Fact or Fiction: Marcus Smart Could Be an All-Star Someday
We’ve reached NBA All-Star weekend and it’s time to do some assessing of both the state of the league and the Celtics’ place in it. This season has been a real treat, from the surprise of the Atlanta Hawks to the explosion of the Golden State Warriors to the melodrama in Cleveland, Oklahoma City, Sacramento, L.A. and elsewhere.
And don’t look now but the Celts, by virtue of their place in the woeful Eastern Conference, are on the cusp of the playoff picture. There are plenty of angles to examine so let’s not waste any more time and get right into some NBA Fact or Fiction.
FACT: Marcus Smart is a rising star even if the league won’t acknowledge it
The Celtics rookie point guard was left out of the annual Rising Stars Challenge played Friday night. This event has undergone many changes over the years, from rookies vs. sophomores to TNT talking heads picking teams to a more traditional East/West matchup. This year, a group of rookies and second-year players hailing from the U.S. will take on a roster of 10 rookies and sophomores from the rest of the world and Smart was left off the U.S. team roster even after Sixers second-year point guard Michael Carter-Williams needed an injury replacement.
Smart’s talent or progress shouldn’t be pigeonholed into something as superfluous as the Rising Stars game (which, by the way, included second-year Canadian Kelly Olynyk on the world team although he didn’t play due to his ankle injury). He’s been the man ever since Rajon Rondo was dealt to Dallas and even though Evan Turner still sees time at the point, there’s no doubt that a shift to make this Smart’s team is underway. Smart is playing more than 35 minutes per game since being inserted into the starting lineup last week, and the Celtics have won four of five over that stretch. Offensively, he’s still a work in progress (although his three-point shooting, a dismal 23.8 percent in November, shot up to 38 percent in December and 42.4 percent in January) but on defense, he’s a hustling, tenacious, whirling dervish who can change games for significant stretches.
Marcus Smart may not be the NBA’s definition of a “Rising Star,’’ but he’s on his way to being an All-Star, and that’s way cooler.
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FICTION: The Hawks are winning the East
Just because they’re one of the best, most impressive stories of this NBA season doesn’t mean it will have a happy ending. All four of their all-stars deserve to be there and it’s hardly a fluke that having a raft of exceedingly talented (if not star) guys playing in a system that’s a known successful commodity under a coach who learned from the best would be at least a very good, very dangerous team.
But there are some dangerous signs already popping up, starting with their inexcusable loss to the Celtics on Wednesday in which they held the C’s to 32 percent shooting but still went down after blowing an 18-point lead. It feels like they are in the midst of a hangover from their astronomical January, when they went undefeated as part of a 17-game winning streak and all four of their all-stars – Al Horford, Paul Millsap, Jeff Teague and Kyle Korver – along with fifth starter DeMarre Carroll, shared Player of the Month honors. That they are 3-3 in February lends credence to that possibility and this weekend’s break probably came just at the right time.
But even if they capture at least part of what worked so well for them earlier in the year, you could make the argument that they’ve already peaked. As good as the Hawks have been, I’d still bet against them in the playoffs against both Cleveland with a reengaged LeBron and the Bulls with their toughness and experience.
FICTION: Oklahoma City is going to be fine
Man, this is a bummer of a story. The Thunder barely survived without Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook in November and now they’re fighting for their playoff lives, a half game out of the 8-seed in the rough and tumble west.
They’ll probably make it. Their direct competition for that final spot consists of Phoenix and New Orleans, neither of which engenders as much confidence as a team featuring both Russ (who went for 40-plus three times in five games recently) and KD.
But then what? This team has regressed a little more every year since trading James Harden on the heels of a Finals appearance in 2012 and Durant is a free agent after next season. They cast their lot with Serge Ibaka as the third star when they sent Harden to Houston and he now seems to have recast himself as a three-point shooter averaging 13 a night instead of the beast in the paint he once looked like. And given how little they have beyond those three (soon-to-be-traded Reggie Jackson has fallen off a cliff and don’t even start with Dion Waiters), it’s nearly impossible to see them beating Golden State or Memphis in the first round even with two of the 10 best players in the NBA playing severely pissed off.
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FACT: Unless he gets hurt, Steph Curry will be the league MVP
Even if he does suffer a horrific injury, Curry will still get some votes. The Warriors ascendance to the top of the NBA has been sensational, a joy to watch. Klay Thompson became a borderline superstar, Draymond Green became an indispensable, core player and the entire team has taken the next step under the tutelage of first-year coach Steve Kerr, who spurned the Knicks at the last minute to take this job. Think he’s pleased with that decision?
The through line is Curry, who has flashed an MVP form at times in the past couple of seasons but has really taken the next step in this one. He is an absolute assassin but we knew that about him already. What’s new is that he’s now a complete point guard on both ends, capable of controlling tempo and flow without necessarily going through the most eye-popping heat check you’ve ever seen. Thompson can now be the one to go off for 37 points in a quarter and Curry can play three fewer minutes per game than he did last year (five fewer than in 2012-2013) and the Warriors can still rule the league. Even if they aren’t big or strong enough up front to ultimately take it all the way through the playoffs, MVP is a regular season award and who else is winning it but Curry?
Harden? He’s a legit candidate who you could successfully argue means more to his team, but people like Curry so much more. Anthony Davis? Soon enough (and then, probably for like five or six years in a row). LeBron? Maybe if he hadn’t taken the first three months off.
This is Curry’s award for the taking. Bow down before him.
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FACT: The Celtics should go all in for the playoffs
Kind of can’t believe I’m saying this but you know what? Why not?
There’s no denying the Celts have been a better, more competitive team for the past month. They finally look like they have some actual shape and form and while it would be nice to see them cut their dependence on perimeter jumpers way down, there’s no denying how hard they play most of the time which can offset how flawed they can be on offense (like in that win over Atlanta).
So maybe they should fly under the radar at the trade deadline. It’s not like they need to add more assets to their collection. And more importantly, the difference between them winning 33-37 games and sneaking in vs. being the 10th or 11th of the 14 lottery teams is negligible.
So go for it, guys. Keep playing Smart 35 minutes per game. Don’t buy out Tayshaun Prince. Try to keep Brandon Bass and Marcus Thornton. Hell, see if you can make a play for an impact guy who may be on the block like Enes Kanter or even Goran Dragic. If you can get that done just by dipping into your slush fund of draft picks, by all means do it. Give the kids a taste of what truly meaningful games are like. Give the vets some hope that they still have something to play for. It’ll be fun, at least more so than punting the rest of the schedule, which is what will be necessary to make another trip to the lottery any more than a formality.
Do it, Celts. Let’s get weird.
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