Thursday, March 09, 2006
Ups and Downs - March Edition
It’s been awhile since we trotted out the Up and Down meter for guidance, but the Celtics’ recent winning ways have cast doubt and confusion amongst the remains of the CelticsDoom staff, and it seemed a good time to assess things through its incorruptible lens. Three for today. Perhaps more tomorrow.
DOWN – Trading Paul Pierce
UP – Keeping Paul Pierce forever and ever and ever
Yes, this magic season of rebirth has reached critical mass, and Pierce has accumulated so much goodwill in the minds of soft-hearted Celtics fans that he could pretty much spend the next 21 games wallowing in his own feces in the middle of the TD Banknorth parquet and there would still be a sizeable number of people comparing him to Larry Bird demanding we sign him ASAP to a Ray Allen type extension. The problem with all this happy-crappy stuff is that Pierce has been playing out of his mind all season, but the team still sucked ass until the improbable heroics of Ryan Gomes and, to a lesser degree, Delonte West, transformed us from “hateful underachievers” into “likeable kinda-.500 team.” Re-signing him obviously commits us to building around him - a well known road that leads to the 8th seed and the emotional-debtors prison of NBA marginalia. Trading him is a roll of the dice that leads us through fire and uncertainty and many, many losses, but could ultimately be the only chance at climbing back into the land of champions.
UP – Ryan Gomes
DOWN – Everything you thought you loved in this world before Ryan Gomes became a starter
Gomes is the story of the post-trade Celtics, a fairy tale from nowhere that has come to dominate the conversation of our immediate future. It is the story of an unlikely hero buried on the bench by a naked emperor (Doc) and tormented by the ugliest of all stepsisters (Scalaburine), until injuries to his two other, far less wicked stepsisters, put him into the big time he had deserved all along. Midnight will at some point strike and that majestic carriage of endless promise will transform into a pumpkin of solid NBA role player, but fuck it, he’s proving once again that a smart four year college player can make a much more lasting impact than an impossibly talented, yet dumb, high school man-child. Think of him as Shane Battier without the haughty pretense.
UP – Regretting the loss of Marcus Banks
DOWN – Regretting the loss of Ricky Davis
This one is mysterious to me, but sure enough, fickle Celtics fans have abandoned all memory of Ricky and seem content to tolerate Wally “Wounded Knee” Szczerbiak, even as he shoots a lusty 5-17 and aggravates all within line of sight with his passionate scowls and spastic high-fives. While Wally has yet to become a Grousbeck hard-on fan fave ticket shifter, it’s still astounding that most Celtics fans have made willing purchase of the post-trade shitfucking from Celtics PR sources about how Ricky was a problem and a malcontent. Granted, I believe many of these things, but Ricky was the face of the franchise during the Great Uncertainty of Summer-Winter ’05, and it’s sad to see him so readily dispatched in the hearts of the fans. Marcus, on the other hand, grows all the more epic in his absence, most notably with his mighty inclusion into the 24-36 Wolves starting lineup. “…his destiny as a good player on a bad team.” Yup, it’s finally come true.
DOWN – Trading Paul Pierce
UP – Keeping Paul Pierce forever and ever and ever
Yes, this magic season of rebirth has reached critical mass, and Pierce has accumulated so much goodwill in the minds of soft-hearted Celtics fans that he could pretty much spend the next 21 games wallowing in his own feces in the middle of the TD Banknorth parquet and there would still be a sizeable number of people comparing him to Larry Bird demanding we sign him ASAP to a Ray Allen type extension. The problem with all this happy-crappy stuff is that Pierce has been playing out of his mind all season, but the team still sucked ass until the improbable heroics of Ryan Gomes and, to a lesser degree, Delonte West, transformed us from “hateful underachievers” into “likeable kinda-.500 team.” Re-signing him obviously commits us to building around him - a well known road that leads to the 8th seed and the emotional-debtors prison of NBA marginalia. Trading him is a roll of the dice that leads us through fire and uncertainty and many, many losses, but could ultimately be the only chance at climbing back into the land of champions.
UP – Ryan Gomes
DOWN – Everything you thought you loved in this world before Ryan Gomes became a starter
Gomes is the story of the post-trade Celtics, a fairy tale from nowhere that has come to dominate the conversation of our immediate future. It is the story of an unlikely hero buried on the bench by a naked emperor (Doc) and tormented by the ugliest of all stepsisters (Scalaburine), until injuries to his two other, far less wicked stepsisters, put him into the big time he had deserved all along. Midnight will at some point strike and that majestic carriage of endless promise will transform into a pumpkin of solid NBA role player, but fuck it, he’s proving once again that a smart four year college player can make a much more lasting impact than an impossibly talented, yet dumb, high school man-child. Think of him as Shane Battier without the haughty pretense.
UP – Regretting the loss of Marcus Banks
DOWN – Regretting the loss of Ricky Davis
This one is mysterious to me, but sure enough, fickle Celtics fans have abandoned all memory of Ricky and seem content to tolerate Wally “Wounded Knee” Szczerbiak, even as he shoots a lusty 5-17 and aggravates all within line of sight with his passionate scowls and spastic high-fives. While Wally has yet to become a Grousbeck hard-on fan fave ticket shifter, it’s still astounding that most Celtics fans have made willing purchase of the post-trade shitfucking from Celtics PR sources about how Ricky was a problem and a malcontent. Granted, I believe many of these things, but Ricky was the face of the franchise during the Great Uncertainty of Summer-Winter ’05, and it’s sad to see him so readily dispatched in the hearts of the fans. Marcus, on the other hand, grows all the more epic in his absence, most notably with his mighty inclusion into the 24-36 Wolves starting lineup. “…his destiny as a good player on a bad team.” Yup, it’s finally come true.
# posted by Dr. Chestnutt @ 3:56 PM 
