The Running Myth
Danny Believes It,
And It Will Cost Him His Job
By Red’s Army Co-Founder
John Karalis
Let’s play a little game. Stop when you find the NBA Champion that spent its season as a high-flying, run-and-gun team.
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002 LA Lakers
2001 LA Lakers
2000 LA Lakers
1999
1998
I’m going to stop right there. Have you found any yet? 2002 Lakers? Nope. That was Shaq’s half-court team that ran occasionally, but mostly ran a half court offense through its huge center. 1998 Bulls? Nope. They ran the triangle… and when they did occasionally run, the trailers on the wing (like John Paxson) feasted on people collapsing on MJ and Pippen.
In reality, you have to go back to 1987-88 Los Angeles Lakers to find the last team that truly pushed the ball EVERY chance it got and won a championship out of it. Oh, and they also had a few Hall of Famers, including the best point guard ever.
But there is a myth that is running rampant in the NBA right now. It’s a myth that Danny Ainge is buying lock, stock and barrel… and its going to cost him his job (and us a chance at celebrating a title). The conventional wisdom that is permeating the NBA is that you’ve got to be a run-and-gun team.
“Hey, it
works for
Well, not
really. How many championships has
But despite the last 20 champions being teams that only ran when the opportunity presented itself and then ran a smart, half-court offense every other time down the floor, just about everyone connected to the NBA right now says you’ve got to go small… and you’ve got run, run, run.
It’s a myth. Don’t buy it. It doesn’t work.
But Danny buys it. That’s huge mistake number one. Huge mistake number two is that he’s trying to cram half-court pegs into a running hole.
Hey, I love watching the Phoenix Suns run all over the place, catch alley oops, and win games 122-118. But year in and year out, teams like that hit a skid in the playoffs where their alley oops are defended, and their fast breaks are broken up. Running teams are turned into half court teams in the playoffs. And they inevitably fail because they don’t know how to do anything but run past everyone for layups.
It’s no
secret that players will coast during the regular season. Don’t believe me? Spend a week watching
But a funny thing happens in the post season. Guys like Shawn Marion suddenly have people in their paths. Their dunks aren’t so uncontested anymore. They get bumped. They get hit. They get tossed to the floor. They’re forced to earn their points at the free throw line. All of sudden, guys like Marion or Amare Stoudemire will think twice about flying into the lane because they know this time there’s a big body waiting for them. And trust me, you want Shawn Marion taking 6, 7 or 8 three pointers in a game. He’s not a good enough shooter to knock those down consistently over a 7 game series.
Isn’t that
what happened to
So clearly,
the running style doesn’t work like everyone would like you to believe. But there’s an even bigger problem in
The Celtics can run when someone gets a rebound, turns, and spots an outlet right away. If you can get someone to release at the right time, then you’ve got a fast break. But the C’s aren’t built to run a fast break every single trip up the floor. If the break is not there, then it’s best for the Celtics to pull back and set up the half court offense. Let Paul Pierce do what he does best: break guys down 1-on-1 and score in the half court.
But Danny will keep telling us its all about the running. And every time he makes a move with that in mind, he’s committing a cardinal sin. You always… ALWAYS… adapt your style to the players you have. You NEVER try to fit your players into a certain style. The latter is a long and arduous process (sound familiar C’s fans?) that involves learning and breaking habits. However, crafting a style around your personnel allows guys to rely on their own strengths, which lets things flow easier, faster.
Take the New England Patriots, for example. Bill Belichick is a Bill Parcells disciple. He was always a “three yards and a cloud of dust” kind of guy. But he’s got Tom Brady. And Tom Brady is a God-like QB that makes smart decisions and rarely makes mistakes. If Belichick was like Danny Ainge, he’d turn a blind eye to the obvious and tell Brady to hand off all the time and only throw on 3rd downs. But Belichick has been branded as a genius because he did the obvious thing: he told his best player to do what he does best. Suddenly, Brady is making stars out of guys signed off the street, the Patriots are winning championships, and Belichick is already tweaking his Hall of Fame induction speech.
And this brings us to the most pivotal draft in Celtics history. We don’t know what pick we’ll get, but it’s entirely possible we’ll get the #1 overall pick. Do we trust Danny Ainge to make the right call? Do we trust Danny to take Greg Oden, and put a potentially dominant center in the middle of this defense? I don’t.
I think Danny is still stuck in his running ways. I think Danny is going to salivate over Kevin Durant so much, that he’s going to pass on conventional wisdom and draft another big wing player that scores a ton of points and plays very little defense.
Don’t get me wrong. If we get the #2 pick and Oden is gone, then you take a guy like Durant and try to make it work. But if you’ve got Greg Oden sitting right there and you don’t take him, then you’re a fool. Durant is a special player, but there are more Durant-type players in the NBA than there are Oden-type guys. How many dominant centers are there in the league? A couple?
How many 6-9, 6-10 players are there in the league that like to shoot and drive from the perimeter? Isn’t there one on every other team? Aren’t there hundreds, maybe thousands, of those guys being groomed around the world? When you get right down to it, which player is more likely to show up in future drafts… the next Durant or the next Oden?
Everyone would like you to believe that the way to win now in the NBA is to run someone out of the building. And while that might be true from November to February, the last team standing the spring is always a team that balances running and half court styles… and knows how to use both to their advantage.