Whom do we blame?
Gary Washburn of The Globe wrote on Monday that the team “appears to be disconnecting from the coach”.
This is great code, right here. This is usually what is written before a coach is fired.
“I don’t think it has anything to do with training,” said Ainge on Monday.
How about you, Danny? Is it time to start tearing up the president of basketball operations?
“Right!” he said. “We are not playing with the passion we need. I think it depends on the players. And the team players are on my own.
“There are things I could have done better, but I’m not going to name any names. I will take that responsibility. This is a team that was assembled by me, and we are not playing with enough consistency and urgency, and it is my job to see what we can do to improve the team, but this is always much more difficult than improving on the inside. “
Are the changes happening?
“Just changing faces doesn’t always change things,” said Ainge, “but it may have to come to that.”
Oooh. There’s something. The NBA’s trading deadline is March 25. Is it possible that the ever patient Ainge gets fed up and does something big? He has until the next off-season to take advantage of the $ 28 million exception they acquired in Gordon Hayward’s signature and exchange.
“This is definitely not the time to panic,” warned Ainge. “But it is always time to reflect. My job is to reflect after each game on where we are and where our team is and how they can improve. I know that our team is better than the way they are playing and I am confident that they will play better.
“I am not judging all my players, but I see that there is a lack of consistent urgency, and part of that is our success. We started 8-3, and we have a lot of young people and a lot of guys who were in the final of the conference three times. I think sometimes you don’t realize how hard it is to win every night. “
This is an abbreviated form of “some of these guys are overrated when they look in the mirror”.
After Sunday’s embarrassing explosion against Washington, the worst team in the Eastern Conference, Brown said: “If you let it be a ‘rock bottom’ mentality, then this is what it will be.”
“I don’t think it’s rock bottom, because we’re not healthy, we’re not playing well and we’re young,” said Ainge, a former NBA coach. “Rock bottom would be if we expected to win a series of playoffs and lose to a team that we were supposed to win. That would be rock bottom.
“I’ve seen a lot of bad stretches of basketball in the regular season to consider that rock bottom. But having said that, we have been playing very, very badly and inconsistently and without enough urgency in recent weeks.
” I know these players very well. I’ve seen them play since they were young. We are not playing well now and, unfortunately, each individual player is imperfect, and I don’t think that has anything to do with training.
“When teams are not playing well, each player has his own individual idea of what the others should be doing better. It is very refreshing to hear some of the players – not all players – say: ‘I need to improve. I need to play harder. I need to be more prepared. ‘”
Brown and Kemba Walker said these things after Sunday’s disaster.
Ainge understands the concern of Green Team Nation.
“I like the fact that the fans are not patient,” he said. “We need to be more urgent. I like it when players realize that our fans hold our players and all of us accountable.
“To wear this uniform, there is a lot to do. People are looking for you because of the success you have had, and part of that is that you have to go out and act and live up to expectations.
“Some of these things seem rude, but they are not; it’s reality.
“I need to be patient to see the big picture of the next five games. It is not easy to really get recognition. The most important thing is to have an overview. The most important thing for players is that they win the next game.
“I’m not very focused on results in the regular season. I’m more about the process that we’re becoming. You can go through bad periods of the regular season because of the schedule and because of injuries and many excuses that you can make up, but now we have a pattern of not competing with the urgency we need. It’s that simple.”
Dan Shaughnessy is a columnist for the Globe. He can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @dan_shaughnessy.