All Green eyes on Freak Show
In one sense Giannis Antetokounmpo should be happy about opening the playoffs against the Celtics tomorrow.
He averaged 33.5 points in four games against the Celtics this season — more than any other opponent — including a 40-point performance on Dec. 4 during a Celtics win at the Garden. Little wonder Brad Stevens, who tends to handle all opposing stars this way, will throw a Broadway cast at the Bucks forward.
“We’ll have to guard him with everybody on our team,” the coach said.
Antetokounmpo’s numbers against the Celtics aside, the C’s do have a player uniquely suited to guarding the “Greek Freak,” even if Stevens was careful not to put this burden squarely on Al Horford.
“I trust Al to guard any position because he can really move his feet and he’s got great size and length,” Stevens said. “His attention to detail is excellent. That said, it’s not only one person to guard Giannis. It’s not going to be one person to match up the entire night. We have to throw a lot of different bodies at him.
“Just in general, Al’s very important. He’s important to the whole growth of our organization and to our every day and to what we try to accomplish in practice and things. I don’t think he’s any more or less important. He’s just always been really important. Yeah, he’s good.”
Horford followed a similar track when asked about guarding the Bucks star.
“The way I look at it, we’re not going up against him — we’re going up against the Bucks,” he said. “A guy like him, we have to be able to contain him as a unit, and that’s our mindset.
“It’s his ability to finish. He’s a very athletic player who can finish extremely well around the rim,” Horford added. “It’s also his ability to get on the break and create chaos that way. It’s important for us to make sure we’re between him and the basket as much as we can. Just make sure he doesn’t get anything easy. Easier said than done. He’s had some big games against us this year, but that’s the point of emphasis we have in this series.”
Let’s be serious
Bhuvan Bam is an Indian comedian with a YouTube channel (BB Ki Vines) that has over 7 million followers. The NBA, forever looking for ways to expand its global footprint, has also brought the young entertainer into the fold as part of its attempt to promote the game in India.
Though Bam admits his chief sports are cricket and soccer, and that the NBA (Michael Jordan and LeBron James in particular) was something he only heard about in school, he’s learning fast.
He flew into Boston with a camera crew last week to attend his first NBA game, the Celtics’ win over Brooklyn in the regularseason finale.
“I’ll watch a match here in Boston, and then talk about it back in India,” he said while standing courtside. “It’s a wonderful opportunity. I went to the academy in India, I tried learning basketball.”
The Garden wasn’t a bad place to start. He looked up, past all of those championship banners, toward the building’s distant ceiling, and admitted that everything about this league is a little different for a young guy from Delhi.
“It’s big, huge, something new for me,” he said. “Been to the U.S. three times, and every time I’m here people are watching basketball. Then the league called me and said you have to come here and see a game. Now I can go back and talk about it in India.”
The Chicago Bulls are Bam’s favorite team, though not necessarily because Jordan was the first player he heard of.
“I love their logo,” he said. “Chicago Bulls is the team I used to choose every time I played those cassette games back in India.”
Deep threats
The Bucks have a number of other threats, including Malcolm Brogdon, last season’s Rookie of the Year who returned Monday after missing 30 games with a partially torn quad.
“Giannis, Jabari (Parker), (Khris) Middleton, they’ve got a number of very good players,” said Stevens. “Obviously, that’s how we’ve tried to guard all year, is playing together, playing on a string. We’ve had our moments where we’ve been really good, so obviously we’re going to have to be very locked in to make it as difficult as possible.”