Showtime

Before I get into the meat of this, let me first state that I am not writing this to denigrate the 1980s Los Angeles Lakers. I’m not trying to call them frauds, phonies, or anything of the sort. I do not think they were lucky. I believe the Showtime Lakers were one of the greatest basketball teams in history. Those Lakers may have been the best team of the 1980s. However, I do not think they were the most impressive team of that decade. The Lakers were consistent, and they took advantage of the opportunities afforded them. And most of all, the Lakers did not have to play in the East.

A few years ago, some of my friends were complaining about the East-West imbalance in the NBA. I told them that I didn’t think it was any different from the 80s. Back then, the East ruled. The Lakers had no competition in their conference. In the ten years from 1980-1989, the Lakers lost two series to Western Conference foes, to the 1981 and 1986 Houston Rockets. On the other side of the country, the Boston Celtics had to deal with the 76ers, Bucks, and, later, Pistons.

I was thinking about this the other day and wondered about something. I did some quick research and found a telling truth. If we use the 1986 season as the cutoff point—I chose 1986 because that marks the 76ers killing the franchise by trading away Moses Malone and the first pick of the draft—every season from 1980-1986 in which there was a Sixers-Celtics playoff series whose winner went on to play the Lakers in the Finals, that team lost to the Lakers. Every season during that period in which either there was no Sixers-Celtics playoff series or the Lakers failed to make the Finals, the Sixers or Celtics won the championship. From 1987-1989, the same is true if you replace the 76ers with the Pistons. To further illustrate this, see the table below:

Year	Eastern Conference Finals	Western Conference Winner	NBA Champion
1980	Celtics-76ers	Lakers	Lakers
1981	Celtics-76ers	Rockets	Celtics
1982	Celtics-76ers	Lakers	Lakers
1983	76ers-Bucks	Lakers	76ers
1984	Celtics-Bucks	Lakers	Celtics
1985	Celtics-76ers	Lakers	Lakers
1986	Celtics-Bucks	Rockets	Celtics
1987	Celtics-Pistons	Lakers	Lakers
1988	Celtics-Pistons	Lakers	Lakers
1989	Pistons-Bulls	Lakers	Pistons

As I said before, I think the Lakers were a great team. I just find it more impressive what the Celtics, Sixers, and Pistons had to get through just to make it to the Finals.

Of course, all this is probably just coincidence. The 1983 team was the best Sixers team of the era. The 1986 Celtics are argued by some to be the best team in NBA history. Those teams played Milwaukee in the Eastern Conference Finals. Would they have won the championship had they faced their rival instead? We’ll never know, but I’ll always wonder.

You have to give the Lakers credit for their consistency, though. They made it through the West 8 times out of 10 years, and won 5 championships. Nothing but greatness.

The Boyle Effect

My first thought upon reading the news that Duke freshman Kyrie Irving was leaving school for the NBA was that the young man had made a smart decision. Sure, he might be able to improve his game and long-term prospects as a player by remaining in college for at least another year, but an injury already cost him all but 11 games this season. Another collegiate injury would severely hurt his draft stock, and there is a strong possibility that it would render him virtually undraftable. Irving is already considered a top 2 or 3 pick in the draft; his potential coming out of college would never be higher than it is today. One attends college to grow as an individual and to do what is necessary to maximize one’s market value to potential employers. After one season, Kyrie Irving has accomplished that. Professionally speaking, there is nothing left for the young man to accomplish at Duke. The time for him to leave is right now. He made the right decision, and I am happy for him.

But my second thought was that I wouldn’t draft Kyrie Irving. That has nothing to do with him leaving school after just one season. Had Irving remained at Duke for four year, won 3 national championships, and 3 Naismith Awards, I still wouldn’t draft him. That has nothing to do with Irving’s character or ability. Nope. Irving’s biggest basketball flaw is that he played on a high school team coached by Kevin Boyle.

Before we get to Boyle, some background…





One day last week someone brought up the Pistons-Heat Eastern Conference Finals of 2005. Whenever I think about that series, I don’t think about Dwyane Wade’s injury. Instead, I think about the fourth quarter of Game 7 and how the Heat blew the game on two possessions near the end of the game. Miami trailed by two points with about three and a half minutes left, and Shaquille O’Neal made an apparent decision to take over the game. He established himself in the post and demanded the ball. Ben Wallace fouled him and Shaq converted both free throws to tie the game. After a defensive stop, O’Neal demanded the ball again and gave Miami the lead by hitting a basket. The Heat held Detroit scoreless again. On the ensuing possession, Miami had a chance to make it a two-possession game. Again, O’Neal planted himself in the post and demanded the ball. Damon Jones passed the ball into the post, but Shaq wanted to get a little closer. He passed it back to Jones and attempted to repost, but Jones instead swung it around the perimeter. Tayshaun Prince stole the ball and Richard Hamilton scored to tie the game again. When Miami got the ball back, they fed Shaq in the post and he drew another foul on Wallace. He converted one of two to put the Heat up by one. Two free throws put Detroit back up by one, and instead of feeding O’Neal in the post again, Dwyane Wade came down and rushed a long jump shot before most of his teammates had made it down the court. Detroit scored again and the game was essentially over. I will always feel that Miami would have won that game had they fed Shaq on those two possessions that ended with Damon Jones’ turnover and Wade’s missed long jumper.

Because of the way my brain works, that led me to thinking about Game 7 of the NBA Finals between Detroit and San Antonio. The fourth quarter began with the two teams tied, and I thought to myself that Detroit would win if they continually fed Rasheed Wallace in the post. I knew that wasn’t going to happen though. As it turned out, no Piston other than Rasheed scored until 8:35 had ticked off the clock in that quarter. The Spurs were up by six points by then. Rasheed was 3-4 in the quarter up to that point, but it wasn’t enough. Detroit never caught up, and I will always believe that Detroit lost that game because they didn’t learn the lesson of why Miami had failed against them. They didn’t feet Rasheed like they should have, and Rasheed didn’t demand the ball like he should have.

But I knew not to expect that out of Rasheed Wallace. I had been watching him play since he was in the tenth grade at Simon Gratz High School in North Philly. At Gratz, Wallace was coached by Bill Ellerbe, a coach I found to be stylistically and philosophically closer to John Chaney than any other coach I’ve ever seen. Like Chaney, Ellerbe is a coach who believed that the guards should do all of the ball handling and an overwhelming majority of the shooting. He wanted his big guys to always defer to the guards. When I saw Gratz lose to Franklin Learning Center in the 1992 Public League Championship Game, I came away thinking that Rasheed would never, ever dominate even though he had the talent to do so. I can’t tell you how many times he was wide open for 12-foot baseline jumpers in that game, but I can tell you he only took one of them (he made it). The normal routine was for him to hold the ball above his head and pass it out to point guard Reds Smith. That’s why Wallace only averaged 16 points per game as a senior. He was the national player of the year because all the scouts could see his talent, but he didn’t even lead his high school team in scoring or shot attempts per game.

Rasheed wasn’t going to ever dominate in college or the NBA because Ellerbe coached that out of his game. That messed up his game for his entire career. I will always believe that is why we never saw Rasheed Wallace exploit his post game and become a Hall of Fame power forward.

Chaney and Ellerbe are coaches who are good at getting the most out of players with low and average levels of talent. But they coach the same way when they have the best players, and I believe that hurts those highly talented players. For every Aaron McKie and Mardy Collins that Chaney sent to the NBA, there was a Mark Macon or Lamont Barnes, really good players who got worse every year under the coach’s tutelage.

Most high school coaches have little effect on the long-term games of NBA-level players. Others help. Some are really, really detrimental. And because I was thinking about that Miami-Detroit game and the San Antonio-Detroit game, I started to think about other high school coaches who mess up their players. At the top of my list is Kevin Boyle.

Once I found out the Kyrie Irving went to St. Patrick’s I realized that he is someone I would never draft. I’ve seen enough of Kevin Boyle and I’ve seen enough of his players. He sends a lot of players to high level Division I schools and the NBA because he was able to recruit New Jersey’s best players to his school. But he is the most hotheaded and spastic basketball coach I have ever seen. A quick look at some of his former players (Al Harrington, Samuel Dalembert, and Derrick Caracter, to name a few) is to look at a list of some the most brain farting and frustrating players in college and NBA ball in the past 15 years. (As I write this, I’m surprised he lost J.R. Smith to St. Benedict’s.)

I haven’t seen any of that out of Kyrie Irving—or Dexter Strickland, for that matter—but I don’t trust Kevin Boyle. I’d sign Irving or any of Boyle’s other players as a free agent after watching them play in the league for a few years, but I wouldn’t draft any of them, especially not at or near the top of the draft.

Runaway Slave

Did Jesse Jackson go too far in saying that Gilbert viewed LeBron as a “runaway slave?” Not at all. That’s exactly what I thought nearly twenty-four hours before Reverend Jackson said anything. How dare he turn us down? After all we did for him? Who does he think he is?

Fans complain that it’s only about money to the players, but the owners love it that way. As long as free agents go to the highest bidder, the owners still maintain a decent level of control. “If you pay him, he will come,” if you will. Gilbert was allowed to offer LeBron more money than any other owner, yet James still walked away. Gilbert could not deal with that. He had to have asked himself, “What more does he want?” Clearly, LeBron James wanted much more than just Cleveland’s dollars. Dan Gilbert was unable to buy LeBron off. Essentially, Gilbert offered the player the best he could give, and LeBron still chose to go elsewhere. Gilbert’s best was not good enough, and that, more than anything else, is what set him off.

Gilbert is delusional with power. Once the season was over, LeBron was no longer a Cavalier. Sure, he was technically under contract until July 1. But let’s be real here; LeBron became a free agent the moment the Celtics eliminated the Cavs in the second round of the playoffs. Yet in an interview, Gilbert cited LeBron not meeting with a prospective head coach as one of the things the Cavaliers “let him get away with.” How exactly did Gilbert let LeBron get away with anything when he was no longer part of the team, meaning no longer under his employ? That’s another example of entitlement. “Let him get away with?” Get out of here. If that’s not a statement of ownership, I don’t know what is.

Some people called Gilbert’s rant a case of sour grapes. Sure, that’s part of it. It was also a classic case of being upset that someone had the nerve to turn him down. The rich and powerful are not used to being turned down. They are used to people holding hands out willing to accept whatever scraps they are lucky to be offered. Like so many in the world, Dan Gilbert could not accept being told no.

If you’re one of those people who has a problem with Jackson’s use of the word “slavery,” think about this: if the statement was made in reference to a White player, would you have been upset? When that word is brought up in America, people automatically think in terms of Black & White. This is a shame, and it’s something of which we are all guilty. We are so conditioned to think Black people when we hear the word slavery, but any type of person can be a slave. The fact that everyone jumped took Gilbert being described as a slave owner as the equivalent of him being called a racist is another tragic effect of this country’s legacy of racism. Gilbert’s words exemplified feelings of ownership. It doesn’t have to be about color; it’s about one man trying to exert power over another—but you and I both know, this has a lot to do with color.

But it’s not just Dan Gilbert. It’s everyone else, too. I know it when I see it.

When I was a senior in high school, I applied to about twenty colleges. Among those twenty was an application I sent to Harvard. As part of the application process, I agreed to an interview. One Sunday afternoon in late Winter, my father drove me up to Trenton to my interviewers’ house. They were a married couple in their early-to-mid fifties. They were both Harvard alumni. And they were both psychiatrists. Harvard accepted me, but due to a number of factors, I decided not to accept. When they received word that I had decided to attend a different school, the man and woman who had interviewed me sent me a letter telling me to let them know if I was dealing with any emotional issues.

Even at the age of seventeen, I knew the deal. It was Harvard arrogance. These two people could not believe that I had the nerve to refuse admission to their prestigious university. No guy in his right mind would turn down Harvard, so obviously something must have been wrong with me. My decision could not possibly have been the result of sound reasoning and decision making.

As I see it, this was the case with Dan Gilbert and Cavalier fans’ hurt feelings regarding LeBron James’ decision to leave the Cavaliers. Because he grew up in Akron, the fans in Ohio feel as though they’ve raised LeBron from birth. Never mind that those people had nothing to do with his development as a man or basketball player. Never mind that ninety percent of them never saw LeBron play one game in high school. They’ve cheered for him his whole life and helped him become the player he is (yeah right), so they feel entitled to his loyalty. They gave him their adoration and cheers, and for that, they feel, LeBron James owes it to them to spend the rest of his career in Cleveland.

Fans are fanatical. We expect this kind of irrationality from them. The team’s owner is a different story. LeBron was Dan Gilbert’s golden goose. Whatever millions LeBron earned from his contract with the team, he earned ten times that amount for Gilbert. In return, the owner catered to the player’s every whim…except providing him with a championship level supporting cast. Now that LeBron is gone, Gilbert feels left out in the cold. For all the money he spent on him, Gilbert feels entitled to James’ services. Entitled. That’s the only way to describe the language of the letter Gilbert wrote to Cavalier fans in the wake of LeBron’s leaving.

Furthermore, the rage expressed by fans toward James implies that they feel he should have never left Cleveland. As Henry Abbott wrote on ESPN.com ( http://es.pn/crHVmj ), these people seem to have an issue with free agency in general. Damn those players for having the right to play where they want to play.

What makes the bull’s eye on LeBron’s back so much larger than any other free agent I can remember is that he did not leave for more money. He left, in part, to play ball with his friends. Both owners and fans dislike this. LeBron took control of his situation. He did not let the desires and priorities of other people guide his choice. A friend of mine often quotes an old classmate of his: “Once you have enough money, going to work every day has to be about enjoying your job.” LeBron’s decision was to play with his friends on a team that has a chance to win championships. He did not take the most money. He did not choose to stay with the comfort of the status quo. No, he chose the path he wanted. I applaud the man for having the self-confidence and self-assuredness to follow his own mind. In Abbott’s column, the writer references a column by Ken Berger, who quotes an anonymous NBA executive as saying, “It’s an incestuous, friend-ridden business.” The statement was made in reference to players discussing their futures—and desires to play with each other—among themselves. Friend-ridden? Yeah, I think that says it all.

Ownership and, therefore, slavery are not about racism, per se. They are about control. Dan Gilbert, and anyone who is upset with LeBron, are expressing their frustrations that a young man dared to take control over his own life. I even heard one person say that he would have preferred to see LeBron stay in Cleveland and become a Charles Barkley-like player who never won a championship than to see him win one in Miami. See, everyone all over America is talking about what they wanted him to do or what they think he should have done. They talk about what he did to the people of Cleveland. As Jesse Jackson said, “LeBron honored his contract.” That’s right. He honored his contract. Fans complain all the time about players trying to renegotiate their contracts before they run out. LeBron James did not. He waited until his contract expired and then sought a new one, where he wanted and with whom he wanted. He followed the protocol and still draws ire. A Black man can’t win for losing, can he? Fuck yall.

The Chosen One

One of the recurring themes of Richard Russo’s Empire Falls is the idea that one must take advantages of opportunities when they are presented or else life gets in the way—life has a way of killing dreams before they ever get started. More than once, we are told that Miles Roby, the protagonist, makes his mother, Grace, furious because he drops out of college to care for her while she is terminally ill. Grace is emphatic about her desire for Miles to escape the small, formerly industry-filled succubus of a town in which he grew up; Grace wants Miles to get out, live life, and find happiness. He has dreams, and she is afraid that by staying and caring for her, Miles will lose his chance to fulfill them. She tells him that choosing to stay will get him trapped in the town forever, and that he will never get another chance to escape. The desire of the novel’s antagonist is to keep Miles from leaving home and chasing any of his dreams.

Who can’t relate to that story? Only a bad parent wants for his/her child to grow up and never leave home. Only the most selfish of parents want to keep their children from living out their dreams.

Similarly, it is only the bad and selfishness in humanity that allows people to be upset at LeBron James for leaving Cleveland. I’ve heard a few people say they aren’t upset that James left, but rather by how he left. These people are just ignorant to the reality that brought about the one-hour ESPN special that occurred last Thursday night in Greenwich, Connecticut.

Do you remember how hard it was to leave home the first time? It can be a frightening convergence of excitement, sadness, fear, and melancholy. It is an emotional event. Only in rare circumstances can it be called easy.

Have you not yet left home? Do you know someone who has never left? As each day passes by, it gets much more difficult to make yourself walk out the door. It is very much like trying to quit smoking. Or ending a bad relationship. Let’s ride with that metaphor for a minute. Who hasn’t been in a bad relationship? Sometimes they are easy to end. Others, not so much. We’ve all known that person who was in a situation everyone knew was damaging. Yet, that person stays. And stays. And eventually, that bad relationship just becomes part of who that person is. That relationship becomes his/her identity. We don’t know that person outside of it. If only he had gotten out of it early, we wish. She should have left him months ago, we lament.

Well, that’s what LeBron did. He got out. The Cavaliers were a bad situation for him. Seven years was long enough for us to see that team management could not build a team that was going to win a championship with him. At the end of each postseason, though, all he hears is how Jordan would have won with that roster. That franchise—more specifically, that city—could not attract high quality free agents. Really, how many of you would choose Cleveland when more attractive destinations are on the table? As far as basketball goes, Cleveland was a losing proposition for LeBron. Why wouldn’t he leave?

Cavalier owner Dan Gilbert said to Sports Illustrated’s Ian Thomsen, “For him, I think he does not like that burden, that pressure…” To quote Thomsen: “Now he wonders if the burden of leading his hometown franchise was too much to ask of James.” Of course it was. The man was a boy when he was drafted first overall by his hometown team. From the moment the Cavaliers won the draft lottery in 2003, the burden placed upon James was to (a) revitalize Cleveland’s economy, (b) stimulate the downtown area around the arena, (c) resurrect interest in the failing basketball team, (d) lead the Cavs to NBA championships, and (e) be the bright and shining face of Cleveland for the whole world to see. That is a lot to ask of anyone, especially a teenager. To his credit, LeBron embraced it all, though.

As the years went by and the playoff losses mounted, it had to wear on him. Optimistic as he may have been three years ago, the past two seasons had to have taught him the reality. His team’s management wasn’t doing a good enough job of building a champion. He had to wonder if they ever would.

After Game 4 of the Celtics series, I believe he knew his chances to win in Cleveland were over. Do you realize how heartbreaking that had to be? I do not at all excuse his listless performance in Game 5, but I most definitely understand it. He had to be asking himself, “What more can I do?”

Meanwhile, the city put together a video begging him to stay. For me, that would have been the final straw. At 25 years old, could I have forced myself to remain in a situation that led me to lose at my job with little to no hope for winning while being held responsible for the economic fortunes of so many people?

LeBron wants to become a global icon. How exactly was Cleveland helping him achieve that goal?

He had to go. If he didn’t leave now, when was he going to? In 2013, when he was 28 and even more firmly entrenched in the community? He never got to leave the area. Not for college, like Derrick Rose. Not for a stint in the minor leagues like Joe Mauer. If LeBron James did not walk away from Cleveland in the summer of 2010, he was never going to leave. Never. You know I’m right.

The decision to leave Cleveland, I imagine, was one of the most difficult of his life. Frankly, I did not think he would have the balls to go through with it. That is why I always thought he would go back to the Cavs. I applaud him for joining the Heat. I have a lot more respect for him now than I did this time a week ago.

Once he made that decision, he had to deliver the news in a cold, calculated manner. There could be no press conference in Cleveland or Akron. That could have made it impossible for him to walk away. Just as Miles’ mother told him to stay at school and not come visit her, I would have advised LeBron to make his announcement as far away from Ohio as possible. The smallest measure of emotion may have been too much for LeBron for him to allow himself to go through with leaving. He knew he was creating ill will. But he had to do it. That slight moment of emotion when the fans burned his jersey looked like a slip-up to me. He expected it to be bad. He had practiced his stone face. But when the moment arrived, he lost control for the briefest of moments. It meant something to him. If that event took place in Ohio, I don’t believe for a moment he could have spoken any team’s name other than Cleveland. He did what he had to do to preserve his dream for his life.

By choosing Greenwich, Connecticut, LeBron made a statement. Greenwich has the highest per capita income of any American city with at least 50,000 residents. LeBron had given his all to Cleveland, but it was time for him to move on to bigger and better things.

Maybe people are upset because they know they are neither bigger nor better. Perhaps they are just jealous that he was able to get out and chase his dreams while they never had the opportunity. Do these people really feel justified in trying the lock a young man into a bad situation just because he happened to grow up there? How un-American is that?

Like many of us, Miles Roby was never able to live the life he wanted. LeBron James has the chance. I know I’m rooting for him.

Closing the Deal: The Failure of the 2009-2010 Boston Celtics

There are many reasons why the Lakers are NBA champions and the Celtics ended the season unhappy. One can cite injuries, age, coaching, home-court advantage, and a host of other things. While I think Kendrick Perkins’ injury was an underrated factor, I do not believe it made the difference in the Finals. I think Perkins’ absence from the lineup merely amplified the difference between the two teams. By the time the injury occurred in Game 6, Boston was already well on their way to not winning the championship.

During a Game 5 timeout, Phil Jackson was recorded telling the Lakers that the Celtics blew more big leads than any team in the NBA. I’ve heard some people call Jackson classless for what he said, but the man spoke truth. Blowing big leads was the Celtics’ M.O. all season long. In the end, Jackson’s suggestion that Boston would hand the game over to the Lakers was correct—he just spoke two games premature.

Bill Simmons’ theory is that the Celtics’ offense fails down the stretch of close games because Rajon Rondo plays differently. Rondo is a horrible free-throw shooter. According to Simmons’ theory, Rondo changes his offensive attack in an effort to avoid going to the foul line near the end of close games. I wholeheartedly believe in this theory. One needs only to watch a few Celtic games to agree. What Rondo does turn his team into a 4-man offense. In Game 7, he further handicapped it.

Watch a replay of the fourth quarter of Game 7. What you’ll see is at least three possessions during which Rondo, at the last possible second, pulls back a pass he was about to throw to Ray Allen. Allen’s shooting struggles during the series have been well-documented, but that offense, to a great extent, relies upon him running behind screens and taking jump shots. When Rondo refuses to pass Allen the ball while the shooter is open, the offense stagnates. During a large chunk of the fourth quarter of the final game, Rondo turned the Celtics into a 3-man offense.

Speaking of Ray Allen’s poor shooting in the Finals, I think we can look at two main factors. Both revolve around defense. Allen’s defense on Kobe Bryant was critical during the series. Kobe did not have a good series. It was Ray Allen who spent the bulk of the time hounding the Mamba around the court. Everyone knows that guarding a great perimeter player tires out a player more than anything. Guarding Kobe Bryant throughout the series killed Allen’s legs. There is also a Rondo component to Allen’s poor shooting. As everyone knows that Rondo cannot shoot, defenders back further and further away from him. As the Finals progressed, Kobe began backing more than five feet off of Rondo. Instead drawing Bryant closer to him by taking more jumpers, Rondo continued to play his normal game. This allowed Kobe to play a one-man zone while, theoretically, guarding the man with the ball. Completing passes to would-be scorers became much more difficult. Every Celtic possession resulted in Ray Allen running around two or three extra screens. Over the course of a game and a series, those extra trips around the court added up.

Unless there was a fast break, the point guard seemed unwilling to be involved in the second half offense. Against a well-coached and defensive-minded team like the Lakers, that is a killer. Fast breaks were few and far between for the Celtics in the final two games of the series. That is a direct result of the lack of rebounding, which was a major problem for Boston in Games 6 and 7.

Pau Gasol was a beast on the boards for those final two games. He was such a beast that he recorded over 38% of his Finals rebounds during Games 6 and 7. During Game 7, the Lakers had eleven offensive rebounds in the first quarter alone. This was the point when many of the pundits started acknowledging the impact of Kendrick Perkins’ injury. As I said earlier, Perkins’ injury only amplified the problem. This era’s Celtics have had a problem rebounding the basketball in situations like Game 6 and Game 7 for the past three post-seasons.

And here we get to the crux of the problem.

The biggest reason the Celtics failed to win the championship on the Lakers’ home floor is because these Celtics have repeatedly shown us that they are not capable of it. This team has proven itself to be one that cannot seal the deal unless they are playing in the TD Garden. Because they finished the regular season with more victories on the road than at home, the 2009-2010 Celtics earned a “road warriors” reputation. During the playoffs, that reputation was cemented. The truth, however, is that those road victories were fool’s gold. They only led people, including me, to believe they would do that of which they were not capable of doing.

A Google search of “Celtics road warriors” produces the following headlines:
Boston Celtics show why they are road warriors in NBA playoffs…
Road Warriors: Celtics complete Florida sweep for 2-0 lead over…
Road warrior Celtics return home with series tied 1-1
Road-warrior Celtics must find way to win at home
Celtics – The 3-Pointer: Road Warriors

Boy, oh, boy, did the Celtics have many fooled. Yes, they were good on the road, but they stunk when it counted. This post-season, the Celtics were 0-4 on the road when they had a chance to end a series. In all other road playoff games this year, Boston was 6-2. Coming into the Finals, those records were 0-2 and 5-1. The Celtics were simply unable to close out any series on their opponent’s home floor.

This isn’t new. In 2009, Boston had two opportunities to close out playoff opponents on the road. They lost both games, each of which led to a Game 7 back in Boston. If you can remember as far back as 2008, the biggest question as we got deeper into the playoffs was whether the Celtics could win on the road. They did not win a single game on the road during the first two rounds. After defeating Detroit in Game 6 of the conference finals to win the East, those questions went away. When they lost Game 5 of the 2008 Finals and were forced to close out the Lakers back in Boston, no one questioned the Celtics’ ability to win on the road. Two years later, people should.

To recount, the Celtics are a combined 1-9 in the past three post-seasons when they have a chance to clinch a series on the road. Of the ten playoff series they’ve played since 2008, the Celtics have had opportunities to end all but one on the road. And only against the Pistons did they ever seal the deal. That’s pretty pathetic. And it should have been a pretty good indication that they weren’t going to be able to do what they needed to do in the Staples Center.

This year, as in the previous two, the Celtics failed to play their best during the road closeout games. In 2008 and 2009, though, they managed to approach the level of play they had established earlier in each particular series. I looked at each post-season game and series during which they had an opportunity to end the series on the road—as the Celtics never had a chance to end the series in Cleveland, I did not look at this year’s Cavs series.

What I found is that rebounding really was the greatest difference in the Celtics’ performance in the road closeout games. Rebounding. Again.

I compared their rebound percentage in the road closeout game with that of series overall and on the road, specifically. During the past three post-seasons, the Celtics have rebounded less effectively in road closeout games than they did during the rest of the series. That’s not surprising. Equally unsurprising is that the trend continues if you compare the road closeout game only to other road games in the series. What did surprise me was how much worse the Celtics performed in that area in 2010 than they did in 2008 and 2009.

Compared to how they rebounded in series prior to playing a road closeout game, the Celtics’ three worst rebounding differentials over the past three years all occurred in 2010. Amazingly, the putrid performance against the Lakers in Games 6 and 7 of the Finals improved Boston’s rebounding numbers. Look at these numbers from the 2010 playoffs:

In games prior to road closeout games, the Celtics rebounded 24.8% of their own misses and 51.0% of all misses. In road games, those numbers are 24.3% and 48.2%, respectively. In road closeout games, those rebounding numbers fall to 16.5% and 42.3%. That’s awful. You can’t beat anyone anywhere rebounding the ball that scarcely. As I said, Games 6 and 7 in Los Angeles improved the Celtics’ numbers. Prior to the Finals, their road closeout offensive rebound percentage was 10.7% and their overall rebound rate was 41.5% (the rates for earlier games in the series were 22.7% and 52.2%; on the road, those numbers were 22.2% and 48.4%). Pitiful.

Rebounding is about effort and focus. I find it strange that a strong veteran team like the Celtics would fail in those areas. But that’s what they do. That’s what they’ve done. And we should have known ahead of time that couldn’t put the Lakers away in Staples.