BOSTON – See, it’s not just some fans and the media who don’t have an overly optimistic outlook for the Boston Celtics this season.
The NBA’s annual GM survey is out and as expected, the Boston Celtics don’t figure prominently in most categories.
Isaiah Thomas, the team’s leading scorer from a year ago, has a couple of areas in which he ranked pretty high.
GMs voted Thomas second with 17.2 percent of the votes, when asked which bench player made the biggest impact when he entered the game. Thomas got some honorable mention love aka “also receiving votes” for being the fastest player with the ball in his hand and being the best role player.
Celtics head coach Brad Stevens didn’t finish in the top four or five of any category, but he definitely was on the minds of GMs when it came to voting for the top coaches.
Stevens was part of the “also receiving votes” crowd in a number of categories such as which coach was best at making in-game adjustments, which coach runs the best offense and which coach has the best defensive schemes.
And while the Celtics didn’t have the kind of offseason fireworks they were hoping for on the free agent front, the team’s offseason moves were praised by fellow GMs.
Amir Johnson and David Lee were part of a three-way tie (Milwaukee’s Greg Monroe was the other) for fourth in ranking the most under-rated offseason acquisition with each receiving 6.9 percent of the votes.
The only other player to receive votes was Marcus Smart who was “also receiving votes” for being the most likely to have a breakout season.
And as a team, the Celtics were among those “also receiving votes” for the league’s most improved team for this upcoming season.