Brad Stevens spoke to the media on Wednesday, answering wide-ranging on Jayson Tatum, this year’s team, trade strategies, and more. Here’s everything he said, with my reaction.
ON JAYSON TATUM POTENTIALLY RETURNING:
“There’s strength thresholds he has to meet. And then after that, several weeks of progressions, right, from the standpoint of scripted against small groups, scripted against bigger groups, scripted in 5-on-5, unscripted random, all the way up through those. But it's a long progression, and it's almost like, once you hit the strength, then you do your thresholds of a progression of play, and then you're also reconditioning to play real minutes, whatever that looks like. He’s obviously made great strides. Right now, we're still focused on the full-strength game.”
FOLLOW UP: WHERE IS HE IN HIS RECOVERY:
“We’re not putting a timeline on it, as we haven't the whole time. I mean, I think one of the things that everybody can see that we didn't apply for a DPE (disabled player exception) this year, which was a conscious decision for a lot of reasons. But the reality is, he's not going to be back until he's 110 percent healthy, and he feels good about it, and that's a big part of it, right? Obviously, he's itching to play. Obviously, he hates watching. But he's also very cognizant of the need to meet every threshold and why there are those things that are put in place. We've had a lot of great talks about it. One of the things that we love about this whole group, and I think the guys that have been here the longest lead the charge, is they love the play.”
Karalis’ Analysis:
There's a little bit of cold water being dumped on all the videos we’ve seen of Tatum seemingly progressing through his recovery. Stevens saying that they're still in the stage of building strength and that they're not at the progression to play and reconditioning is a reminder of how long a road he has to go.
The videos of Tatum working out are meaningful, but it’s still only December 17, which is a tick more than seven months post-surgery. Tatum’s father said at the time that this was an eight-month recovery, which means we’re not even at the place where an optimistic family member was targeting yet.
I have said all along that the beginning of March made sense. That would be approximately 10 months post-surgery, which is plenty of time to check all the boxes Stevens mentioned.
They are all on the same page on this. Tatum has to be physically … and mentally … ready to return. That's why Stevens added “and he feels good about it.” Every doctor in the world can say he’s ready to play and if his own brain said otherwise, then he’s not ready.
That said, I think his brain is going in the other direction, which is the “he's itching to play” part of it, but I do believe Tatum when he has said he’s not going to rush it.
One thing Tatum does not want to do: He doesn’t want to go through this again. It sucks. He’s not going to put himself in a position to return and risk a re-injury. There's always a risk of injury in basketball, but he’s not going to increase that by coming back too soon. No one is.
ON THE TEAM’S FIRST 25 GAMES:
“A lot of positive, seen good growth, which is important. I think we're in the midst of it, as every other team is, and there's a fine line between feeling really good about yourself and not feeling so good about yourself. And I think we just have to kind of stay in the work. I've kind of looked at us on a positive side, a work in progress where I'm really encouraged by both the work and the progress. You know, I think that we're making strides, and so we just have to continue to do it.”
Karalis’ Analysis:
Notice he didn’t say “we’re a good team,” or anything in that realm. There's “a lot of positive,” and “good growth,” but the best thing he can say is they're “making strides.”
You’ll see later how he’s not putting a ceiling on this team, and he did snap back at me when I prefaced a question about exceeding expectations with a “who’s expectations?” He’s not going to say anything less than something positive about these guys, but it’s always what he doesn’t say that tells the story.
I’m always reminded of him being asked about what he liked best about Vincent Poirier, and he replied by saying he’s one of the funniest guys in the locker room. Best way I’ve ever heard a coach tell the media a guy sucks without saying it.
ON TEAM NEEDS:
“Yeah, I mean, we need to get better. I think some of that's internal, and I think some of it's external, but we'll see how that all goes.”
Karalis’ Analysis:
Some guys can get better, but they need to make a trade to improve the team. This team is open for business.
ON THE TRADE DEADLINE APPROACH:
“I think the whole league, from everything you know, especially as you start to talk about those things with other teams, as you go to all the college tournaments that were a couple weeks ago, and then now the fact that a lot of the league can be traded, I think everybody, or a lot of teams, are really still very much in, ‘Let's see how everything looks as time goes on.’ Everybody's a work in progress. What’s the difference between third and ninth in the East right now? There's hardly anything, right? And I think that we're all still trying to figure out who we are and what we can be. We will not put a ceiling on this group, if it makes sense for us to look for things that can help us, we certainly will. But it all has to be within good deals, and it all has to be within the ultimate goal, which is the North Star of retooling so we're in a position to compete for what we want to compete for.”
Karalis’ Analysis:
I’ll just add a little bit here before going on to the next, very related answer. Stevens is making it clear that he won’t risk anything just to make a half-cocked run right now. The team is good, but not good enough for that. At the same time, there are a lot of front offices that have a lot of decisions to make.
And this is the part of the trade deadline that few people consider, at least not seriously. Other teams have their own evaluations of where they are and what’s important to them. We like to play in trade machines and come up with trades that we like, but teams have to be open to the move. More on this in a second.
ON GOING FOR IT NOW VS. A LONGER-TERM APPROACH:
“If I feel like we can do something to reach those things, and it makes sense with another team that's willing to do something, which is very complicated, then we always listen, and we always look, and we're always pursuing that. There's nothing holding us back, necessarily, from that. But at the same time, there's a lot of things that have to go right in a deal. One thing you can control is the people in the room getting better. I think it would have been easy for all of us to assume that (Neemias Queta) would have a long way to go in this role, and he's just jumped in and grabbed it and been great, right? Like, Jordan (Walsh) is getting to grow because of the opportunities there. So there's a balance with all that. But the North Star is the North Star, and we'll keep it that way”
Karalis’ Analysis:
The North Star is a championship, and there are a number of ways to get there. The guys on the roster have to continue their improvement to help in achieving that goal.
At the same time, Stevens isn’t going to over-extend to push this particular team to make a run. Even as a lot went right as they got to 15-9, and people started to wonder if the Celtics should become buyers, it doesn’t seem like Stevens will make anything besides a no-brainer move that happens to improve them this season.
Basically, there's nothing in this start to the season that has swayed Stevens, and that's why he’s the boss. Because people on the outside, both fans and media, can get caught up in the momentum and he has the ability to block that out and be realistic.
Part of that realistic approach is the difficulty of making deals, which he referenced. This isn’t the old system where two teams just made deals with each other. This new system means more teams have to be involved. Which brings me to …
ON THE DIFFICULTIES OF MAKING TRADES AND THE NEED TO INVOLVE MORE TEAMS
“I think there is definitely an increased awareness every day about the aprons, the effect of the aprons and the trade restrictions that are a part of that. And so, yes, it becomes much more difficult just to do a one-for-one. And it's always been difficult when you start including third, fourth, fifth teams. So I think that's a real thing, and it's probably why maybe there'll be a deal or two that are early, who knows, across the league. But would also not surprise me if it takes a while.”
Karalis’ Analysis:
Getting deals done in this apron era is difficult by design. Expensive teams with star players are supposed to trade them to teams with cap space, young players, and picks. The expensive teams are being forced into rebuilds earlier than ever and the bad teams are supposed to get good more quickly.
Contenders are supposed to get more and more expensive until they're crushed under the weight of the second apron. This isn’t designed to for them to make fringe moves to stay in contention.
OKC is viewed as the exception, but we cannot forget that they made all these deals for the picks well before the apron system. They just set their future up in such a way that they are now able to thrive in this system for a little while.
Anyway, deals will be difficult. The only way to get them done is to involve more teams, which makes this the most complicated era of team-building we’ve ever seen.
ON JAYLEN BROWN:
“He's been great. I think one of the things that I'm most encouraged about our team is we went through a summer, and you're kind of retooling, and you know you're going to be retooling, and you don't know how long that's going to take. And your older guys that have kind of been through it, that have only been parts of really good teams, for the most part, I'm so impressed with not only the attack and how they're playing – Jaylen specifically – but also just the mindset, the patience with helping grow younger people. I think that all of our young wings have shown that they're capable of something, right? And I think that's largely due to the fact that we have all of these older guys that are really – even some of the guys that aren't playing as much right now, like Xavier (Tillman) and Chris (Boucher) and Luka (Garza) – that are giving them that environment. And I think it starts with Jaylen. I think it starts with Derrick (White), Payton (Pritchard), obviously, those guys that have been there, because it's not easy when you necessarily go through the changes we went through, and the talent that's lost, to have that kind of patience. To start out 0-3 and to just keep focus on getting better, I thought was a really good sign.”
Karalis’ Analysis:
I agree that Brown has been impressive in both how he’s played individually but how he’s been patient with the process and embraced younger players. He hasn’t expressed any frustration with where the team is. In fact, he has routinely said it takes time to improve, and he’s done that with the media and on his social media channels.
Brown has grown a lot and is showing an incredible level of maturity as a leader. It’s still only mid-December, but this team is still very much unified in pursuing a common goal and getting there the right way.
ON JORDAN WALSH:
“I knew he had no prayer on the first team. The first team was really good. And last year's team was basically the first team, so it was going to be hard to crack that one, too. When he got here, he was young. I mean, these guys — him and Hugo (Gonzalez) and Josh (Minott) — these guys are young. I mean, I go to college games almost every weekend, and I'm watching prospects that are the same age or older some of the time. So you have to give them the grace of time, and then also, sometimes you're not going to get the opportunity that they get. And I think that's why you see, like, such a desire to take advantage of it, and that comes with a burden you put on yourself, and that ends up creating more ups and downs generally. But I think that those guys have all done a really good job, and Jordan specifically. He’s got a role, and I think Joe and his staff have done an excellent job of defining what those guys need to do to be good. And sometimes it takes steps. You know, you start to see Jordan now occasionally more driving closeouts and dumping it to Neemi for a dunk, or dumping it to somebody else off of a roll, or kicking it out off of a roll. Your role expands when you show that you can consistently be good in the simplest of things. And I say simplest — it's hard to play that hard, especially against the guys he's guarding — but he's doing a good job.”
FOLLOW UP ON ORGANIZATIONAL PLAYER DEVELOPMENT SUCCESS:
“I think the coaches are doing a really good job, both here and in Maine. I think they've been doing that for a long time. And I think the intentions have always been to be the best that we can possibly be at creating an environment for growth for however long guys are here. And I think that there's two reasons for that. Number one is because it helps you. And number two is, regardless if you're here for a year or 10 years or 20 years, you want to feel invested in it. And I think we can always get better, but I give a lot of credit to the players work ethics, the coaches, and all of the people in the organization that are putting time and thought into developmental plans and sticking to them, regardless of whether Jordan plays a minute in the first two years or not.”
Karalis’ Analysis:
I do think Boston’s developmental system has been good, but so much of this boils down to opportunity. Of course, it has to be both things.
Guys have to develop their skills and they have to be able to play to not only showcase them, but to hone them and learn in real time. NBA basketball isn’t just “go here and do this” kind of stuff. Guys have to make reads and decisions all the time, and it’s hard to simulate that stuff in practice.
Pilots can do a great job on simulators, but they have to get into real-world situations to learn how to fly the big jets. That applies here, too.
Walsh is a unique case, because I still didn’t see a ton of progress with him, even in summer league and the preseason. I had no inkling that he was going to figure something so quickly. Maybe the emergence of Minott gave him a blueprint of what he needed to be. Maybe Brown’s intervention convinced Mazzulla to give Walsh a bigger chance. Maybe Walsh sold his soul to the devil.
It seemingly happened in an instant, but the truth is it took a lot of things to get him here.
ON ANFERNEE SIMONS:
“I think he's I think he's really trying, and I really have -- first of all, he's a quiet guy, but just a super person. And so he's really come in with a great mindset of, I'm going to help the team any way I can. And offensively, he knows he's capable of going nuts on any given game, right? But then defensively, I've just been really impressed, like he's picked up, he's made it hard. I think he's made great strides in the months he's been here, on that end. And I'm a big fan. I like him a lot.”
Karalis’ Analysis:
Remember what I said about it being what Stevens doesn’t say that says the most? Look at that quote again.
“He’s really trying”
“He’s a super person”
“He’s made great strides”
It ends with Stevens saying he’s a big fan and he likes Simons, but he never said anything about Simons being a great player or a part of this team’s future. He never said Simons is a big reason why the Celtics have exceeded expectations.
I could be wrong, but this feels like Stevens putting a big, positive spin on Simons’ early time here so other teams can read the “I like him a lot” headline. But there's not much substance behind that. I’m sure Simons is a super person who is really trying, but I don’t see that quote and think “hire a real estate agent to look for houses.”
ON NEEMIAS QUETA:
“I mean, he was just so good when he got limited opportunity the last couple years. We were just really lucky to have the depth we had at that spot, right? We just had, I mean, all you have to do is turn on the TV and meaningful games and you see a former Celtic playing, it feels like. We just had so much talent at particularly that big spot. And so even when he got his chances, we felt pretty good about it. But then there's a big difference between doing it occasionally and doing it every game, and now hitting a couple of 30-plus minute games, you know, back-to-backs, you know, all that stuff. It's a different level. And we've always been impressed by his character and his desire to be that, but I've been really impressed how he's handled it thus far.”
Karalis’ Analysis:
“I've been really impressed how he's handled it thus far.”
See? He can say it if he wants to. I still think the “thus far” is doing some heavy lifting in that sentence. One of the keys with Queta, Walsh, Minott, and others is how they handle times of great success. Does that help them grow their games, or only their egos?
Queta has impressed me, a noted Queta critic, this season. There is still more for him to do, but I’ll take this growth from him right now and hope that he can build on it. Right now, I see Queta as a good backup big option on a contending team. Can he get good enough to be more than that?
I have my doubts, but he’s proved me wrong before. Let’s see if he can do it again.