and, again, to get upset and make your teammates better.”

His growth with the guys, just like that of Kristaps Porzingis, will benefit from some more time off the floor. But as Mazzulla tries to figure out how he’s going to work through lineups and combinations, Holiday says he’s open to whatever is needed. 

“(Starting is) not that big of a deal,” Holiday said. “I like winning. Winning is really important. Playing good on the court is important. Supporting my teammates is important. So it’s not always how you start, it’s how you finish.”