While Boston has mortgaged young talent (Al Jefferson most clearly) for a rise to success, Detroit has kept together a championship nucleus for half a decade, continued winning, and still found a way to energize its reserve with players of unique and devastating ability. Both Jason Maxiell and Rodney Stuckey are not only good, but more importantly these guys play with an abandon too talented to be reckless but loose enough to avoid quantification.
Maxiell in particular went crazy in a Ben Wallace circa 2003 manner on D (the blocks he’s had on Garnett in the last two games could well be on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in an enlightened future), while raining on O like the other Wallace(6-6 including flailing dunks on fast breaks and spot ups from the top of the key.
Stuckey on the other hand plays like Rondo with twice the swagger plus the ability to hit jumpers. He doesn’t think about deferring: never, and more: Last night in the fourth he had a play that aged him 10 years: he was guarded one on one at the top right of the lane dribbles hard to the hoop, beats his man to draw the post guy off the block and then feinted in and pulled up for a jump pass to a lay-up. I mean he clowned the man D of the widely proclaimed best D in the League like he was Nash or Davis.
This is all to say nothing of the guys who are barely playing but will, Amir Johnson, Walter Herrman and who knows who else.
The Celts, meanwhile, are aged like the Spurs with none of the backstory, rather coming together 3 titles too late. They certainly have some young guys getting minutes in Rondo and Glen Davis, but both of these guys are only a little bit more than space. The talent is there but you don’t see these guys overcoming. This may be a little harsh in the case of Rondo who did have a few good games this playoffs, but Davis doesn’t have the athleticism to really be more than a body off the bench.
On the other side of the country the Spurs and the Lakers can hang with the Pistons in terms of reloading talent. The Spurs literally get their players fully formed from foreign leagues, while the Lakers have the drafting acumen of Dumars. The hope for the Lakers is that the Spurs are too late in the cycle, and that Gasol will have a breakout game on the road. If that happens the Lakers can wrap it up early, while if not 7 games can fall either way.
Another interesting thought is how big the Big Three are, but only by having garnered individual accolades as the Great Players on Bad Teams. How good could Parker or Ginobili have been had they been alone on the Sonics, Celts or Timberwolves? And is it their fault that a good team picked them up before they could go the way of French Reds, creating a legendary vintage through slowly aging in seclusion?
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