Today’s lecture is on team chemistry … its myths, its importance, examples of, ad nauseum.
At the outset, let’s understand that the concept of team chemistry isn’t universal — at least as it applies to a winning environment.
Earl Weaver managed the Baltimore Orioles to four American League pennants and a World Series title in 1970. So he knew a thing or two about winning.
His view of team chemistry was pretty simple. He said team chemistry came down to pitching and three-run homers. He’s not wrong. It takes talent to win. And in baseball, talent means the ability to get people out, and the ability to knock the ball out of the park every now and then, as opposed to the arduous process of stringing together hits every time you have to score.
And, of course, Weaver had one of the great pitching staffs in the modern MLB era, and he had Frank Robinson and Boog Powell swinging the bats in the middle of the order, so it was easy for him to take that approach.
So Weaver basically let the game unfold. He hated bunting, because it meant giving up outs. He hated team meetings, too.
“What if you have one, and then you go out and lose?” he asked famously.
He wasn’t afraid to tailor his lineup to fit matchups. He kept a book on players, and how they hit certain pitchers. But that was as far as it went.
It’s easy to see where baseball’s just a little different than other sports. You don’t have to rely on your offensive tackle to protect your blindside. You don’t have to worry about who’s not going to pass the ball to you, or who’s not going to pass it back to someone else once he gets it. And you don’t have to worry about whether your left winger is going to fight for the puck in the corner so he can pass it out to you for a scoring opportunity.
In those instances, a little team chemistry couldn’t hurt. Professionalism aside, I’ve always maintained that you have to have some chemistry with the person you’re being asked to protect, or feed for baskets and/or goals. There has to be some feeling of camaraderie in the locker room before you can ever expect your teammates to make some of these sacrifices.
This is a very long, involved introduction to talking about the Boston Celtics.
Now, there have been dysfunctional Boston Celtics teams in the past … but not many. At least certainly not like the Kyrie Irving Celtics.
If Red Auerbach had managed to stay alive into this season — which would have made him 101 years old, by the way — watching these guys would have endured that he wouldn’t see 102.
Auerbach, like Vince Lombardi in football, understood group dynamics better than just about any other U.S. CEO. It’s no mystery why these guys were sought out to speak at corporate team-building exercises. They got the drill.
It’s no secret why these men always coached winning teams. They knew that for men to sacrifice for one another, there had to be a team ethic that bound them all together. That’s why Bill Belichick insists on spelling T-E-A-M every time he mentions the word.
The Celtics lost that ethic this year, and it seems a little too easy just to say “goodbye and good riddance” to Irving and think that problem has been solved.
Yes, Irving was a part of it. Just from the outside, he seems to be a difficult guy to be around. He appears to have a prickly personality and can easily rub people the wrong way.
And once that happens, and that resentment takes hold, you’re through if you’re counting on team harmony to get you through the rough spots.
But you know, sometimes you allow yourself to be rubbed the wrong way too. The Celtics have two players — Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown — who seem to be guilty of that. And from all appearances, that merely exacerbated the problem until it got out of control. Add to the mix Al Horford, who is a genuine mensch, but also wasn’t about to rock the boat and confront Irving and the kids. So what you ended up with were players who weren’t as eager to make the tough defensive stops, or who weren’t as eager to rotate the ball, as they might have been a year earlier. And in Tatum’s case, he really took about 10 steps back.
Irving’s gone, and if it’s not exactly a case of “good riddance,” it is the perfect way, both symbolically and realistically, to reset the clock to zero and start over. Kemba Walker is a proven player who doesn’t carry the “prima donna” rap that Irving had.
This team, as it stands now, is incomplete. The Celtics are in the unfortunate position of being a championship-driven team building on the fly. I’m not sure how often that works, if it ever does.
This would be the year, above all others, where the Celtics need a leader forceful enough, and sure enough of his own standing, to herd these (apparently) easily-distracted players back to the team fold. Right now, the job seems to be Marcus Smart’s, but he’ll have to curb his own tendencies to fly off the handle if he’s ever to succeed.
If it’s not Smart’s, it’ll have to go to someone else. But not having a peer leader in this environment could be lethal.