Celtics ☘️ Sentinel

 Boston Celtics fans are hearing and reading that the present Celtics team is looking to pick up the pace. But the 96-97 Celtics crew led the League in pace and had the worst season (recordwise) in their history . For that horrendous season, the M L Carr-coached Boston team finshed the regular season with 15 wins and 67 losses . Antoine Walker was the star, but he was only a rookie. And The Green were still trying to recover from the deaths of Len Bias and Reggie Lewis . Rick Pitino had not arrived on the scene yet. Hindsight reveals his presence in Boston would not have made a positive difference in the season's outcome. The 96-97 crew had 11 players averaging 20-or-more minutes per game, and as stated, their pace led the NBA. It appears that Boston sports fans can expect high  minutes from the Celtics core this season - and significant floor time from a number of the newcomers .  NBA.com has the Boston Celtics ranked 12th in the East in their Power Rankings , b...

     For the most historic franchise in sports history from this writers perspective, has any other team ever lost two transcendent players in a span of seven years? Give me another franchise who had such success and yet lost what could have been two players who could have been basketball Hall of Famers?             In modern sports generally, your transcendent players go in a few directions. They tend to stay with the team that drafted them, typically they win and make an incredible impact on that franchise and city. Sometimes they force a trade, or they choose to leave in free agency. Yet for the Celtics, they lost Len Bias in 86 due to a cocaine overdose. Fast forward to 93 and they lost Reggie Lewis to a heart condition/ usage of cocaine.          These two impactful moments in a franchises history lead to some very dark days of basketball in Boston and eventually led to the hiring of Slick-Rick-the-r...

      With the second overall pick in the 1986 draft the Boston Celtics select All American Len Bias out of Maryland! Say that again. The NBA champion Boston Celtics with Red Auerbach at the helm get Len Bias to go with the Big 3, Danny and DJ!!! Back to back champions is what fans saw coming their way.  Fans also saw the next great Celtic who would not only win rings with the Big 3, but probably challenge Jordan and the Bulls in the East.        Len Bias was a true talent He had amazing leaping ability and   his physical stature was a force. He was incredibly dynamic and was compared to Michael Jordan. With what basketball fans were able to witness watching MJ, if Len came even close to that the Celtics would have won several more titles. In 87 when the Celtics dealt with injuries, imagine Bias on that team and what he could have done. Yes Banner 17 would come in those 87 Finals over the Lakers.       "What if " is a q...

      Do you ever sit there and wonder what could have been? Len Bias and Reggie Lewis were two of the best draft picks the Celtics ever made. Len unfortunately never was able to play on the parquet. Reggie gave us a glimpse of how special he was becoming.       From all accounts and video we have on he Len was Jordan like and probably would have been his greatest rival. When he was drafted Len was heading to the NBA champion Boston Celtics. Imagine him on that 87 team or subsequent years and what he would have done with the team that was already here. Possible titles in 87, 88, and 89 he would have definitely put us over the top vs the Lakers and Pistons.       Reggie, who we were able to see, was taking the mantle from Larry and the Big 3 and handling it quite well. Do we all remember those playoff series vs Indy and Cleveland?! Sadly we all remember that series vs Charlotte when he collapsed. We all know where we were when he b...

The pain of losing both Len Bias and Reggie Lewis will forever go down in Celtics history as a near-disaster that helped put The Green in a 22-year Championship drought. What could've been....sigh pic.twitter.com/ILDngfoBFW — Frosty Bias (@frostybias) January 15, 2021 Shortly after being taken second-overall in the 1986 NBA draft, Bias died of an apparent cocaine overdose. Boston had acquired the draft pick by means of trading Gerald Henderson to Seattle, and I not-so-fondly recall a cruel written comment indicating "the Celtics traded Henderson for a corpse."   Red Auerbach knew NBA talent, and Len had it big time. The 6'8" forward would have been a superstar in the League. The next year, Boston took 6'7" Reggie Lewis with the 22nd pick in the first round of the 1987 draft. If rival GMs could have a redoing of that draft, Reggie would have been snagged much sooner. He turned out to be that good.  But death intervened once again for Red and his team. Lew...