Al Horford Needs a Day Off
Everyone loves Al Horford. His five years in a Boston Celtics uniform have been filled with winning. He's played in 84 playoff games in those five years, after only playing in 74 in nine seasons with the Atlanta Hawks. In those first four years, he was dynamite in the playoffs, and earned the nickname, "Playoff Al." This season though, he has been anything but. The reason is clear – Al Horford needs a day off.
There are a lot of statistics I want to point you to to justify this seemingly absurd stance, but first I want you to look at these two pictures from the last possession in Game 2 where the Celtics had the lead:
The Heat had tried to keep Jayson Tatum from the ball, but it swung back to him here with nine seconds left on the shot clock. Caleb Martin is guarding Tatum, and Gabe Vincent and Jimmy Butler stand ready and willing to defend. On the far side, you have Max Strus on Jaylen Brown, and on the near side, you have Al Horford standing all by his lonesome, as Bam Adebayo leaves him alone to monitor the paint. Now let's fast forward two seconds:
You can see that Tatum has now drawn all three defenders, and that Adebayo has taken a step into the paint to cover Grant Williams, who is trying to give Tatum some space. Brown hasn't moved much, and Horford hasn't moved at all.
Now, I want you to look at this picture, and think about your memories of recent Celtics history. Typically, this pass would go into the corner, Horford would quickly release a three pointer, it would swish through, and the Celtics would have a five-point lead. Tatum drawing extra defenders and kicking to Horford for an open three is as common a sight as you can expect from the C's. But it's not what happened here. The reason? Al Horford is ice cold. Instead, Tatum passed to Williams, and with the shot clock running down, Grant more or less had to force a shot up against Adebayo, who did a great job of defending without fouling. Ten seconds later, the game was tied. Twenty-seven seconds after that the Heat took the lead, and didn't give it back.
In Game 2, Horford shot 1-for-5, and 0-for-3 from three. And he was a complete waste of space in the fourth quarter. When he re-entered the game for Robert Williams III with 7:41 remaining, the C's had a 93-87 lead. Stan Van Gundy had spent the last half hour raving about the Tatum and Rob pick and roll that had been dominating the Heat. Horford played the next seven minutes and 20 seconds, and all he did during that time was commit two fouls. No shots, no points, no rebounds, no assists. He couldn't stay in front of Adebayo, and on a couple of possessions, Horford was late getting back on defense and never made it into the paint to defend at all.
The lack of offensive production is not new. It was acceptable in the last series because he was busy putting a lid on regular-season MVP Joel Embiid. And he was able to get to double digits in rebounds in Games 6 and 7 of that series. But he hasn't reached double figures in points in any of his past five games, and he hasn't shot better than .500 from the field in the last six. In those six games, he's shot 10-for-40 from the field, and 5-for-29 from three-point land. 17.2%. From three. From a guy who shot .446 from 3 in the regular season. If you're looking for a reason the Celtics are suddenly down 0-2 in this series, let's start there. That ineffectiveness is why the Heat can send three players at Tatum, and leave Horford completely uncovered.
On 18 occasions in the regular season and six occasions in the playoffs, Horford has played three games in five days, for 24 times total this season. The sixth time in the regular season was Christmas Day. The span for those games was 49 days, and he had missed five consecutive days during that span. His next span of such games took only 16 days, with the 12th game coming on January 11th. As you might suspect, Horford was terrible during this stretch – he averaged 6.9 points and 6.1 points in the eight games in this span, shooting .412 from the field with a respectable-but-below-his-standards .375 from three. His next span of six games would take 57 days, as the team got him a lot of rest in the days leading up to the All-Star break, and then he also got the All-Star break to rest.
Now that the playoffs have started, he's now had another span of playing a third game in five days six times in just 17 days. It was from April 25 to May 11. And Horford's shooting was even worse this time – 7.3 points and 7.6 rebounds on .367 shooting from the field, and .273 from three. That stretch does not include the last three games, but he's been even worse in them. He hits another "three games in five days" span tomorrow. The Celtics should rest him.
The Celtics were at their best in Game 2 when Rob Williams was on the court. The starting five for Game 3 should be Tatum-Brown-Rob-Marcus Smart-Derrick White. Grant Williams should be the first player off the bench, and it's time to dust off Sam Hauser as well.
Al Horford is an important player for the Celtics, and they will not win an NBA title without him this season. But he's beat. You can see it with your eyes, and you can see it with statistics (I could cite even more of them, but it feels like that'd just be like beating a tired horse). This is exacerbated by the fact that Miami is not a great matchup for him. They have a lot of fast, strong players who are able to move him around and exploit his biggest weakness – defending in space. It's time to sit Horford for a game, and allow him to get his wind back. At the very least, his starting role needs to go to White. Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla showed a willingness to be flexible against Philly, and he's running out of time to adjust in this series a lot faster. The time is now.