Baylor Scheierman Carrying The Celtics With The Game Of His Life Was Just The Latest Example Of Why Brad Stevens Is A Basketball God

Brian Babineau. Getty Images.

It's a little wild how quickly things can change in the NBA. Not too long ago it was 2022 and the Brooklyn Nets had this supposed superteam with KD, Kyrie and James Harden. They had just beaten an injured Celtics team with no Jaylen Brown (Tatum still had a 50 ball though) in the 2021 playoffs, and I'm sure there were some who thought the Nets would own that matchup for the foreseeable future.

Well, we all know what happened next. The Nets Big 3 are no more, the Celtics have currently won 8 straight against BKN dating back to last season, and if we go allllllll the way back to that 2021-22 season including the playoffs, the Celtics have won 18 of the previous 20

The fact that this is also mostly done with two franchise players that were gifted to the Celts via BKN makes it even sweeter in my opinion. We've seen the Celts have their fair share of one sided matchups, for example, they've won 10 of 11 against MIA, but this is some cosmic shit at play here between BKN/BOS. The Celts are basically living the life that I'm sure Nets fans were certain was in their future when they formed their superteam, but instead for the last 4 years all they've seen is the Celts beat that ass. Life is funny sometimes.

In 2024-25 however, this loss is something everyone can get behind on both sides, The Celts avoided the bad loss at home and get to continue to ride momentum into their long West Coast trip, and the Nets get the loss that they are looking for as they continue to tank to end their season. I will say this about the Nets though, they play what I would call "acceptable tanking". They play hard as shit. They aren't punting games, they are playing to win. Even if you've never heard of 90% of their available players, they do not disrespect the Basketball Gods which I do think is important in a tank season. Just like I said in their previous matchup the other day, I have no problem seeing the shorthanded Celts play competitive games, those reps matter. As long as they finish the deal, there's nothing wrong with being forced to execute in high leverage situations. 

Given that this might have been the most extreme version of the Hospital Celtics we've ever had (no Tatum, no Brown), the fact that they kept the standard and continued to stack Ws is pretty damn impressive. Especially against a team that played hard defensively. It may not have always been pretty, but it was vintage Hospital Celtics and when we get that, we know how those games usually end. 

With their seeding virtually locked in, my guess is we're going to see a whole lot more of these type of lineups from the Celts down the stretch, and with arguably the easiest remaining schedule in the entire NBA, it's a great opportunity for everyone to load up on confidence before one of the most important playoff runs of our lives.

But first, let's talk through what was yet another fun as hell Hospital Celtics performance

The Good

- There was some internal debate as to who would kick us off and earn the top spot in the blog, and while there are legit cases for both candidates, the Green Kool Aid flowing through my veins will not allow me to start anywhere else. 

We will tell our grandkids one day about what it was like to watch The Baylor Scheierman Game

Here is a sentence I cannot believe I am actually typing, but is the 100000000000% truth.

Baylor Scheierman saved the Boston Celtics in this win. 

I'm not sure I've completely processed what we watched in those 16 minutes. You have to understand, for pretty much this entire season, Scheierman looked like what I would call a AAAA player. Too good for the G-League where he was lighting it up, but not quite ready for the NBA. He came in missing every single jumper he took, and you wondered if it was a confidence thing because then he would immediately go to Maine and drop 30 with ease.

Then about 2 weeks ago he had 15 points on 50/43% with 3 3PM against the Sixers in a blowout win, and you hoped perhaps that was the performance that unlocked his confidence. He finally saw the ball go in. Before that game, Baylor had never made more than 2 FGM in any appearance as a Celtic. His career high was 5 points. 

Since that game? 

Baylor is 10-17 from deep (58.8%). He's shooting 61.9% from the floor (13-21). We finally are seeing exactly what the brain of Brad Stevens saw back when he was drafted 30th.

Now, I urge you, let's keep perspective. Baylor isn't taking anyone's rotation minutes in the top 9, he's not ready to fill the Hauser role (yet), and this was against a Nets team who was loaded with fringe NBA players. That is all true.

It's also true that I do not give a single fuck.

All I am looking for from Baylor to end this season is just signs of his development and actual, tangible progress. To me, that's all last night was. A step in the right direction. It at least told me he belongs, and not just because he was dominating against a tanking team. What stood out right away to me was how comfortable Baylor looked playing with the regular rotation guys. His decision-making looked MUCH faster which tells you he feels more comfortable processing what he's seeing, and the little two man game he had working with Jrue was certainly noticeable.

What makes Baylor intriguing isn't just the shooting, but his overall feel. I love the pace he plays with, I love how he seems to understand where to go and how to keep things moving, and I love how much shit he talks. It's so preposterous but that's also why it rules.  Make no mistake, the Celts desperately needed every single one of those Baylor points to pull out this win, and the fact that he already fully embraces Mazzulla Ball is very encouraging. Add in the fact that he also had several solid defensive plays and you can understand why he's getting the top spot in this blog.

As we know, given the CBA and the Celts salary issues, it is pretty fucking important that between Walsh, Baylor, and whoever they take this summer that one of those players ends up being a draft hit. Brad simply has to hit on these end-of-bench developmental projects for when the roster looks much different in 2-3 years. 

Can Baylor be that guy? Maybe. We have a LONG way to go before we start entertaining those ideas, but it's fair to say we took a step in that direction last night. The next challenge will be to see it consistently and against better competition, but that will come in time.

- Is it a stretch to suggest we watched Kristaps Porzingis have the best game of his season? I get this was against BKN, but there was no Tatum or Brown available which means KP had to step up and carry as the #1 option, and he responded with a 25/13/3/1/3 on 9-13 and a +11 in his 29 minutes

It wasn't like he was able to feast off the gravity of the Jays, and I thought all of his post ups were with purpose. When he's aggressive like that and is able to use his size advantage, he's unstoppable. When the Celts needed big time buckets in high pressure situations, KP delivered. When it came time to own the glass down the stretch, KP was there. 

You have to remember, this was just his 2nd game after coming back from the bubonic plague, so that definitely plays a factor in how I view his night. One area I was really impressed with and is something that I do think will actually matter in a playoff series is how well KP handled the late doubles when he was operating out of the post. Plays like this

We all know that the Celts are always going to look to find KP in that mismatch once he gets a smaller player on him, and once that happens I think we're going to see playoff defenses do exactly what the Nets did. They are going to send help as soon as KP starts his catch. He's not paying attention to the man doubling, and it's a great way to potentially cause a turnover. 

When he has the ball at this moment, the easy thing to do would be to simply pass it to Al in the strongside corner for a wide open corner 3. 

You can see KP start to make that read until he sees the low man start to rotate into the corner. Given he's 7'3 he can see over the defense

and instead of the corner, he throws a dime to Jrue in the dunker spot for the easy layup. This coming in a 6 point game with under 3 minutes left is a HUGE play, and in my opinion, is going to be crucial in any playoff game that KP plays in. Teams are going to swarm him, so his ability to not only prevent a TO on the catch but then to also know where his reads are in a split second like that is going to be very important. 

Considering he's been great in both of his games after missing that long stretch, I'm not too worried about his conditioning at this point. KP is used to this shit. Nobody comes back after missing huge chunks of time and looks like they've never left more than KP. With him on the floor it completely changes what the Celts can do on both ends of the floor, and all I am asking for is a clean bill of health the rest of the way. 

- You'll never believe this, but the Celts didn't shit their pants in the 4th quarter of a close game. In fact, it was their best quarter! Talk about a prayer. 

And sure, while most of this was the Baylor Scheierman show, what I enjoyed was the defensive execution. Mostly because as we know, the Celtics are easily one of if not the worst 4th quarter defensive teams on the planet. They get allergic to stops once we enter the final 12 minutes, but not last night.

Holding BKN to 36/27% with 4 TOs was good enough for me. I'll take anything that comes close to resembling good defense in the 4th quarter, and I don't really care who it comes against. I just need this team to start getting stops over the final 12 minutes, and if that means it has to start with the tanking Nets then so be it. Considering that is NOT how the 4th quarter went in their last meeting, I found this to be a nice little surprise considering this was only a 1 point game heading into the final frame (71-70). 

To pull that quarter off with no Tatum and no Brown means something to me dammit. 

The Bad

- Thank heavens for KP/Baylor because everyone else? Not all that great, especially shooting the basketball. Usually in games where you have 50+ points of offense on the bench, that means the "others" are going to have to level up and come through. Sadly, that's not exactly what we got

Sam Hauser: 3-8 (2-7)

Al Horford: 1-5 (1-5)

Derrick White: 6-19 (3-11)

Jrue Holiday: 5-14 (0-5)

Payton Pritchard: 3-9 (3-7)

Torrey Craig: 0-2 (0-2)

All in all, an 18-57 (9-37) shooting performance which comes out to a brutal 31/24% split, and you can add in 8 TOs as well. Safe to say things are a little different when the roles change and these secondary scorers are now tasked with being primary scorers. DWhite's shot creation was pretty tough, same with Jrue. It's a much easier life when they can feast off ball and kill defenses once they are in rotation after having to deal with the Jays, so that wasn't all that great.

It's no surprise then that with the best players getting some rest over these last 3 games, the offense has been pretty gross. A 3 game set of MIA/BKN/BKN saw the Celts only average 107 points a game on 46/35% shooting. For comparison, they average 116 points a game on the season. 

I suppose this should be what to expect to close out the year given who will be getting rest, but that doesn't mean we can't be honest when we saw that even in all 3 of these wins, the offense has looked pretty gross at times. 

- I find it fascinating how Luke Kornet is kind of shitty against bad teams, but very awesome against good teams. You'd think it'd be the other way around, but I feel way more confident in Kornet minutes against a legit team than I do Kornet minutes against a bad tanking team. He wasn't all that playable last night which was odd given he's so solid, and maybe this is just a me thing but his FT shooting annoys the fuck out of me.

How does someone go from a 90% season last year so basically being a toss up if he makes both this season? The year before last he was 80% too, so it's not like that was a fluke. Granted I may be the only person on the planet who has noticed this, but it's bizarre. 

- Speaking of FTs, I get that it didn't matter overall, but I will never be OK with missing 3 4th quarter FTs. This is a me problem I get that, but as a general life rule, you cannot miss 4th quarter FTs, even in games where it does not hurt you.

- It was a little weird we saw Jordan Walsh get a DNP-CD in a game like this where they certainly could have used the wing help. Especially since I didn't think Torrey Craig looked all that great. This was a game where you really saw his age and slow lateral quickness, and if he's not going to defend or make open 3s, why is he playing over Walsh?

I can understand riding with Baylor because in the game it was clear the Celts needed shooting, but I also thought early it needed Walsh's energy/chaos instead of whatever it was that Craig provided. 

This back up wing role is all about sensing who has it and who doesn't, and it was pretty obvious right away that it was not a good Torrey Craig night, so why not give Walsh some developmental run? Isn't that what this stretch is all about? 

The Ugly

- I know I mention it every blog, but they leave me no choice. I will never, ever, ever understand how this team is so horrific at throwing entry passes. The fact that the major culprits are the two starting guards makes it even more infuriating. I don't want to ban them from throwing these passes because post ups are so important to the Celts offense, but seriously, what the fuck is this

There is just no way players this good can be THIS bad at throwing entry passes. The fact that this has been an issue all season has my brain in a complete pretzel. Do we just need to accept that this team can't throw entry passes like how earlier Celtics teams couldn't throw lobs? Seriously, this is the shit that is going to lose them a playoff game and it's going to haunt me for weeks, I can already see it.

But hey, as we know, winning ugly is still winning, and doing it in a game without your two best players is certainly nothing to sneeze at. The Celts need a 10-3 finish to secure back to back 60 win seasons, and while that would be nice I think we can all agree the win total doesn't really matter at this point. Just finish healthy and be ready to defend your title.