Analysing Offense

As I get more chance to watch Celtics playing, I understand their offense game a bit better.

Celtics' offence is essentially driven by ball movement to get good looking shot. They keep thing simple and not trying to be fancy. Their playbook is pretty much based on this mind set.

When Rajon Rondo is on-court, he frequently pushes the ball up challenging the other team's defence still being setup. He uses his speed trying to beat his counterpart, and if he sees opportunity, slashing to the basket or drawing quick foul. If this first option does not arises, and if time allows, they will move the ball, or else they will setup their play.

Other than the familiar plays of Give-n-Go and Screen-n-Roll (classis motion offense), one of the variation they occassionally run is known as the Dribble-drive Pentration. For the setup, firstly, there is no screens in order to create spacing for drives, and secondly, the post man ran to the weak side of the lane (instead of the ball side), leaving the ball handler an open driving path to the basket.

According to SI's article, Dribble-drive is tailor-made for today's high school and college teams, which favor speed in the absence of classic back-to-the-basket big men, but it isn't for everyone. It requires quick, smart and talented guards who have a feel for the game (like Rondo). It requires agile big men who can shoot from the perimeter and race downcourt (like Garnett). It requires deep benches and three-point shooters who can punish sagging man-to-man defenses and the inevitable zones.

There are some other NBA team, such as the Nuggets, that runs similiar play.

Rondo is stepping up

There is no coincident for Rajon Rondo's excelled performance (on both ends of the floor), in the absence of Garnett and Ray Allen.

In the Orlando's game, he scores 15, added 5 assists, 6 steals and 5 rebounds (but 3 turnovers). Two nights later against the Miami Heat, he scores 23, added 3 assists, 1 steal and 6 rebounds (only 1 turnover).

While these opposing team point-guards are not the top-tier of the league, the key is that they find it difficult to match Rondo's speed and pace of the game.

With two (Garnett and Allen) of the three options for offence no longer available, Rondo is stepping up his game. He is now running the offence, instead of shepherding, using his quickness dribbling and maneuvering in the lane, and making passes to get his teammates open look. Take a look at the last game stats, three other teammates have scored 20 or above and none of them is Pierce.

Rondo is also driving more to the basket, getting contacts and foul-calls, which means more FT attempts (12 in last two games). His FT accuracy has also improved to over 80% in those games.

(AP Photo/Luis M. Alvarez)

Steve Weinman from CelticsBlog sums up, "He has always had the physical ability to wreak havoc in the paint and thread nice passes. Now, he finally has gained the efficacy in his game around the rim and the confidence in his offensive skills to be that player once and for all."

"This isn't to say that Rondo is now The Man or that a few good weeks validate him as a star of any sort. He still has plenty of a ways to go. But he has grown as a player throughout the season, and in the absence of some of the big names on this team of late, he has shown that he is most certainly a very legitimate point guard in this league, and he has demonstrated that there is reason to believe that he can be far more than that in the long term. It is time to free Rajon Rondo, to let his penetration abilities drive the offense, to run screen-and-rolls that force teams to make quick decisions regarding how to cover him around the screens, which will undoubtedly lead to quite a share of open Rondo drives or easy passes for lay-ups."