Heartbreak and Celebration: Sean Grande Helps Digest The Boston Celtics season

Summary

Locked On Celtics – Heartbreak and Celebration: Sean Grande Helps Digest The Boston Celtics Season

Host: John Karalis
Guest: Sean Grande (Celtics radio play-by-play voice)
Date: May 11, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode is the first of a three-part series featuring John Karalis and Sean Grande dissecting the Boston Celtics’ 2025-26 NBA season—a campaign defined by unexpected high points and crushing playoff disappointment. The episode unpacks the Celtics’ regular season success, the heartbreak of a playoffs loss to the 76ers, the critical role of the center position (especially Nēmi Keita), and the paradox of feeling both anger and joy about the season’s result.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Poetic Bookends: The Season’s Start and End

• Opening Concerns:

  • John Corrales [03:29]: Recalls his preseason worry about the team’s potential for a long losing streak, noting that the Celtics had historically avoided prolonged slumps for years. He specifically watched the season’s first five games, fearing an early losing streak.
  • Noted the irony that the season began and ended with Joel Embiid being pivotal for the Philadelphia 76ers, underlining how Embiid’s three stellar playoff games were ultimately enough to eliminate Boston.

• Sean Grande [04:59]:

  • Reflects on the “wild poetic nature” of how the season’s early questions about beating Embiid and the Sixers mirrored the way the Celtics’ playoff run was ended by the same foe.
  • Points out “the symmetry of Philly and the three losses,” describing the Celtics’ year as “an 83-game fantasy” that ended almost exactly as skeptics predicted.

2. Production at Center: The Nēmi Keita Factor

• Sean Grande [05:25]:

  • Credits Keita as “the number one reason the Celtics were the single most overachieving team I have called in 28 years.”
  • Notes that for all Jalen Brown’s excellence and other positives, “the biggest difference in value over replacement player” this year was at center, especially compared to prior seasons with traditional rotations.

• John Corrales [08:41]:

  • Emphasizes that Keita’s emergence stabilized the center spot and made the team’s overachievement possible. Compares the necessity of getting Vucevic up to speed to the 2019 team playoff hopes riding on Gordon Hayward.

• Sean Grande [11:17]:

  • Explains the tenuous Celtics depth behind Keita: “What happens after Nēmi? What happens if he gets into foul trouble?” Other options, like Luca Garza, were not reliable, and going small with Tatum wasn’t feasible given injuries.
  • Reflects on the “breaker” moment: “It was a dream that ended… The clock just hit midnight in the third quarter of game five.”

3. The Playoff Loss: What Went Wrong

• John Corrales [15:20]:

  • “Even the Locked On Sixers hosts thought without Embiid the Sixers had no chance. But who could have imagined Joel Embiid, being 2023 Joel Embiid for three games, is what actually killed Boston?”
  • The unpredictability—Paul George outperforming Jalen Brown, aberrant shooting, and hot streaks—complicated analysis and made the loss tougher to accept.

• Sean Grande [16:18]:

  • “Every time the Celtics have one of these disappointing series… we rightfully crush the Celtics. But sometimes, these are two wildly aberrational things that happened at the same time.”
  • Raises the issue of perspective: On paper, by Game 7, “the Sixers were the better team.”

• John Corrales [18:12]:

  • Cautions against “the notion that the Celtics should win every series just because they’re the Celtics.”
  • Cites Jalen Brown’s season performance but admits Brown “was not one of the top five players in that [playoff] series.”

• Sean Grande [20:26]:

  • Recognizes the matchup struggles Boston had with the Knicks all year, speculating the team might not have gone further even if they had survived the Sixers.

4. Duality: Celebrating an Overachieving Season and the Disappointment of Falling Short

• John Corrales [20:52]:

  • Pushes back on claims that the Celtics “had it easy” or only beat tanking teams: “Everybody plays those tanking teams. The Celtics also had some bad nights and tough losses.”

• Sean Grande [21:41]:

  • “There are two things that can be true at the same time: The body of work this regular season deserves all the accolades… and the Celtics blew it in the playoffs. Joe [Mazzulla] will probably get Coach of the Year. Jalen is going to make All-NBA.”

• [22:12]

  • The “gap year” concept: Grande explains he referred to the team as a “gap year Celtics” in a self-effacing, satirical way because they kept “making me look stupid every night.” Highlights that rookie coach accolades, “house money” expectations, and the underdog narrative evaporate with success.

5. The Celtics’ Offensive Issues in the Playoffs

• Sean Grande [29:35]:

  • Critiques the Tatum/Brown-led offense’s tendency to revert to isolation play: “Whenever the hey-you-have-to-ISO-now bait is dangled in front of them, they bite on it like a bass… Every single time.”
  • Misses “the adult in the room” leadership Drew Holiday provided in the 2024 title run, implying a steadying presence was absent this year.

• John Corrales [32:34]:

  • Notes that while Tatum and Brown had career assist years, turnovers and settling for poor shots cost them.
  • Regular season offensive rebounding masked their “not great first looks” but against the Sixers—who choked out those extra chances—the Celtics’ offense faltered.

6. Shot Quality and the Modern NBA

• [34:54] John Corrales:
  • Compares Celtics’ high three-point attempt rate to casinos: “They become vulnerable because sometimes the house doesn’t win when it’s one or two hands of blackjack in a playoff series.”
  • Recaps an ongoing debate about shot quality metrics vs actual results, and how persistent poor shooting from usually reliable players (like Derrick White this year) complicated Boston’s strategy.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

“The biggest difference in value over replacement player...the reason this team was the most overachieving in 28 years was Nēmi Keita.”
— Sean Grande [06:19]

“The clock just hit midnight in the third quarter of Game Five and we were awakened from this six month gap year fever dream.”
— Sean Grande [07:35]

“Jalen Brown was brilliant all year...he was not one of the top five players in that [playoff] series.”
— John Corrales [18:12]

“Every time the hey-you-have-to-ISO-now bait is dangled in front of them, they bite on it like a bass...that part has driven me nuts for a very long time.”
— Sean Grande [29:35]

“None of them [fans] said the Celtics shoot too many threes. People only complain when they don't go in.”
— John Corrales [36:28]

“There are two things that can be true at the same time: The Celtics had this extraordinary regular season... and the Celtics blew it in the playoffs.”
— Sean Grande [21:41]

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Important Timestamps

• 03:13 — Season’s poetic bookends, Embiid as Celtics’ alpha/beta nemesis
• 05:25 — The center position: Keita’s impact and depth issues
• 11:17 — Team’s playoff limitations: lack of depth, injury impact, and matchup problems
• 15:20 — Playoff analysis: Embiid’s role and unexpected standout performances
• 16:18 — Discussion of "aberrational" playoff series and perspective on loss
• 18:12 — Celtics’ expectation management, playoff disappointment
• 21:41 — Duality of celebrating the season and mourning the playoff exit
• 29:35 — Celtics’ late-game offensive flaws, ISO tendencies, lack of leadership
• 32:34 — How offensive rebounds masked shot creation woes
• 36:28 — The three-point debate and how "shot quality" isn’t enough

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Conclusion

This episode delivers a nuanced, candid, and occasionally raw breakdown of a confounding Celtics year. Grande and Karalis don’t shy from hard truths (playoff failures, personnel limits, ISO habits) but also elevate how improbable this exciting run was—especially on the back of unexpected player development.

Stay tuned for parts 2 and 3, where the conversation continues to probe: What next for this team? How should fans remember this campaign? Can the Celtics get back to contender status?

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Transcript

[John Corrales]

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[Sean Grandy]

Now that we've cooled off a little bit, let's do a proper autopsy on this season and postseason with Sean Grandy, Celtics Radio Play by Play Voice what went right? What went wrong? Why we can be both angry and happy at the same time right now on the Lockdown Celtics podcast.

[John Corrales]

Hey there. Welcome back to the show. I'm John Corrales.

[Sean Grandy]

Today's show is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers get bet just $5 and get 250 in bonus bets. If your first bet wins, head to FanDuel.com to get started. Here's what we did. Sean Grandy, Legendary Celtics Radio Play by play Voice and I Talked for about 90 minutes about the Boston Celtics regular season, postseason, all the little topics, the Jaylen Brown stuff. We got to a ton of it. So this is a half hour podcast. I'm breaking it up into three shows. I think what I'm going to do is a Monday show, a Tuesday show and a bonus podcast. So you get it all in a couple of days. I'm not going to drag it out too much, but I'm going to give you three distinct segments of this conversation. So today the first half hour of our conversation gets into the the playoff loss to the Sixers. We get into the regular season and why this should be both celebrated while we're also still upset about how the season ended and we get into some of the Stuff like coach of the month and all of that stuff. Coach of the year stuff. It's tons to get to, so let's get right to it. Conversation here with Sean Grandy. All right, Sean Grandy, where do you want to start with this? This is a long season. You get. You're the guest, you get to pick the starting point.

[John Corrales]

Not as long as some people thought it was going to be. But I know exactly where I want to start because I specifically recruited you to have this conversation with me so we could discuss something that I thought became so poetic at the end. So as you were preparing for the season.

[Sean Grandy]

Yeah.

[John Corrales]

Ramping yourself up into optimism at the start, I was concerned. If you remember, way back in October, one of the things I was concerned about was the losing streaks, because it had been. I thought the season might go to the dogs like that. I thought that the Celtics had gone three years without a three game losing streak. They had gone five years, something like that, without a four game losing streak. And it was coming up on 11 years without a five game losing streak. And my concern among the playoff streak ending was that at some point this team could lose five in a row and that streak would be over. So I was looking at times it might happen, and one of the five I looked at was the opening five games of the season in which they had the Sixers at home, at New York, at Detroit, at New Orleans, in a home game against Cleveland. And I remember you walking through the early part of the schedule on this beloved podcast and you were talking about, well, if they beat this, you know, once they beat the Sixers on opening night, they'll do. And I said, I text you and I said, wait a minute. So you already are assuming that a team with the MK as the starting center is going to beat a Joel Embiid, That a win at the Garden against a Joel Embiid led team is some sort of. And isn't it funny how seven months later, the season ended with a game with Joel Embiid, who history will record basically, in the 11 playoff games that the Sixers played. He had three great games in him and they were just enough to eliminate.

[Sean Grandy]

Yeah, it's. It is kind of wild that the poetic nature of the beginning and the end of the season, the three in a row, the Philly connection, all of that stuff. Joel, I mean, Namish, Kayla kind of look, Nemi played fairly well in. He played. I think he played great in game

[John Corrales]

one and game seven. That was his. I thought game seven was the best game of his series.

[Sean Grandy]

Yeah, but each time like he played more in Game 7, but he still, but he still was in foul trouble and should have played even more. Like he played 30 some odd minutes. He should have played 40 minutes. Like they were running guys out there for 40 minutes. And I am catching a little bit of grief from the Namishkeda fan club that, you know, I, I am putting some of this stuff on, on him at the end of the season because he wasn't able to stay on the court. I think that's one of the things that happened. It's not the only thing that happened obviously, but you tell me if you disagree. One of the reasons why the Celtics season went so well is because they actually got really good production out of their center spot. And that is almost entirely Nami Ashketa. But you had the stretches of Luca Garza Vuch was, I can't really, you

[John Corrales]

could say wasn't work. We all wanted it to be something it turned out not to be. How much the injury played into that, we'll never really know. In fact they never got to play with with jt. The fact that there was a stretch. This is already we're completely diving off the deep end into a Vuchevic conversation. But what always struck me was even the way he was sort of being played was not if Al Horford was treated like the entire team last year in 25 was bubble wrapped, right? Porzingis was bubble wrapped all year. Al Horford was bubble wrapped. Vuchovic, 35 years old, was treated as if he was 25. Remember the five game and seven night stretch when they were out west and they played in Phoenix? He played every game and he's playing the fifth game in seven nights at Denver against Jokic. And then people get, people are getting on him for hey, what's this? Much of it isn't because people just hadn't been trained to think of him the same way you have been trained to think about Horford and players that needed to be a little more bubble wrapped and protected. Kada is the number one reason the Celtics were the single most overachieving team I have called in 28 years. Because as great as Jalen was, all the other things that went well, the biggest difference in value over replacement player, whatever advanced metric you want to use and the reason that those of us that thought the Celtics would win 40 to 42 games at the start of the year, the reason was because one year we it was Tatum, Porzingis, Horford and Cornet and the next year it was K. Garza Minot and Tillman. That's the reason that I didn't feel horribly like I was betraying anyone to suggest that this team might not be one of the elite teams in the league and that making the playoffs and keeping that streak alive would be a good year and scaring the heck out of a team that everyone thought would be better than them at the start of the year in the first round and maybe going to seven games be the kind of year I thought it was going to be. It just was this dream that ended. The clock just hit midnight in the third quarter of game five and we were awakened from this six month gap year fever dream into and the year ended with the symmetry of Philly and the three losses. It ended exactly like a lot of us thought it was going to at the beginning. It was just a 83 game fantasy in between that.

[Sean Grandy]

That's the wild part of it all that in the end like we spent so much time, so much time going man, we were really wrong about this team at the end. We're like, oh no wait, you gotta wait till the end of the movie before you are say you're wrong about how the movie was gonna end. But yeah, I, I, I do think that Kada is, is the number one reason like Tom and I had like that, that moment a couple weeks ago of like talking about the number one story lines and I was like Kada. And he laughed like I was joking. Like no, actually Nemes Kato was the number one storyline to me because, because everything that you just said and it just struck me that I was making the Gordon Hayward comparison in conjunction with Jason Tatum because he was injured and coming back. But really I think the better comparison would have been to, to Vucovic in that not that he's coming back from injury, but both guys were. The only chance the Celtics had to really make a deep playoff run was for back then Gordon Hayward to get up to speed. And that's where they pissed off Terry Rozier and they pissed off a lot of these young guys by playing Gordon Hayward when you might say he didn't deserve it. But they had no choice. He had to be some version of Gordon Hayward for the Celtics to be able to make a run. Vuch when you say, when you talk about playing those five games and seven nights, like, oh, he's the Gordon Hayward. He's the guy that they were like desperate to get up to speed because he got hurt with, you know, he broke his finger. If he'd never broke his finger, he might have been bubble Wrapped. But because he broke his finger and came back like, like he had, they had like very limited time to get him going, to get him up to speed. And the only chance they had to make a deep playoff run was. Yes, Nemi being Nemi, you just assume that certain the things, certain things were going to happen. But what happens after Neemi? What happens if he gets into foul trouble? What's your next option? Luca Garza, for all of the great things that he did, was not a great option. Going small with Tatum was something that we all talked about. But he's, you know, coming back off that Achilles, maybe that was just never really possible. Now with the knee, you're like, did you really want him planting that left leg and, and trying to go up against Embiid in any of those minutes?

[John Corrales]

It would have, it might have got him through game seven, right. Gimmicking it up with Tatum at the five might have gotten him through game seven. But we're sitting here now and you're using the term long playoff run. It was very difficult for me. I never really said it because it wasn't my place to say at the time. I never believed the Celtics were going to beat the Knicks anyway. Now it's certainly looking like the way it was. It was going to go. I know Celtic fans can ask yourself as difficult as brutal a couple of days and I'm doing this with you now. We're talking on Sunday, eight days after the playoff loss, because it was a really ugly few days. It was nasty. I'm sure it was nasty in your mentions. It was a difficult spot because nobody wanted to be cheered up. Certainly everybody just wanted to be angry and felt like they had been misled somehow. And they were misled. They were misled by a team that made you believe that they were a championship contender. Why? Because they played like a championship contender for 83 games. That wasn't an illusion. They, they did that much more.

[Sean Grandy]

When we come back, I'm going to use the word aberration a lot to discuss the playoff series with the Sixers. And we get into an interesting discussion about what would have happened if the Celtics had faced the Knicks. That's all coming up next. Today's show is brought to you by FanDuel. The NBA playoffs are here and every possession matters. If you're looking to get even closer to the action, FanDuel has a great offer to get you started right now. New customers can bet $5 and you get 150 in bonus bets if your first bet wins. That's right, you can turn 5 bucks into 150 in bonus bets just for getting started. FanDuel gets you ready for the playoffs. You can check trends, stats, matchups before you make your picks, which makes the whole experience feel a lot more informed. And whether you're looking for player props or just following your favorite stars, it all adds another level of excitement to every game. It's a very easy app to navigate. It makes playoff basketball even more engaging from start to finish. When you sign up, make sure you use the tools that are available so you can set your limit, set your budget. Make sure you're only betting what you can afford to lose so you can gamble responsibly. They will help you do that at FanDuel. Go to FanDuel.com to get started FanDuel play your game Today show is brought to you by Indeed. There's workplace chaos. There are deadlines stacking up, and you still have that job that needs to be filled. When the pressure is on and that inbox is overflowing, you need Indeed Sponsored Jobs. It's going to help you find the person who actually fits what you're looking for. Just like an NBA team when they're looking for a player, they know what they're looking for and they go for the people that have those skills and those expertise. You're going to get the same thing. And Indeed Sponsor Jobs in this minute that I'm talking to you. Companies like yours will make 27 hires on Indeed according to Indeed Data Worldwide. So if you're hiring, spend less time searching and then more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. When you use Indeed Sponsored Jobs, you get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your job the premium status it deserves@ Indeed.com podcast that's Indeed.com podcast. Go there right now. Support us by letting them know that you heard about Indeed Sponsored Jobs here on this show. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire. This is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Thanks for making Lockdown Celtics your first listen every day and being part of this show every Monday through Friday. Plus bonus podcast like one of these parts of the conversation with Sean's going to be the show is daily. It's Monday through Friday. Like I said, it's on YouTube. So subscribe wherever you get your podcasts or watch the show there. Get into the comments section. Share your thoughts with me. I'm John Corralis. I'm a beat writer. I cover the Celtics for Sports illustrated Celtics on SI. I've been doing this podcast for 20 years doing this, covering the team for 20 years, doing this podcast for 10. So thank you for being with me and being an everydayer. Let's get back to the conversation here with Sean.

[John Corrales]

I mean, this the most depressing thing I've ever heard him. I've been through a lot of depressing things. Right. That I've experienced in my life. Listening to your guys at Locked on Sixers before the series, talking about Phillies chances in the series, that was the saddest thing I ever heard. Even they knew they had no without him. And I'm like everybody else. I thought the Celtics would win the series because I thought the Sixers without Embiid are not going to be competitive and be able to score against the Celtics. And I was right. But who could have imagined that we were going to, you know, you can do this and that with Tatum was this. And Vuchevic was this. A couple of open threes and maybe they should have driven the basket. And Derrick White makes a couple more shots. All these things are true. But Joel embiid, having been 20, 23, Joel Embiid for three games, and let's say the quiet part out loud, Paul George, whatever you want to say, I'm not going to say dominating, because that's clickbait. But with Paul George clearly getting the best of Jalen Brown with none of that was on the dance card here at this. At the start of the series. Yeah.

[Sean Grandy]

Well, once again, see, this is a great place to kind of pivot to that playoff series a little bit more deeply. Because every time the Celtics have one of these disappointing kind of series, right. The Miami series a few years ago, New York last year, this series here, we'll sit here, and rightfully so, crush the Celtics for those moments of when they say, well, we mess around with the game, the other team, they, we weren't the harder playing team. All of those things, you're like, well, why weren't you. Why didn't. Why weren't you able to close this thing out when you had everything under control? Up 13, excuse me, out of halftime in the third, why weren't you able to do all that stuff? But on the other side, you had a Caleb Martin, Gabe Vincent series. You had these aberrational kind of things, things that happened, you're like, what. What is going on here? Paul George go, what? Like, when did Paul George become this good? Like, you know, I. I'm in the media room before, like, waiting for Joe, and we're all talking to you and people are saying, like, where did this come from with Paul George? You know, like, I don't know. I, I don't want to be irresponsible about what I'm saying about Paul George, but it, it kind of came out of nowhere. And do we, how much do we acknowledge that Embiid coming back and being anywhere near good? Paul George being what he was, and the Celtics being just so bad shooting wise, like some of this is just, yes, the Celtics deserve to get crushed, but also some of it's just like, man, these are two, two wildly aberrational things that happened at the same time. And here we are not Talking about Game 4 between the Celtics and the Knicks.

[John Corrales]

And for all the perspective, all the things you just listed, and there are more you could probably add to that laundry list. They lost the series in seven games in which they outscored the other team by three points a game. So it wasn't as if they just got hawks or sixered by what the Knicks just did. These were series that obviously were coin flip series. Even with all the things you mentioned going wrong, that could be wrong, I. There is this notion a lot of these series you're talking about, it was fair that it feels like there was a percentage of Celtic fans that believe they should win every series they're in, no matter what, they're always the better team. We're the Celtics because that's what it says in the uniform. And the perspective gets so lost. Were the Celtics the better team on the floor when game seven started? Who had the better team with Boland B Paul, The Sixers were the better team. And here's again, here's another potential soundbite. Jalen Brown was one of the top five players in the NBA this year. Maybe he doesn't make first team. I think that would be a mistake. If he doesn't, he earned it. He was brilliant throughout the course of the year. He was not one of the top five players in that series. So when you want to make a list of things that went wrong for the Celtics, the Sixers, arguably, you could say they have the three best players in the series, depending on how you value, you know, Paul George's seven games versus Embiid's four. Three and a half. And for all the brilliance. Oh, Nick Nurse was great and Joe Mozilla is terrible and suddenly doesn't know how to coach. Why didn't take Nick Nurse a game and a half to get Joel embiId off the three point line? Yeah, why do you give away all that? He very nearly cost them their season by waiting till the second half of game five to do that. So, yeah, you know, there's a lot of little things you could. You can nitpick. Embiid was amazing. It was. It was remarkable to see and just the worst possible time for the Celtics. I wonder now if Celtic fans would rather lose a seventh game at home to the Sixers or have gotten. I'm not saying they would have gotten throttled by the Knicks, but they might have gotten throttled by the next. Especially if you don't have Tatum the way the Knicks are playing right now. And what would have been worse because I, I said at the start I feel the Knicks were going to win that series anyway take Tatum out the first couple of games, which is probably what was going to happen at. At least we'll never know. But that was probably the case. It was. The Celtics were not going to beat the Knicks this year. It was not. That was not going to happen.

[Sean Grandy]

I think that that's fair. And the Celtics had trouble with the Knicks all year long. So it's not like.

[John Corrales]

And as Brad, as Brad unsolicited pointed out now that he was talking about the top three seeds when Brad ran out his three and 11 again without coming with the numbers before anybody even asked about it. What made the season one of the successes that it was. If you look at that next group of teams, the other playoff teams, fourth grade or the Celtics had a really good record.

[Sean Grandy]

Yeah.

[John Corrales]

Against those teams and the other people and also want to pull the card to try to discredit from the season. And I'm jumping around. Well, a lot of teams were tanking and a lot. First of all, everybody else was playing those tanking teams and the cells had the fourth best record and the fourth best body of work. And I seem to remember because I was there, the Celtics losing home games to Brooklyn, Utah. I mean there were. There were bad nights. Right. They got. One of the worst losses they took this year was a game at Milwaukee in December. So there were plenty of losses to those bad teams. You cannot. The Celtics deserve a lot of what they're getting for the last three games of the playoffs and all that's fine. But don't pretend this outrageous regular season. If you say we're Celtic fans, we don't care about the regular season. Great. Then don't. But you can't deny you it was an extraordinary body of work.

[Sean Grandy]

Listen, I, I've been saying this from the beginning here. Like they. At least after the season there's. There are two things that can be true that at the same time the Celtics had that, like you said, the body of work this regular season which deserves all of the accolades that are coming their way. Joe will probably get Coach of the Year. Jaylen's gonna make.

[John Corrales]

That'll be a fun Prescott for tone.

[Sean Grandy]

Yeah, we'll see. We'll see if what they get, they might get.

[John Corrales]

The duality of that press conference is

[Sean Grandy]

that's going to be what. What would, what would Joe's Coach of the Year think? I I'm gonna say it's going to be a 45 second zoom on peacock and that's going to be the extent of it.

[John Corrales]

Yeah, I mean when he called it, I, I think people, they jumped on it when he was trying. What he was trying to say was that it was a staff award when it first came up when he was trying to kill it award. And you can make the case that it is to me it'll never be the dumbest award in the NBA because as long as we have Coach of the month of the Year is fine. Coach of the month is my personal all time favorite because whenever anybody, Doc, Brad, Joe, any of my people that I had to spend time with on the air won that award, I knew I had a free day because the last question of that pregame conversation was hey, congratulations on winning coach of the Month. Why were you such a bad coach last month? What improvements did you make in your coaching this month? Yeah, it's just one of the dumbest. That was, that was pretty, you know. Yeah, always. That's always fun to. That press conference will be. Will be something but Joe will find a way to make it about the staff and about the team and about the players, which it should be. And by the way, you know, Brad being executive of the Year, Joe will never get to win coach of the year again. That's right. That this, this house money expectation year which I beg people begged them, you know, I spent the year begging people please don't let go of this house money. And we'll talk about the gap year thing later too because I know people have associated me with that and not quite understanding how satirical I was being and self effacing because they were making me look stupid too every night by having the success that I. That I didn't think was possible. That's what the gap year Celtics was thing that I kept, you know, kept referring to. But you. This was a once in a Tatum Brown generation year of. For the love of all things holy, let the Knicks and the Cavs and the Pistol, let them feel the pressure. Knowing that the Celtics and Pacers will be back in the mix next year and knowing that can never be an underdog again. You'll never, Joe will never win coach of the year again because the expectations are wrong. Everything's coming back in the fall depending on obviously how the offseason goes. But it's all coming back. So if you couldn't enjoy this and I hated when, well, Vegas says the Celtics are now the fa. First of all, I'm not interested in anybody who understands basketball. Pointing to the Las Vegas odds, which are not about basketball, but about where they want the money to fall. I understand why it happens and you're playing with people's emotions and things like that. But this was always going to be what it was going to be. And we all hoped it was going to be this amazing run. And the east at one point really did look wide open. I just thought for a guy who said opening night, Nixon thunder in the finals, who said at mid season Nixon thunder in the NBA finals. And it feels pretty good about saying to you right now here today, Knicks and Thunder in the finals. I just never saw a reason to change my mind. There was this. If Tatum continued to look amazing, I think it was game three when in postgame I think I remember saying to Max, this is the first time I didn't even think about the injury.

[Sean Grandy]

Yeah.

[John Corrales]

Now ironically, that was the game we played all the minutes. And maybe now we're looking at that and saying, oh, because everyone wants a reason because nobody wants to say Joel Embiid was amazing for three games and Paul George got the better of Jalen for three or four of the games in the series. Edgam hit big shots. Quentin Grimes had that big game five. That can't be there can't be basketball reasons. It has to be something the Celtics did wrong that caused this calamity to happen.

[Sean Grandy]

Well, I still think the Celtics didn't attack Joel Embiid the way they should

[John Corrales]

stop putting him in. And some of that was now there's where Nick Nurse gets credit because they were more aggressive on the ball in Game 5 to keep the Celtics from putting him in regular pick and roll actions.

[Sean Grandy]

We'll come back. We really want to emphasize that this regular season was something to celebrate. While I understand everybody is still upset, so we're going to continue that part of the conversation. Sean gets into the gap year stuff when we come back. Today's show is brought to you by Rocket Money. If you've ever opened up a bank account and thought, Where'd all my money go? You're not alone. Keeping track of subscriptions, spending and bills can get overwhelming fast. And I know, especially nowadays, that that money can really fly out. That's where Rocket Money comes in. Helps you take control of your finances all in one place. It tracks all of your subscriptions in one spot so you can cancel the ones you don't need with just a few taps. It automatically categorizes all your spending so you can actually see where your money is going. And you can set budgets, get alerts, and stay on top of upcoming bills. It makes everything feel more organized, gives you a clearer picture of your finances day to day. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps you find and cancel unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, and helps you lower your bills so you can grow your savings. Let Rocket Money help you reach your financial goals faster. Join@rocket money.com LockedDon that's rocket money.com LockedOn this is Jake from Lock Dawn. When the game's on the line, the best know when to pass because the right assist can change everything. And off the court, it's no different. That's where your State Farm agent comes in. Well, whether it's protecting your car, your home, or helping you prep for the unexpected, they'll help set you up with a game plan that works for you. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability and eligibility vary by state. Thanks for making Lockdown Celtics your first listen every day. If you never miss an episode, it's time to make it official. Join the Lockdown Every Dare Club get ad free audio access to our members only. Discord and more it's all built for you, our most loyal fan. Go to lockdown celtics supercast.com lockdown celtics.supercast.com 5 bucks a month or 50 bucks for the year to join the Lockdown Celtics every day club. Now more with Sean Grandy. Well, I still think the Celtics didn't attack Joel Embiid the way they should

[John Corrales]

stop putting him in. And some of that was now there's where Nick Nurse gets credit because they were more aggressive on the ball in Game 5 to keep the Celtics from putting him in regular pick and roll actions, but obviously that's an easy thing to look at now. Is that because they put Joel in game four? I so that was an NBC game right after we're on the bus, see a car pulled by, it's got to Rico and Reggie Miller in it and Tarico calls me from that car and he's like, what did Joel Embiid mess up the Sixers? Is what he asked me. And I said, because we weren't. I'm upstairs, and he was downstairs. So we didn't get to talk, like, before the game or during, you know, right after the game because we both were taken off right after. And I said, no, just. The Celtics put him in every freaking action. That's what they did in game four. They put him in every action. And obviously there was a reason that didn't get done over the final few games, but Celtics were never going to have anybody that one on one could stop him. And as I said, why did it take Nick Nurse that long to realize it?

[Sean Grandy]

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he definitely changed the series. Everybody acknowledges that he changed the series. I. I still think that they. This is where the, you know, the. The coming down on them. I think is. Is fine in the aftermath of this series. I just don't think they worked hard enough to get to that. Okay, so the. The Sixers made an adjustment. That's great.

[John Corrales]

It.

[Sean Grandy]

I think my biggest thing for the Celtics in the Tatum and Brown era is that whenever. Whenever the. Hey, I guess you have to ISO. Now bait is dangled in front of them. They take it. They bite on it like a bass. It doesn't matter. You can throw that bass back in the water, dangle that same bait in front of it, and it will bite every single time. And every single time. The Celtics with Tatum and Brown, when they get the. Oh, man, they took this thing away. And now there's 14 seconds on the clock and you have the ball against the matchup that you kind of like, oh, man, it would be a shame if you stalled your entire offense and tried to dribble 10 times to get past Tyrese Maxey. Like, that part has driven me nuts for a very long time. Instead of, hey, let's go back to. Let's go back the other way. Mimi, come up. V. Come up some like. Let's flip the screen. Okay, that screen didn't work. Let's do it again. Let me go the other way. Set. A little deeper. Let's just keep getting closer and closer to the rim. Let's. Let's do something to keep running the offense because one of the Celtics strengths on offense is they have no problem using 23.7 seconds of a shot clock. And that. That last. They will take it down to the very last bit to work to get a good shot when the offense is going great. But sometimes that bit right there, it drives me nuts. And I think the Celtics just fell too much into that trap. And I. I do think that's part of what Brad was talking about in his press conference, that we got. We got to get away from that. I don't know why we keep doing this, but I think that message was to Jalen, to Jason, and to Joe. In these moments in. Down the stretch, in. When we slow it down, for some reason, we have to break that habit. And I don't know if it's. Those guys are going to break that habit or. You got to find. Bring back Drew Holiday. Because when. When the Celtics won the championship in 2024, I was calling Drew Holiday, the adult in the room. He was the guy that, when that stuff was happening, Drew would be like, okay, we're gonna. I'm gonna take care of this thing. I'm gonna. I'm gonna go get this rebound that you missed, and we're gonna. I'm gonna finish this play. We're gonna come back, we're gonna settle down, and I'm gonna get everybody back on track to do what we. What we normally do. They didn't have that this year. And I just. I don't know that Jalen or J be anything but what they are in that. In that kind of moment. And it's up to Brad to get. To get the players here that will get them to those things before that bait, before that hook drops in front of their face and they bite on the ISO stuff again.

[John Corrales]

Yeah. Tatum, you know, became a higher assist player that he had been, and he has returned. Obviously, Jalen had career high assists, and, you know, the turnovers came back in the playoffs. The Sixers were a team that forced turnovers all year, and so they were going to always force turnovers in those situations. When you went ISO the difference to me, and not that I disagree with Brad, other than I would add, I don't think it was a great shot quality year for the Celtics, period. I don't think they had the personnel to create great shots. What they did all year was create offensive possessions that were efficient because they got so many offensive rebounds. And when the Sixers started choking that out, when the Celtics weren't getting second chances off their not great first looks, that's when the series, obviously, embiid will always be number one, but that's where the series started to turn, is when the Celtics stopped getting offensive rebounds, which they were doing all year. And again, going back to the regular season and the whole gap year thing, Remember, nobody remembers in the first 10, 15 games of the year when the Celtics weren't medium rebounding team. They were a horrific rebounding team that first week. You were like, they are going to win 20 games this year because they can't get a rebound. If you had said then that they were going to end up as the third best rebounding team in the league in another great princess bride, inconceivable that that was happening. Wait till I get going. That it was not possible that that could happen. And yet it was one of the many things that happened. But that offensive rebounding, by the way, the knicks in Game 4 against the Sixers, that was what the Celtics were all year. It would either make threes and if they missed them, they were getting offensive rebounds, Kicking out, boom, open three. Because there were so many of those threes were created. It was not a great three point shooting year for the Celtics, but they created so many good looks when you do off offensive rebounds because the defense is all running around and you know, shot quality. There's the historic way. They lost the first two, the Knicks series last year, which is losing in the first two games with just a myriad of open threes. That's why the Celtics were a casino for a couple of years. At 24, 25 teams were casino. 82 games. You can't beat them in 82 games. They're going to win 60 because the numbers will go in your favor. You get two games like they had in a best of seven series. They become vulnerable because sometimes the house doesn't win when they. When it's one hand of blackjack or two hands of blackjack as it was in game one and game two of that first round last year. And suddenly the shots just didn't fall this year. And I was very much honest with Joe throughout the course of the year for people who listened to us before the game, because I was really curious about how the shot quality thing works. First of all, ironically, on opening night of all times, I asked about Edcom. How do you scout Edgam and come up with that number of expected offense with a player who had never played in an NBA game? And Edgam went crazy that night and obviously was very significant in the playoff series. But we had a living, breathing experiment of what I always asked him for years, which is if you have a.300 hitter and you get to the all star break and that lifetime career.300 hitter is hitting.250, what are you expecting in the second half? You expect him to hit.250 again like he did in the first half? Are you expecting him to hit.300 like he's always done, or are you expecting him to hit.350 because he's always hit.300 and the season always ends up with him hitting at.300. And we had a living, breathing example of that, which with Derrick White all year, where you kept waiting and waiting for Derrick White, who, by the way, for people who want to dog the year he had. He has been, for his Celtic career, a Gold Glove defensive shortstop that always hit.290, but this year he hit.245. He was still a Gold Glove shortstop and still saved a lot of defensive runs, but obviously wasn't as productive as a shooter in that one particular area. But going back to the numbers, the Derrick White thing was a great example because you keep expecting, you run your offense a certain way that Derrick White is going to be worth this much on open shots, and he wasn't this year. So how do you, when do you make that, when do you make that adjustment and when is it. It's one thing that people give him grief. Who said Zach Low, My guy. Celtics raised the flag. You know, raise the banner every year for shot quality. But at some point, when does that, you know, that's what Brav is talking about. That's the frustration. This is the only thing I'll say about the threes because I, I, I baited some people on social media today just for the fun of it in the first half when I said just, you know, scrolling Twitter seeing if anybody's complaining about the Knicks shooting too many threes. Yeah, yeah, so, and that's the, the sound bite I've been using, doing all these interviews. And you know, my new friends over at Nessen, this year is 23 months ago. I was on a duck boat for an hour and there were 1.4 million people to the left and right of me on that duck boat ride. And you know what? None of them said the Celtics shoot too many threes. People only complain when they don't go in. They only complain about Joe in the 20 of games that he loses, not the 80% of games he wins.

[Sean Grandy]

So like I said, we Talked for like 90 minutes. It was a long conversation, breaking it up into about 30 minute segments or so. So part two tomorrow. A lot to get into there, including Sean putting everything just perfectly, the one perfect sentence that encapsulates what the season was, the ups and downs and all of that stuff. So it was a great conversation. I hope you come back for part two tomorrow and then part three also. I think tomorrow in a bonus podcast. Kind of depends on how everything else is shaking out. But you you're going to get three versions, three parts of this show, so make sure you're subscribed so you can get everything. When they drop and share the podcast, tell everybody they should be listening to and watching the Lockdown Celtics podcast. Here in the Lockdown Podcast Network is your team. Every day.

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[John Corrales]

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[Sean Grandy]

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