This is not an original idea.
The thought that Josh Minott could be a breakout player has been had for a few years now. He’s 6-foot-8 with a nearly 7-foot wingspan, elite athleticism, a high defensive motor, and a history of good offensive efficiency. He has all the tools to inspire optimism and make people wonder if this could be his year.
Maybe the fourth time is the charm.
“I'd almost consider this the one,” Minott said on media day. “I'm really excited about being here. I feel like it's a great opportunity to impact winning, whatever that looks like.”
The one. Minott understands his situation very well. It’s like he’s playing a claw machine at the NBA’s arcade of opportunity, and he knows he just put his last token into the machine. Like those claws, the grip on a regular NBA job for a player like Minott is tenuous at best. If he can’t grab one this time, the next kid in line is going to get a shot.
“Desperation is a perfect word for it,” Minott told Boston Sports Journal. “I feel like every time I step on the court, man, it's like, do or die … At the end of the day, though, I don't want to use fear as my motivator. So I'm just gonna go out there and play desperate.”
The Celtics have promised to play fast and physical this season, which is never easy to keep up over 82 games. Not only will there be nights where Joe Mazzulla has to reach deeper into his bench for fresh legs, there will be some where the team just doesn’t seem to have it. There's a job for Minott if he wants it. Call it a spark plug, or a wild card, or an energy guy, the Celtics will need someone to be the human defibrillator and give them a jolt.
“(He has to) quickly learn the system, have an understanding of what the execution is, what his role is,” Mazzulla explained at a recent practice. “On the offensive end, can you help us create advantages? Whether it's sprinting through transition, whether it's screening, whether it's offensive rebounding. I think clearly understanding what his role is and executing that at a high level of consistency and intensity."
Minott has a lot to learn in a short amount of time. He was here four weeks before camp officially started in order to get a jump on things, and Mazzulla already has a strong impression. Minott has called his new coach “amazing” and “inspiring,” so if it’s intensity Mazzulla wants, then that's what Minott says he’ll get.
“Man, if Joe tells me he needs me to run through a wall every game for 82 games, I'm gonna go run through a f---ing wall, bro,” Minot told BSJ. “ It doesn't matter what the role is. It doesn't matter what's asked of me. I’m gonna go out there and do that.”
What more can a coach want? A maniac wind-up doll that can be unleashed in any situation seems to be a nice option off a bench with a lot of question marks. But Mazzulla and the Celtics aren’t just looking for some agent of chaos.
The team is investing time, money, and a roster spot on an energetic young player with natural gifts. Training camp is essentially school, and Minott’s effort with his teachers and his homework is going to play a big role on whether he graduates and becomes part of the rotation. The student needs a teacher, and that work falls squarely on the shoulders of player enhancement coach Da’Sean Butler.
“We really work on a lot of defensive concepts, a lot of new stuff,” Minott told me. “Understanding how to use my length to gamble in a safe manner. We want to take a little bit more chances this year but, at the same time, without giving up positioning.
“(Also) moving without the ball, understanding the spacing of this offense is one of the biggest challenges … understanding how to position myself to get the best shot possible within the offense.”
Butler says Minott is a quick study, latching onto new concepts quickly. Minott is enamored with the “backpedal closeout,” a new concept that is when a Celtics defender closes out to a shooter, then takes a backpedal step to stay in front of the offensive player while staying in control.
“He has such a high IQ, and he does a good job of applying these things once he learns it and once he sees it,” Butler said. “Once he hears it, it sticks to him … a very quick learner.”
Butler says Minott immediately started applying the new concepts to his work in camp, which happens to be against some of the best perimeter basketball players in the world. And they are seeing the results.
“He’s a pest,” Derrick White said. “He’s got good size. Arms are long. Active hands. So he can guard multiple positions. It’s been good to see him challenging himself, picking up. I think he’s gotten a lot of us.”
Butler says, “the sky’s the limit to what he can potentially be,” which is damning praise. Minott isn’t there yet, but he could be. He is putting in the work and learning, but it’s still mostly about unrealized potential.
But there are a million guys with potential out there just waiting for Minott to fail. They're like seagulls at the beach waiting for someone to drop a French fry. Minott doesn’t want to be part of that frenzy anymore.
Minott doesn’t stand out as one of the team’s biggest personalities. He’s more on the quiet side. When he speaks, he says what he has to say. Nothing more, nothing less. He’s all business.
“Three years to do that to you, man,” he told BSJ. “I haven't really accomplished anything, so I'm just staying down. There's not really anything to celebrate. So, yeah, I’m just here to work, man. That's really all it is.”