National Basketball Association

2016-17 NBA Preview: Boston Celtics

Published Jun. 30, 2017 6:28 p.m. ET

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The Nylon Calculus season previews are back, and they’re starting with one of their beloved teams, the Boston Celtics. From here, they’ll be making their way west until opening night. The NBA media culture is vast online now, but the Nylon Calculus win predictions have been as accurate as any site, including giants like ESPN and FiveThirtyEight. By understanding the best public projections out there, you can better understand the entire league.

2015-16 in review:

Skepticism was the mark of the 2016 season for the Celtics. A couple years ago, Brad Stevens led a few stray pieces and unheralded young players to a playoff berth to 40 wins. So naturally, a year of growth for the young team, and a full year without Rajon Rondo, prompted some optimistic projections from sites such this one. The mainstream consensus was that without a visible star, they wouldn’t be able to approach 50 wins.

While they “only” managed to win 48 games, the NylonCalculus average was 48.15 — this was an expected season. Of course, Basketball-Reference’s expected wins, based on their point differential, was 50. The team lacked size but they were disciplined and created a load of turnovers while minimizing their own. Jae Crowder was quietly one of the best wing players last season as he found his outside shot, while Thomas buoyed an offense without elite shot-creators. Unfortunately, they lost to their brothers-in-arms the Hawks in the playoffs, but the cast of doubt has been broken.

Rotation players in: Al Horford, Jaylen Brown, Gerald Green.

Rotation players out: Evan Turner, Jared Sullinger.

Boston’s free agent history is surprisingly meager, partly because free agency hasn’t been around for their entire history, but, as many have said before, Al Horford is their greatest prize. He replaces Jared Sullinger, another big man without impressive height. The Celtics also lost Evan Turner — they’ll miss his ballhandling at times, but through some voodoo of Brad Stevens he regained some value he lost after an awkward stint with the Pacers.

While Boston is a darling of the advanced stats community, they made an intriguing decision in drafting Jaylen Brown, who was poorly rated by translated college stats. Finally, Gerald Green returns to the Celtics nearly a decade after being a mere commodity in the famed Kevin Garnett trade. He’s lost some stock because of a declining three point percentage, but based on his history he should regain some of his outside shooting prowess, which the Celtics need.

2016-17 Projected

Boston, after a successful 2016 campaign and the acquisition of Al Horford, has been legitimized, and now the question is just how high they can ascend in the Eastern Conference standings. Given the natural progression they’ve had the last few years and the addition of Al in the middle, I can assume people think they will rise in the east — and they probably will, but not exactly for reasons everyone assumes.

Case in point: Al Horford, heralded multiple-time All-Star, is curiously at once a representation of both how the media overrates players for superficial reasons (i.e. the all-star label) and a flag-bearer for a superstarless, well-rounded team, one perpetually underrated. He’s made four All-Star teams, but that’s not an accurate gauge of his value. The Eastern Conference has been weak for a while, the center position is usually weak in terms of star power, and people draft All-Star rosters with a representation in mind. The Hawks were pretty good for a while. Thus, he’s a perennial candidate, when healthy.

Al Horford is the type of player without one striking attribute, with the exception of his excellent midrange game. He’s a jack-of-all-trades, a well-rounded big man. He’s far from being an MVP-level player, the type of guy who can completely transform a roster, but that’s okay — his diversity by itself is quite valuable. He can play both pivot positions, pick-and-pop from outside the arc, defend the rim, play post defense, pass well, hit his free throws, and can competently keep up with small ball teams on both ends of the court. His biggest weakness, for his position at least, is his rebounding, which is a bit of a concern for a team already below average there. All told, Horford is definitely an upgrade, and his consistent play will be integral to a rotation that had a few hiccups at center last season.

Optimistically, Al’s wondrous fit with the Celtics and a lucky dose of good health could lead to a legitimately tough team. Horford and Amir Johnson form a fantastic duo on defense, and both guys have range on their jump shots too. Kelly Olynyk is a nice bench weapon — Boston played at its best with him on the court, due to his guard-like skills. With a decent backup center in Tyler Zeller, Jonas Jerebko, and Jae Crowder’s ability to play power forward, the frontcourt is one of the best this side of the Warriors.

The team is talented at the other positions too, of course — my composite projection, which uses several metrics, sees Jae Crowder as the best player on the team by a decent margin. But the team’s identity still lies with its trio of guards, who each offer something different. Avery Bradley recently stated he should always be in contention for Defensive Player of the Year due to his on-ball pressure defense, but Marcus Smart usually looks better through the stats because of his ability to force a bucket-load of turnovers. Isaiah Thomas, of course, is a remarkable scorer. People may feel he’s a regression candidate but look at his past history: his “breakout” season was par for the course. His stats, like his efficiency, points per possession, assist rate, and others, were all in line with his career averages, and he’s not too old yet.

Pessimistically, Crowder’s three-point shot could abandon him, as he wasn’t a good shooter before last year, and along with Smart’s historic inaccuracy, the Celtics could see a creaky offense. Without a lot of ball-handlers to depend on, they could effectively lose their coveted depth and balance. Their defense has a ceiling with their defensive rebounding issues. Every prediction should consider negative scenarios, but because of their age and the upgrade inside the sanest projection sees an improvement.

Quick statistic

Marcus Smart is a tenacious defender, and he stands out particularly for one stat: drawing an offensive foul. Over the past two seasons, only Ersan “Super-James Franco” Ilyasova has drawn more. Unlike, say, Damian Lillard, Smart doesn’t use the charge as a crutch because he can’t keep up with defenders; it’s another weapon at his disposal. Metrics like Dredge and PT-PM found that charges were actually more valuable than steals — i.e. drawing a charge was more strongly associated with great defenders, all other things being equal.

Summary

I’ve already argued vociferously on why Boston can be so good despite flashy names , and I think the same applies this year despite the greater wealth of All-Star selections in the rotation. Al Horford is new, but it’s more of the same — they’re even more balanced and egalitarian than they were before, and he’s another big man shooter. It’s a young team with a clear improvement somewhere — of course they could be better. But with a run of good health and some key development for a young player, they could push the Cavaliers for the best record in the east.

Win predictions:

Mine: 53.1. A blend of several metrics, including Dredge, with a few other factors considered, like coaching.

Andrew Johnson’s: 51. A combination of PT-PM (a SportVU player tracking metric) blended with RAPM. Two-time reigning champion of the APBRmetrics board predictions contest.

Nick Restifo’s: 48 A simulation using BPM and RPM for player value, which includes game effects like altitude and rest.

Kevin Ferrigan’s: 51. A player projection system with inputs from RAPM, BPM, height, and age.