By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

Should this indeed be the end of an era, the truth, as always, will rest somewhere in the middle. The Celtics will be able to point to themselves as surely as they can LeBron James or those dastardly men in stripes. Certainly, they will point to Father Time.

In the interest of fairness, then, let us all agree on something: if the Celtics play as they did on Wednesday in an epic 115-111 overtime loss, there will be no shame in that. The Celtics can cut ties with Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett can retire - if that is what each chooses - and no one can say that the Celtics failed to meet expectations, that they cowered, that they quit.

As Globe columnist Bob Ryan so aptly put it weeks ago, the Celtics are, after all, in the fifth year of a three-year plan.

What happens from here is anybody's guess, the Celtics now facing the indisputable reality of needing to win the next two games against these Miami Heat, on Friday night and on Sunday at the TD Garden. Anything less would almost certainly spell their demise. What the Celtics now face is a list of challenges that seem insurmountable, presented here in no particular order of importance:

1. The officials. Everyone from Danny Ainge (following Game 2) to the most rabid Celtics fans are ranting about the latest NBA conspiracy, and no one can dispute that the league has (and always will have) a credibility problem with regard to the officiating. In basketball, complaints about the officiating go all the way back to the peach basket, though the Celtics in this series have their share of legitimate complaints.

Fact: the refs blew the call on Rajon Rondo's overtime drive. The rash of technical fouls with which the Celtics were hit in Game 1 was an embarrassment. At home this postseason, Miami has attempted an average of 32.4 free throws per game, a number that leads all teams in the NBA. And since the start of the 2001 playoffs, only three NBA players have attempted as many as 24 free throws in a game, two of them (LeBron James and Dwyane Wade) currently playing for the Heat. (The other is Dirk Nowitzki.)

Following Game 2, even Celtics coach Doc Rivers noted that Miami shot 47 free throws to the Celtics' 28. Of course, no one in Boston complained four years ago when the Celtics shot 38 free throws to the Los Angeles' Lakers' 10 in Game 2 of the NBA Finals, choosing instead to mock Lakers coach Phil Jackson, who whined about the fact that Leon Powe (Jackson called him Pow) had more free throw attempts (13) than the entire Lakers squad.

If you think the officiating is going to flip in Game 3, don't be so sure. In the NBA, star players get the star treatment at home and on the road. This postseason, among the 16 NBA playoffs teams, the Celtics rank 13th in average free throw attempts at home (20.7). On the road, the Heat rank fifth (24.6). That means Miami still could end up with more free throws.

2. Age and inconsistency. These go hand in hand for obvious reasons. The older you are, the harder is to fire up those engines on a regular basis. If you really want to examine it, the Celtics have not played two consecutive strong games this postseason. They have not won two consecutive games since Game 6 against Atlanta and Game 1 against Philadelphia. On Wednesday night, Kevin Garnett played 45 minutes, the most he has ever played in a Celtics uniform.

Ray Allen played rather well on Wednesday night, but can he put together two good games at this stage? And can Paul Pierce, who has fouled out in two of the last three games, come even remotely close to keeping up with younger, more athletic players like Andre Iguodala (of Philadelphia) and, of course, James?

As for Rajon Rondo, whose 53-minute, 44-point, 10-assist, eight-rebound performance in Game 2 will go down in history, there are questions there, too. Rondo certainly opened eyes on Wednesday, shooting from the outside with such deadly accuracy that ESPN Chris Broussard rightfully categorized his Game 2 performance as the NBA's "worst nightmare." If Rondo can start making jump shots (or even scoring) with any regularity in this series, the balance could shift considerably. But as we all know, Rondo's resume is littered with examples of erratic behavior, on the court and off.

The bottom line: the Celtics seemed to hit Miami with their best shot in Game 2. And lost.

3. Miami is the better team. Rondo was the best player on the floor in Game 2, but James and Dwyane Wade remain the two best players in the series. That was true last year, when Miami won in five games, and it is true now. Add in the play of Miami's role players and the Celtics' injuries - most notably to Avery Bradley - and the Celtics don't seem to have the front-end talent or the depth to beat the Heat.

Short of getting significant contributions from their bench players - particularly Mickael Pietrus - the Celtics cannot play much better (if at all) in Game 3. Their best chance may be for Miami to play worse. But since Miami fell behind the Indiana Pacers 2-1 in their second round series, James and Wade have played as if on a mission, ripping their way through the Celtics defense at critical parts of games and attacking Boston on the interior.

With regard to James in particular, the Celtics basically did everything right against him in Game 2. They held him to 7 of 20 shooting from the field and essentially forced him to beat them from the free throw line. (He missed four free throws in the final 15 minutes.) They kept the game tight and put pressure on him at the end, James missing a pair of potential game-winning shots as time expired.

Again, despite that, the Celtics lost.

All of which cannot help but make one wonder if time is now running out on them.

The matchup between LeBron James and Paul Pierce is pivotal to the Eastern Conference finals. (Jim Davis / Globe Staff)

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

In the absence of Avery Bradley entering Game 1 of this series between the Celtics and Miami Heat, we worried mostly about the wounded Ray Allen, about his inability to match up with Miami Heat guard Dwyane Wade. Maybe it's time to move Paul Pierce to the top of the list.

Quite simply, he doesn't look like he can even come close to handling LeBron James anymore on either end of the court.

Even if you conceded the Pierce-James matchup entering the NBA Eastern Conference finals - and you should have - what happened at American Airlines Arena on Monday night should have you reevaluating exactly where the Celtics are positioned in what could be this era's equivalent to Custer's Last Stand. James outscored Pierce (32-12) and outrebounded him (13-2), all while making nine trips to the free throw line.

Pierce, on the other hand, did not attempt a single free throw for just the fifth time in 124 career playoff games. And the bottom line continued to tell an ugly story that suggests the James-Pierce duel is the biggest mismatch of the series:

James: +17.
Pierce: -16.

In James' case, that figure was best in the game. In Pierce's case, that number was the worst.

“You’re not going to take everything away from them,’’ Celtics coach Doc Rivers told reporters after the Celtics allowed Miami to shoot precisely 50 percent in each half. “They have two sensational players. But we gave them both tonight. We let [Dwyane] Wade, we let LeBron play in extreme comfort, and we gave the other guys everything they wanted as well.’’

So why are we picking on Pierce?

Because what has happened on Monday night merely continued a rather disturbing trend.

Fact: in the last six postseason games between these teams, the Heat are 5-1, including a perfect 4-0 on their home court. Pierce played well in the one Celtics victory during that span, that coming in Game 3 of last year's second-round series. Of course, that contest also came following three days off and did little to derail James or the Heat, who promptly won the next two games to close out the series.

Starting on Monday and working our way backwards, James has now scored 32, 33 and 35 points in the last three playoff games against the Celtics - all Miami wins - while ripping down 31 rebounds and shooting 36 of 70 from the field (.514), including 7 of 16 (.438) from 3-point distance. He has attempted 27 free throws.

Here's how Pierce has matched up in those games:

	Pts.	Reb	FG Pct.	3-Pct.	FTA	+/-
James	33.3	10.3	.514	.438	27	+38
Pierce	17.0	4.3	.400	.308	8	-42

Now here's how Pierce has matched up in the last five Miami postseason wins:

	Pts.	Reb	FG Pct.	3-Pct.	FTA	+/-
James	31.4	9.4	.509	.435	44	+49
Pierce	16.6	5.0	.413	.333	16	-59

Yikes.

Before anyone suggests that these numbers are at all skewed because they either represent a small sample or because they discount the Boston victory, you're missing the point. In the postseason, every game matters. And so long as James can outplay Pierce by a landslide in five of every six games, Miami will happily throw one game away.

We all know the reality here. Pierce is 34 and will turn 35 in October. James is 27. But for all that has been said and written about the Celtics and Heat in recent years, decidedly little attention has been paid to this matchup. Here in Boston, we have spent considerable time talking about the perceived advantages the Celtics have in Kevin Garnett and Rajon Rondo. Entering this particular series, we all acknowledged that the absence of Bradley could create a serious issue for the Celtics with regard to Wade.

We knew, too, that James is a better player than Pierce.

But if Pierce does not do at least a little more to make James' life difficult, the Heat will wipe the floor with the Celtics again and drain any potential drama from this series before anyone knows what happened.

Four years ago, as we all know, Pierce and James engaged in one of the great Game 7 duels in league history during the second round of the Eastern Conference playoffs. While James scored 45 points in an eventual 97-92 Celtics victory, Pierce answered with 41 and finished as a plus-10, the best number of any starter in the game. In many ways, James was every bit the force then that he is now, but Pierce was equipped to match him nearly blow for blow.

But now? Only heaven knows if Pierce has it in him to even remotely slow down LeBron - or whether the Celtics have any other options at their disposal. Allen, too, looked terribly overmatched on Monday night, and one cannot help but wonder whether Celtics coach Doc Rivers must consider some matchup changes before the teams play Game 2 on Wednesday night.

If Paul Pierce is incapable of doing a better job against LeBron James than he did on Monday night, after all, the Celtics don't stand a chance.

By Tony Massarotti, Globe Staff

Rajon Rondo just kept on taking them, one jumper after the next, the ball splashing through the hoop at TD Garden on Saturday night as if there were never a doubt. A triple-double is one thing. Knocking down 18-footers in the crunchiest of crunch times is something altogether different.

Dwell on the points (13), rebounds (12) and assists (17), if you must, but let there be no doubt about regarding Rondo's greatest contribution to the Celtics in their 92-91 victory over the Philadelphia 76ers. With the game in the balance, Rondo knocked down jumpers as if he were Dennis Johnson. That fact clearly was not lost on Celtics coach Doc Rivers, who made a pointed a reference to Rondo's sniping following a game the Celtics absolutely stole.

"I thought Rondo's shooting, obviously, down the stretch was fantastic. He wanted those shots," Rivers told reporters after the Game 1 victory. "We ran that play [for his final jumper]. We were going to switch Ray [Allen] and put him in that spot where the guy curls back up and Rondo wanted that play. He wanted the shot and he took it. That has to be great for his confidence."

And so as the Philadelphia 76ers return to the Garden floor tonight for what is now a critical Game 2 for the Philadelphians, here is the question: How are the Sixers going to defend Rondo now? During Saturday's series-opening affair, the undersized Sixers generally conceded most anything from the outside, particularly if coming from Rondo or Kevin Garnett. Philly rumbled to a 13-point lead in the second quarter and, quite simply, looked younger, healthier, more athletic.

Whether that continues tonight is anybody's guess, but the Sixers now have an interesting problem on their hands: what if Rondo actually starts to make his shots? Prior to the fourth quarter of Saturday's game, Rondo had taken six shots from 15 feet or more, three of them beyond the 3-point line. He was 0 for 6. And then, in rapid succession during the final six minutes of the fourth quarter and with the outcome in the balance, Rondo curled around a succession of picks and squared up at the left elbow, burying theretofore problematic jumpers with such assertiveness that you cannot help but wonder if he has found a sweet spot.

Were he still here, DJ himself could have told Rondo about the opportunities that can come with being labeled a poor shooter. He could have told Rondo that the label may never go away. And DJ could have told Rondo that he was nonetheless regarded as a clutch shooter because he made them on those occasions when it mattered most, operating with the kind of coolness that made him a particular favorite of Larry Bird.

"[Rondo] was aggressive, man," Celtics centerpiece Kevin Garnett told reporters. "I thought second half he did a lot better job looking for his shot."

With all due respect to Garnett, it wasn't in the second half. It was in the second half of the fourth quarter, though there is really no point in splitting hairs. If and when Rondo makes his jumpers - be they on Saturday or at Miami in April -- Rondo becomes a completely different problem and the Celtics become a completely different team. Whether Rondo can consistently develop that skill remains to be seen, and the Sixers are not likely to change their game plan against him just yet.

The triple-doubles? Oh, they're a nice thing for the stat geeks, though what they illustrate more than anything else are Rondo's unique skills as a rebounder. There just have not been many point guards who can rebound quite like him. The points and assists really should be a given considering the shooters the Celtics have on their roster, though that hardly takes away from Rondo's exceptional skills as a ball handler and distributor.

The truth? In the first half on Saturday night - and really for the first three quarters - Rondo played poorly. He was careless with the basketball. For all the flapping TNT analysts did about Rondo's compiling yet another triple-double during his postseason career, they made little mention of his whopping seven turnovers, more than half of the Celtics' total (13) for the game.

Against these Sixers, in particular, turnovers will be problematic for these Celtics. Rivers cited them as the key to the series just moments after the Celtics dispatched the Atlanta Hawks last week, understanding that limiting the Sixers to a half court offense will be critical in defending them.

In the bigger picture, beyond Game 1, we all know what is at stake for these Celtics going forward in what is likely the last run around the trio of Garnett, Paul Pierce, and Ray Allen. In all likelihood, barring an upset somewhere, this is the last series the Celtics should win. Beating the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference final is hardly a pipe dream, but to call the Celtics favorites would be an obvious stretch. With or without Chris Bosh, Miami has home court. Miami has LeBron James and Dwyane Wade. The Heat dismantled the Celtics in five during last year's Eastern Conference playoffs, and there were many who believed the Celtics had a chance in that series, too.

Additionally, of course, the Celtics currently look worn. Both Pierce and Allen looked sluggish on the floor on Saturday night, seemingly leaving Rondo with only a rejuvenated Garnett at his side. TNT sideline reporter David Aldridge noted as much during his postgame interview with Rondo, when he asked the Celtics point guard about the effect of the postseason schedule on what is indisputable an aged Celtics roster.

"As this series goes on, there's no rest for guys. There's a game every other day," Aldridge said. "For an older team, it may be difficult ...."

"It may not be. Look at us," Rondo interrupted. "We'll be fine."

Maybe they will and maybe they won't.

But if Rondo can repeat what he did Saturday in the final six minutes, all bets are off.

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

Sights, sounds and observations while couch-ridden:

On those nights the shots are falling, like Sunday, the Celtics look positively unbeatable. There is no one to stop them. From Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett to even Mickael Pietrus, Brandon Bass and Greg Stiemsma, the Celtics have a collection of shooters like few other teams in the league. That is why LeBron James, in April, called them the best jump-shooting team in the league.

James's remarks, of course, came in the wake of the Celtics' 115-107 win at Miami last month that remains the most impressive win of this Celtics season. The Celtics shot 60.6 percent that day. They shot a preposterous 64.3 percent (9 of 14) from 3-point distance. They all but repeated the trick on Sunday against the Atlanta Hawks in an avalanche of jump shots and 3-pointers that produced a 101-79 victory and a 3-1 series lead in the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs.

Win or lose tonight in Game 5, the Celtics should rub out these Hawks in no more than six games. In the next round, the Celtics should rub out the Philadelphia 76ers or Chicago Bulls, too. All of that should set up a rematch with the Heat for the right to go to the NBA Finals, and this year's meetings with the Heat have proven that the Celtics indisputably have a chance.

A championship? That still seems unlikely. Even against Miami, the Heat (who will have home court) certainly will be favored. But short of unforseen injury, nothing should stop the Celtics from being in the NBA's final four.

For all of the credit being heaped upon Celtics vice president of basketball operations Danny Ainge this season, for all of the confidence Ainge allegedly showed in his team by failing to "blow it up," we all know better. We all know Ainge was willing to (and tried to) deal. Where Ainge really gets the credit now - and over these last five years - is for continuing to add shooters to a Celtics core of Garnett, Allen and Pierce, all of whom can consistently puncture opponents from the outside.

Generally speaking, think of the complementary players Ainge has brought to Boston in complementary roles over the last five years. James Posey. Eddie House. Sam Cassell. Rasheed Wallace. Pietrus. Bass. Even Keyon Dooling, Delonte West, Sasha Pavlovic and Von Wafer. All of them were at least respectable to above-average shooters at their respective positions, acquisitions designed to make the Celtrics tougher to defend in the half-court setting that invariably categorizes the postseason.

On Sunday, did you find yourself lamenting the Celtics' absence of a low-post offense, something that is almost never talked about anymore? What about their deficiencies in rebounding? The Celtics of today are, in many ways, no different than the Celtics of 2007-08, built on defense and jump shooting, save for the slashing of someone like Avery Bradley.

As Globe columnist Bob Ryan noted on Monday, Celtics coach Doc Rivers often has described the NBA as a "make-miss league."

When the Celtics make like they did Sunday, a trip to the Eastern Conference final seems like a can't-miss proposition.

* * *

Kevin Youkilis is doing all the right things, greeting Will Middlebrooks with smiles at the top step of the dugout, but we all know what is going on here. In four games, Middlebrooks is batting .381 with three home runs and nine RBIs, all as Youkilis and the Red Sox approach the end of a deal that has the Sox holding a $13 million option for next season.

Fact: if Middlebrooks keeps playing like this, Kevin Youkilis is not getting his job back. Not this year. Not as the Red Sox continue to plod along in what seems like the definition of a bridge year, a team without an identity and, it seems, much of a chance. If and when that changes, the Red Sox can adjust accordingly. But there is one (and only one reason) to play Youkilis over Middlebrooks if and when Youkilis is ready to return.

To trade him.

Of course, we are still in the early stages of the 2012 season, and so there is ample time to evaluate these Red Sox, decide what is best for the short term and the long. But in the next two months, the Red Sox will be playing for more than just a potential place among the contenders in the American League. They will be playing for the trading deadline, for the purpose of deciding who stays and who goes in what looks to be a transitional year.

If the Sox are not within reasonable striking distance of a playoff spot come July, Youkilis is trade bait, folks. Ditto for David Ortiz or Daisuke Matsuzaka or Cody Ross or Mike Aviles. For that matter, ditto for just about anyone who might leave the Sox this fall or next. (This means you, Jacoby Ellsbury.) In the wake of last year's September collapse, the Red Sox must take a hard look at anything and everything on the trade market, particularly with youngsters like Middlebrooks, Ryan Kalish, Ryan Lavarnway and Jose Iglesias, among others, now on the cusp of the big leagues.

Middlebrooks is now only the obvious.

* * *

In some ways, Matt Light is that rarest of the rare, an NFL starter since essentially the day he set foot in an NFL traning camp. Light played 12 years and 155 games in the NFL, 153 of them starts. He started every game he played from early in his rookie year. Light protected the blind side of Drew Bledsoe (some) and Tom Brady (mostly) during five trips to the Super Bowl, six trips to the AFC championship and three Super Bowl titles, and he did so with relative consistency, professionalism, dignity.

Was Light ever the best left tackle in pro football, a Hall of Fame-type talent? No. But he was better than average, a very good player for a long time on what has been the most successfuil organization in football during his tenure, which is hardly a coincidence.

Light, in many ways, was the model Patriot during his career, a workmanlike and efficient player who did not self-promote despite a high-profile position.

With regard to the Patriots, the impact of Light's departure could be profound. Logan Mankins will be out for the start of the season. Now the Patriots will have a new left tackle (presumably Nate Solder) on the left side, too. All of that means that Brady's blind side will be guarded by an entirely new tandem, at least in the early part of the season, which may now be the biggest question for a team that has loaded up on offense and defense in free agency and the draft, in that order.

Like any player, Matt Light had good years and bad years during his time with the Patriots.

Maybe now, in his absence, we will come to understand just how good

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

Come to think of it, Rajon Rondo always has had a rather sizable chip on his shoulder. Hopefully, he has learned a rather valuable lesson.

Make it work for you, Rajon.

Not against.

"I try not to let my emotions get the best of me, but I'm an emotional player," Rondo told reporters Thursday as the Celtics prepared for Game 3 of their Eastern Conference quarterfinal series with the Atlanta Hawks. "I try to keep my composure and my emotions to myself, but it was a heat-of-the-battle moment and I wanted to win. We make mistakes. I'm not on trial, or anything."

Actually, Rajon, you are on trial. Such is the life of a professional athlete in this day and age, particularly in Boston, where we expect the best of the best to be intense yet mature, gifted yet hard-working, confident yet humble. Mistakes are allowed, to be sure. But getting yourself suspended for Game 2 of this playoff series was a colossal error in judgment with potentially enormous repercussions.

An exaggeration? Hardly. Take a good look at the Eastern Conference at the moment. Derrick Rose is out. Dwight Howard is out. All that stands between the Celtics and another trip to the Finals during this latest era in team history is a potential matchup with the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference finals, and we all know how the Celtics fared against Miami during the final weeks of the regular season.

If Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce haven't already missed their final chance at a title, you nearly made sure of it.

Deep down, Rondo himself knows this, which is why, according to Celtics coach Doc Rivers, Rondo waited at the team bus and thanks his teammates as they boarded their way back to Boston for Game 3. Whether Rondo expresses that type of contrition and gratitude publicly hardly matters. But those certainly sound like the actions of a contrite and grateful man, which is really all anyone should want.

What we should all want now is for Rondo to get right back on that line he indisputably crossed in Game 1, when he bumped referee Marc Davis and earned himself a one-game suspension. The Celtics have the Hawks right where they want them now with the next two games to be played at the TD Garden. And with Hawks forward Josh Smith now questionable for duty in Game 3, it is incumbent for the Celtics to do what the Hawks failed to do.

Grab the throat of your opponent.

And squeeze.

By now, we all know the story with Rondo. The petulance. The immaturity. The stubbornness. And the skill. We can all continue to debate Rondo's true value to the Celtics, his viability as a franchise-type player given his shooting deficiencies, his worth on the trade market. But with these Celtics at this particular point in time, Rondo will have increasing value if and when the Celtics advance to the later rounds of these playoffs.

A championship? No one should be talking about that just yet. But take a good look at the remaining teams in the Eastern Conference and ask yourself this question: is there anyone out there, including the Heat, who has a better point guard than the Celtics do? Rondo is a mismatch in any series the Celtics will play before the Finals, which is why it would be interesting to see how the Heat would approach him if and when the time comes. (Dwyane Wade? LeBron James?)

On April 10, after all, Rondo was instrumental in the Celtics' 115-107 win at Miami, a game in which Rondo had 18 points and 15 assists to go along with four rebounds. Statistically, Rondo has had better games during his Celtics career. But the Rondo of that day showed little reluctance to take -- and make -- jump shots, including one 3-pointer, that prove critical on a day when the Celtics shot a whopping 60.6 percent from the field.

The Heat, undoubtedly, will challenge Rondo to repeat that trick if and when the time comes. And if he can do so with even moderate success, how the Heat defend him (and the Celtics) could change dramatically in the series.

For now, of course, the focus remains on the Hawks, who are younger and more athletic than the Celtics. (Isn't everyone?) The scheduling lords were kind enough to give the Celtics two days off between Games 2 and 3, a break that allows the older members of this team to recharge. Rondo should be as fresh as ever entering Game 3, of course, and the goal for the Celtics now should be to rub out the Hawks as quickly as possible, minimizing any tread or wear on Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen.

No one is expecting the Celtics to win the championship this year, of course, but they are certainly positioned to make one more entertaining run in what is a deteriorating Eastern Conference.

Keep your head, Rajon.

And don't foul it up.

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

For the Celtics, the blueprint was obvious in this first-round series against the Atlanta Hawks. The Celtics needed to split the first two games in Atlanta and then hold serve in Boston, building a 3-1 series lead that ultimately should have required no more than six games.

But as the saying goes, the best laid plans often go awry.

And in this case, blame it on Rajon Rondo.

The Celtics and Hawks will play Game 2 of their Eastern Conference quarterfinal series tonight in Atlanta, and as we all know, the Celtics will do so without their multi-talented point guard. With 41 seconds left in Sunday's maddening Game 1 loss to the Hawks, Rondo indisputably bumped referee Marc Davis, a rather careless and foolish lapse in judgment that earned Rondo a one-game suspension.

And so now, on a night where there might have been every reason to feel good about the Celtics' chances, the team must play its most important game of the season to date without a point guard.

Nice.

Before we get into the particulars of tonight's game, let's all agree on the magnitude of Rondo's blunder. Quite simply, this was the kind of mistake that can cost a team a series and, perhaps, a trip to the NBA Finals. That is not an exaggeration. If the Celtics lose tonight and ultimately drop this series in seven games, Rondo may have cost himself (and the Celtics) one final run at a championship in what could very well be the final joint crusade for Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen.

Think about it. The Celtics played the Miami Heat three times last month and won all three, the most impressive a 115-107 victory in Miami that was the team's best win of the season. Derrick Rose is out for the playoffs and beyond. (For that matter, so is Dwight Howard.) The Eastern Conference is as open as open could be, with only the Heat serving as a legitimate obstacle to the Celtics along the way.

Even then, if things line up right, the Celtics wouldn't have to face Miami until the conference finals.

Rondo's petulance now has interfered with all of that, putting undue pressure on the Celtics to win Game 2 against an athletic Atlanta team that went 23-10 at home this year. (The Celtics were 24-9). Anyone who has paid attention to the NBA can tell you that the Hawks have been a far different team at home than on the road over the last five years, something the Celtics obviously learned in the spring of 2008, when the Hawks forced the Celtics to seven games in the first round despite being the eighth and final seed in the East.

The Celtics ultimately won that series -- and the NBA championship -- because they had home court. And while they may not need home court now as much as they did in 2008, Rondo has made the challenge infinitely more difficult for them.

Can the Celtics still win this game? Of course, though doing so may require them to run their offense through Paul Pierce (5 for 19 in Game 1) with Avery Bradley or Keyon Dooling (or both) manning the "point." Pierce, for his part, was 0 for 6 from 3-point distance in Game 1 -- the Celtics were 0 for 11 as a team -- and Rondo's absence likely means that Pierce won't get many chances to spot up from long distance and redeem himself in Game 2.

Meanwhile, minus Rondo, Bradley gets considerably less effective, too. And so a Celtics half-court offense that can become stuck in the mud anyway now has the chance to positively calcify.

Oh goody.

Beyond Rondo and Pierce, particularly with Allen still sidelined, the key performer for the Celtics in this game is obvious: Garnett. The cornerstone of this Celtics five-year Celtics renaissance -- then and now -- Garnett shot 1 for 9 in the first half of Game 1 and was thoroughly outplayed by Hawks counterpart Josh Smith. If that happens again in Game 2, the Celtics are almost certain to come back to Boston facing a 2-0 series deficit, leaving an aged club with no wiggle room entering the middle of the series.

Remember, folks: the Celtics are old. Any game they can avoid playing now is another they may be able to play later. If the Celtics can keep a series to six games instead of seven, that is less tread on the tires of Garnett and Pierce, at least. In Game 1, Doc Rivers' rotation really consisted of no more than seven players, Dooling and Sasha Pavlovic contributing a whopping six minutes each to the cause.

That is yet another area in which Rondo's bratty behavior strikes them, stripping Rivers of the player who should have been on the floor the longest. (Rondo led the Celtics in average minutes during the season.)

Obviously, the Celtics must approach this game devoid of the bitterness that might have existed after game 1. Garnett, for one, seemed rather perturbed that Rondo took himself out of the mix for Game 2, but these Celtics have proven to be nothing if not tough and resilient. They can still win this game without Rondo. They can still take control of the series. They can still make one more run at the Finals, a task that has suddenly grown considerably more difficult than it should have at this early stage.

But if the Celtics do--- at least for now -- it will be in spite of their enigmatic point guard, and not because of him.

By Tony Massarotti, Globe Columnist

Sprinkling the infield with a little sunshine, a little rain, and a whole lot of fertilizer ...

In the wake of their collapse, beating up on the New York Jets is the fashionable thing to do, just as it was to beat up on the 2011 Red Sox. The teams share some similarities, and they still share them entering their respective 2012 seasons.

Which is why neither should be dismissed.

Let's start with the Jets, who are now being mocked for being so downright stupid as to take on Tim Tebow, whom they acquired from the Denver Broncos for essentially a fourth-round pick. Why is this so dumb? The Jets have an inconsistent quarterback in what is now, more than ever, a quarterback league, and they failed in any pursuit of Peyton manning, however brief. So what were they supposed to do? Go into next season with the same situation at quarterback and offense that has proven insufficient for three years?

Here's what Tebow gives the Jets: options. New York isn't going to win a Super Bowl solely with its passing attack, and the Jets still may not win one now, either. But if the Jets are being truthful by saying about Drew Stanton is still their backup quarterback, then Tebow could provide them with an offensive wrinkle the way Kordell Stewart once did for the Steelers.

And there are these factors: Sanchez, who has been babied since he arrived in New York, needs competition, be it from Stanton or Tebow. And the Jets clearly need character in a locker room that badly lacked it, which something Tebow absolutely, positively possesses in bulk.

After all, look at the impact Tebow had on last year's Broncos, who quickly became believers once he began to play.

* Some of us still would have liked to see the Patriots invest in a true impact player on defense, but it's hard to argue too much with what the Patriots have done thus far in free agency. While retaining Wes Welker, Deion Branch, Dan Connolly and Wes Welker, among others, the Patriots now have added Brandon Lloyd, Daniel Fells, Robert Gallery, Jonathan Fanene, Trevor Scott, Will Allen, Donte Stallworth, Anthony Gonzalez, Steve Gregory and Spencer Larsen. Some of those players will prove to be nothing more than names in a pile of bodies, but the New England passing attack suddenly looks as prolific as ever.

At the moment, three questions remain -- two more significant than the other: the defense, the left side of the offensive line and, to a lesser extent, running back. (Fare thee well, Benjarvus Green-Ellis.) With Logan Mankins injured and Matt Light potentially calling it a career, Tom Brady's blindside is currently in question, with or without Gallery and Nate Solder. As for the defense, one can only hope the Patriots are planning to be aggressive in the draft, where they have two first-round selections and two second-round selections.

Could that be at least part of the reason the Patriots asked Brady to restructure his contract and free up even more salary cap space?

* We all have every right to criticize the Red Sox and question their character in the aftermath of last season, but let's not get silly. The Red Sox are not going to go 83-79. From May 13 through Aug. 31 of last season, the Red Sox went 66-32, a .673 winning percentage that translates into a 109-win pace over a 162-game schedule. There is plenty of talent to win. What this all comes down to is attitude and health, both of which are legitimately in question.

But talent? The Red Sox have plenty. In fact, they still have far more than most.

* Given Bobby Valentine's recent remarks about criticizing his players, can't help but wonder when Valentine said Yankees manager Joe Girardi wasn't very "courteous" in pulling the plug on Thursday night's tie game, was that a fact or an opinion?

* Maybe it has something to do with the preponderance of people in this business from the Newhouse School of Communications, but does anyone else find Syracuse alumni to be disproportionately annoying? We're not saying Syracuse folks have quite entered the arena of Boston College, Duke, and Notre Dame folks, but for a school and program that has been smeared by a succession of scandals of late, Syracuse alums ought to be more red faces and fewer of that unsightly orange clothing.

* The New Orleans Saints got what they deserved, plain and simple. Placing prices on the heads of opposing players is disgraceful to begin with, and lying to cover it up is just as bad.

But as long as Drew Brees stays in uniform, the Saints are going to be a huge factor in the NFC South, especially when New Orleans' out-of-conference schedule features the AFC West.

Of course, New Orleans also has to play the NFC East.

* Peyton Manning immediately makes the Denver Broncos the favorite in the pathetic AFC West, but Denver's schedule in 2012 in hardly a cupcake. Thanks to its first place finish, Denver will face New England and Houston this season. Additionally, the Broncos have both the NFC South and the AFC North on their schedule, which means meetings with Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati. New Orleans and Atlanta, among others.

* We all know that Jose Iglesias probably is not quite ready to hit consistently in the major leagues, but many of us believe the Sox should give Iglesias the nod to start the year with the big club. The Sox can carry one fewer pitcher in the early going, anyway, and the team would benefit a great deal from having a young potentially dynamic player on its roster -- even if Iglesias is only dynamic on defense -- to start the season.

Think about it: when was the last time the Red Sox had a rookie everyone could truly get excited about? Jacoby Ellsbury certainly comes to mind, but that was four years ago. When the Atlanta Braves were at the peak of their reign during the `90s, the Braves liked to integrate about two new starters every three years, turning over the stock and keeping the team infused.

Particularly in the wake of last year, the Red Sox could use the positive energy and bounce Iglesias would bring. The team has too many overpriced veterans to begin with. If Iglesias proves overmatched offensively, the Sox can subsequently send him down to the minors, still leaving open for the possibility of a return late in the season.

What would be wrong with that?

By Tony Massarotti, Globe Columnist

Maybe Celtics president Danny Ainge is telling the truth that he has not been "shopping" guard Rajon Rondo. Maybe coach Doc Rivers is telling the truth that he and Rondo are getting along just fine. Maybe the Celtics have no intention of trading Rondo before the NBA trading deadline on March 15.

But if the Celtics are failing to at least listen - and to give every offer serious consideration - they should be.

Precisely 13 days remain before the NBA trading deadline, and we all know where the Celtics are today: smack dab in the middle of the NBA netherworld known as terminal mediocrity. Based on winning percentage, the Celtics rank exactly 15th among the 30 NBA teams. In the Eastern Conference, they are tied with the New York Knicks for the seventh/eighth playoff spots. The Celtics are getting older by the day and less compelling by the moment, only the March 15 deadline serving as a real impetus to watch them over the next 13 days.

The four most valuable commodities Ainge possesses are obvious: Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Rondo. Among those, Garnett has obvious value to the Celtics because he is their only expiring maximum contract player. If and when the Celtics cut ties with Garnett at the end of the season, Ainge can use Garnett's salary to at least enter the bidding on premium free agents, regardless of whether Ainge can actually sign anyone.

But the others? All are potential bargaining trips to varying degrees, including Rondo, who amasses points, rebounds and assists the way Jason Kidd once did through the late 1990s and early 2000s.

But here's the thing: Kidd has changed teams three times in his career and did not win a championship until last season, at 38, when Dirk Nowitzki led the Dallas Mavericks to the NBA title. And that is true despite the fact that Kidd actually learned to, well, shoot, something Rondo still has not proven.

And might never.

For all of the talk about Rondo's petulance, his inability to shoot the ball is really the issue here. After shooting a dreadful 56.8 percent from the free throw line last season, he sits at just 61.3 percent this season; for his career, the number is 62.2. Now in his 18th year, Kidd has never shot as poorly from the line as Rondo has in all six of his NBA seasons, and Kidd was never a player so good that a team could build around him and win a championship.

Kidd, for that matter, turned himself into an effective shooter from 3-point land, from where Rondo is just 4 of 17 this season (23.5 percent) and has converted at a career percentage rate of just 24.2.

So now, are we to seriously believe that Rondo is a better championship centerpiece than Kidd was? Before last season, Kidd had made two career trips to the NBA Finals and won a total of two games. And one could argue that both of Kidd's trips to the last round were as much the product of a dreadful Eastern Conference as anything else.

So Rondo can be a temperamental pill. So what. This is the NBA we're talking about. For that matter, it's professional sports. Kobe Bryant is an enormous pain in the posterior, but the Los Angeles Lakers have tolerated it all these years because Bryant is a true great. Manny Ramirez was difficult and the Red Sox annually put up with him because he produced. Ditto for Randy Moss and the Patriots - right up until Moss' productivity dropped.

Then the team cut bait with him.

In defense of the Celtics and their point guard, all of this talk about Rondo's poor attitude is, as Rivers suggested, getting rather old. Furthermore, it reeks of posturing. Is Ainge really telling other clubs (or the media) that Rondo is difficult to deal with? How does that help his cause if Ainge is truly open to trading him? For the Celtics to release any negative spin on Rondo's attitude as a player would be detrimental to their own cause on multiple levels.

That is why it makes all the sense in the world for the Celtics to do what they did yesterday, to come to Rondo's defense and fortify his place as both their "best player" (Ainge) while emphasizing that treatment of the player has been "unfair" (Rivers).

With the right cast around him, Rondo obviously can thrive here. He is an excellent ball handler and distributor, and he is a positively tremendous rebounder for a player his size. At times, he can be a disruption on defense. But Rondo is not and never will be that guy around which championship teams are built, which is why Ainge absolutely, positively must consider moving him if the right deal came along.

What is that deal exactly? That is difficult to say. But the Celtics certainly were willing to trade Rondo to the New Orleans Hornets before the season in a deal that could have brought them Chris Paul, only to be thwarted by one very simple fact.

The Hornets did not want Rondo as much as they wanted some other things.

Doesn't that alone tell you plenty?

By Tony Massarotti, Globe Columnist

The NBA is a joke, plain and simple, a league that is now the laughingstock among the big four of North America. The NFL, along with Major League Baseball and the NHL, all have issues. What the NBA has is anarchy and a credibility level rapidly shriveling to zero.

Take heart, Rajon Rondo. You're not the only player who will show up for work today feeling unwanted. Everyone from Pau Gasol to Luis Scola to Lamar Odom and beyond will lace up his sneakers today knowing his employer tried to dump him in the wake of the botched deal that would have sent Chris Paul to the Los Angeles Lakers yesterday. The obvious difference is that Gasol, Scola and Odom were actually traded, at least until league owners complained that such a deal was another destructive weight shift in a league already known for competitive imbalance.

Um ... fellas? Correct us if we're wrong, but you just agreed to the terms of a new collective bargaining agreement. If the new CBA does not adequately address the flaws in a league where players have far too much power -- and it doesn't come close -- it's your own fault. You should have buried the entire season.

What a bunch of dopes.

Before we get to the specifics of the Celtics and Rondo, those of us in Boston should all stop for a moment today and ask the following question: if the Celtics, and not the Los Angeles Lakers, had made this deal only to see it overturned, how would you feel today? How would you have felt four years ago if the NBA intervened and blocked the deal that brought Kevin Garnett to Boston? As much as this has to do with an ownerless New Orleans Hornets team operating under the control of the league, it also has to do with a flawed NBA system that boasts a phony salary cap and has too often kissed the feet of the aristocrats.

OK, so the commissioner stepped in here and prevented the rich from getting richer, as if he were some sort of round ball Robin Hood. But here's the problem: the deal was completely within the rules, which certainly suggests that the mighty commissioner, the all-powerful David Stern, can now arbitrarily exert his influence whenever he sees fit.

If that is going to be the case, why does the NBA need a collective bargaining agreement at all?

The NBA, more than any other league, is questionable enough to begin with. Even before the Tim Donaghy affair, by nature, the game has been vulnerable to scandal. The officials blow the whistle more than in any other sport. Point shaving is often suspected. One player can influence the outcome of a basketball game like no other major team sport, and Stern's influence always has been suspected on many levels.

But this? This is embarrassing. This is Stern (and the entire NBA) arbitrarily deciding which teams can get which players, which is akin to fixing the draft lottery so that, say, someone like Patrick Ewing could end up in New York.

What a sham.

Again: if you don't like the rules, boys, you should have changed them when you had the chance.

As for the Celtics and Rondo, let's hope Boston owners or officials were not among those who complained about the prospect of Paul joining Kobe Bryant in Los Angeles. (Was a swap of Andrew Bynum for Dwight Howard to be next?) That would be terribly disingenuous. The Celtics have exploited the NBA system for years, from the drafting of Larry Bird to the renaissance built around Garnett and Ray Allen, and we have all praised them for it. You win by the sword and die by the sword. There is no crying in basketball, either.

Rondo, in particular, should take note of that last fact, if for no other fact that professional sports are a business. For every team that doesn't want you in a trade, there is usually another that does. In this case, the unfortunate reality is that the Hornets apparently did not want him, either, at least not under the terms reportedly discussed by officials from Boston, Charlotte and any number of other teams.

Still, the point is that Odom sounded every bit as distraught as someone like Rondo appears to be, and Odom (a relatively accomplished veteran) would seemingly have more reason to be upset.

"Maybe I'll see you there tomorrow [at practice]," Odom told the Los Angeles Times. "But I doubt it. You don't want to go to no place you're not wanted. I'll try to give them what they want as much as possible."

Sooner or later, of course, Odom will have no choice but to show up. If he fails to do so, he will not be paid. And we all know that most professional athletes (if not all) love nothing more than their paychecks.

For the Celtics, despite the initial outcome of the Paul negotiations -- his temporary landing in LA -- rest assured that yesterday's development is bad news. Boston has never been a preferred destination for NBA free agents, the greatest acquisitions in Celtics history all coming via trade or the draft. Moves like a trade for Paul are the only chance the Celtics have. Lest anyone forget, the Celtics got bounced in the second round last season by the Miami Heat, who are improving. Meanwhile, Garnett, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce are all a year older, suggesting the Celtics will, at best, be a second-round participant in the playoffs.

Without question, Ainge knows this.

If he failed to, he would not have spent so much time recently trying to do exactly what the Los Angeles Lakers were doing.

By Tony Massarotti, Globe Columnist

Disregard the final five minutes. For that matter, disregard the fourth quarter. The Patriots fell asleep for the final minutes of yesterday's 31-24 victory over the Indianapolis Colts, but the end of the game told us nothing about who the Patriots are and where they are going.

Truth be told, the first three quarters told us nothing, too.

The Pats are 9-3 this morning and once again possessors of the top seed in the AFC, but they have very little to gain in the final weeks of the 2011 season. New England should encounter some resistance in the final four games of this season - at Washington, at Denver, both Miami and Buffalo at home - but there should be nothing to prevent the Patriots from going 13-3 and earning a first-round bye when all is said and done.

That said, two questions endure from yesterday's affair.

First, is it really necessary for the fans at Gillette Stadium to boo Adam Vinatieri? (Weak.)

Second, is it really necessary for Bill Belichick to have the Patriots throwing out of the no-huddle offense holding a 31-10 lead with under seven minutes to go in the fourth quarter?

In the latter instance, nothing Belichick can say justifies the decision. Belichick likes to answer every question about his strategic choices by saying that he is "just trying to win a game," but throwing out of the no-huddle with under seven minutes to go in the fourth quarter was downright stupid and indicated no such thing. At that stage of the game, the Patriots should have been trying to milk the clock. Instead, Brady took a needless hit on a third-and-13 play that led to a Patriots punt, after which the Colts scored.

With the score then 31-17, Brian Hoyer entered the game. Does that all make any sense? Up 31-10, Belichick subjected Brady to a needless hit. Up 31-17, he put Hoyer in. That certainly suggests that Belichick recognized the error of his ways, but he never should have had Brady throwing at that stage of the game in the first place.

Sometimes, the man's ego just gets in the way.

Let's hope the Bobby Valentine acquisition does not prove to be the Red Sox' biggest move of the offseason. With the manager now in place entering the winter meetings, the Red Sox have needs to address on their pitching staff, both in the starting rotation and the bullpen. Presumably, there will be a substantive acquisition in there somewhere.

Under the circumstances, with closers going at inflated prices, one can only wonder if the Sox might be far better served to put their money in a starter, specifically Mark Buehrle. If relievers like Heath Bell and Ryan Madson command three- and four-year deals, the Sox would seem far better off committing three years and even $45 million to someone like Buehrle, who has a picturesque delivery and a long history of health.

In any case, here's what you shouldn't want to see: trepidation. So the Sox have made some bad free agent signings. So what? Does that mean they're all bad? If the Red Sox can pull off a trade for a young, healthy pitcher, so be it. If not, they need durability on that staff, and Buehrle is about the closest thing to a sure bet on the market.

The Red Sox don't need to abstain from the free agent market, folks. They just need to make more prudent decisions.

I mean, in retrospect, was giving John Lackey five years just utter foolishness or what? The man had a history of elbow problems. And everyone knew it.

Let's all pump the brakes on the Bruins for a moment. As extraordinary as this 13-0-1 run has been, this is still just the regular season. Roughly a year ago at this time, the Bruins were struggling enough that Cam Neely came out and seemed to put Claude Julien's job on the line, at which point the Bruins awoke and began playing with greater urgency.

Of course, the Bruins won the Stanley Cup. And while that title has changed everything with regard to the perception of the team and organization, let's not put these bruins in the same discussion with the Bruins of the late '60s and early '70s just yet. Those Bruins were stacked with Hall-of-Fame-caliber talent, and we simply do not know whether this club has quite the same staying power.

That said, the Bruins certainly are positioned to have one of the great eras in their history, which is something we said a year ago. (You can look it up.) The signing of David Krejci further stabilizes a deep and talented roster that can skate, hit, score and play defense, meaning the Bruins can play any style of game, against basically any opponent, anywhere and anytime.

Still, tonight's game against the Pittsburgh Penguins bears close watching, for obvious reasons. These are two of the last three Stanley Cup champions and, currently, the top two seeds in the Eastern Conference. The injuries to Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin last year meant the Pens were absent from Boston's path to the championship, and we still do not know if the Bruins can defeat the Penguins when it matters.

Of course, we also don't know if the Penguins can defeat these Bruins, who seem fortified and emboldened by their Stanley Cup championship.

With all due respect to the most loyal Celtics fans, the window closed in Game 7 against the Lakers in June 2010. Anyone who believes the Celtics can win the title this year by simply adding some small pieces around Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Rajon Rondo is missing the point. The Celtics are getting older and slower while the Bulls and Heat are getting better and deeper, which is why Danny Ainge must act aggressively.

Nobody ever said Rondo was a bad player. The question isn't even whether he's a great player. The question is whether he's a franchise player, the kind an organization can build around the way the Celtics built around Garnett, the indisputable centerpiece of the Celtics' latest championship runs. And it is difficult to think of Rondo in those terms when he is a career .622 shooter at the free throw line coming off a season in which he shot .568.

As a result, Ainge owes it to himself -- and, more importantly, the Celtics -- to explore any and all deals for Rondo, who remains his best bargaining chip. If Ainge can get something closer to a franchise player back, even for the short term, he must consider it. The Al Jefferson-for-Kevin Garnett swap was built on a similar principle, and nobody has complained about the loss of Jefferson for quite some time now.

Granted, Garnett is still here, albeit in a reduced capacity.

But is there anyone who still wouldn't have made that trade?

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

Catching up on happenings in the sports world after the black hole that was the NHL postseason...

• Even after the black hole that was 0-6 and 2-10, the Red Sox are on a pace to win 98 games, a number that have achieved only twice in their history since 1946. The first occasion came in 1978, pre-wildcard, when the sox won 99 games and missed the playoffs. The other came in 2004, when the Sox won their first World Series in 86 years.

  Beginning with a sweep of the Yankees at New York in May, the Red Sox have won 11 of 12 series and gone 26-8.

• Rory McIlroy is off to a terrific start in 2011 and in his career, but any comparisons to Tiger Woods at this stage are completely and utterly ridiculous. Even at a young age, Woods never collapsed in a major championship the way McIlroy did at the Masters earlier this season.
• By the way, comparing McIlroy to Tiger Woods at this stage is a little like comparing Andrew Miller to Randy Johnson. Miller has terrific raw ability and will make his Red Sox debut tonight against the San Diego Padres, but let's see if he can throw consistent strikes in the big leagues before we turn him into a multiple Cy Young Award winner.

  Especially when Miller has heretofore been closer to Nuke LaLoosh.

• Don't look now, Celtics fans, but your beloved team has slipped to No. 4 in the local power rankings. And if we were to factor in projected future performance of our four major teams, the Celtics would also have the bleakest outlook.
• In this market, at least, the NFL picked a good time for a labor dispute. But with the usual start of training camp now rapidly approaching, how much longer can this go on before Patriots fans really start to get agitated?

I mean, the end of last season was disappointing. But the Pats did go 14-2 with a generally young roster and seem positioned to make noise again in 2011.

Sorry, I meant 14-3.

• Now this is the kind of year Jacoby Ellsbury deserves a great deal of credit for -- and for an array of reasons. Ellsbury currently has the highest OPS of his career and is on pace for 18 home runs, 82 RBI, 166 runs and, yes, 55 stolen bases.

  Oh, and did we mention that he's played in every game?

• In this market, one of the major drawbacks of the Bruins' title run was that we did not get to fully celebrate the failure of the Miami Heat in general and LeBron James in particular. Talk about irony. While the Bruins were winning a title as a team, LeBron was explaining another disappointing end to a season by repeatedly using his favorite letter in the alphabet.

  Of course, that would be I.

• Yes, I'm biased, for obvious reasons. But since the Red Sox started giving Tim Wakefield a regular turn in the rotation, he's 4-1 with a 3.60 ERA in six starts.

  Just sayin'.

• By the way, can people in this market stop talking about the Yankees as if they're ready for the senior tour. Fine, the Yankees are old. They still have the second-best record in the American League and are 1.5 games out of first place.

  If you are a Red Sox fan, the Yankees should still be your biggest concern in the American League.

• The Bruins will soon be onto the business of the offseason, so let's all agree that Tomas Kaberle should go and the Bruins should consider bringing Michael Ryder back at a reduced rate. Other than that, priority No. 1 in 2011-12 is for the Bruins to put Tyler Seguin in the best possible position to succeed.
• By the way, purely for the record, the Vancouver Canucks were 2 for 33 on the power play in the Cup final, a paltry 6.1 percent. The Bruins, by contrast, went 5 for 27, a far more respectable 18.5 percent.

  For the entire postseason, the Bruins were 10 for 88 (11.4 percent) on the power play, which included a 5 for 61 performance (8.2 percent) before the final round.

• Adrian Gonzalez is on pace for 230 hits, 34 home runs, 55 doubles and 146 RBI.

  Sounds like a formula for MVP, no?

• We all love David Ortiz and what he has given the Red Sox over the years, but the truth is that the Yankees should have plunked him a long time ago given the damage he has inflicted on them over the years. In 2009, the in head-to-head play, Yankees pitchers hit Red Sox batters on 14 occasions while Red Sox pitchers plunked the Yankees only seven times. During that season, before a game at Fenway Park, one uniformed member of the Red Sox warned Derek Jeter that if Yankees pitchers didn't start behaving themselves, the Red Sox would retaliate.

  And they would retaliate, he said, by going after Jeter.

• I still bet the Cleveland Indians will finish below .500.
• Silver spoon update: In this millennium, in the four major sports, that is now 13 trips at least the semifinals (Patriots 5, Red Sox 4, Celtics 3, Bruins 1) and nine trips to the championship round (Patriots 4, Red Sox 2, Celtics 2, Bruins 1) with seven titles, including the proverbial Grand Slam, accomplished in slightly more than six calendar years.

  Good heavens.

  Will it ever end?

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

Firing away while taking a very deep breath between rounds of an NHL postseason that has been delightfully draining on emotional, psychological and physical levels ...

• Please, no complaining about the Celtics. When Danny Ainge made his deal with the devil four years ago, we all knew the proverbial window would be small. In retrospect, the only real question we should ask now is whether Ainge should have blown the whole thing up last summer and started the rebuilding process then, if only because the Celtics would now be better off for it.

  I mean, if Ainge was going to trade Kendrick Perkins and neuter the Celtics in February, shouldn't he have just pulled the plug in July?

  And yes, I'd trade Rajon Rondo in a minute.

• Looking at the bigger picture, do we have any more answers about the Red Sox now than we did on April 1?

  The offense has been inconsistent.

  The starting pitching has been streaky.

  The bullpen has been bad.

  Maybe the Red Sox built the bridge in 2010 and intend to push us off it in 2011.

• While you were sleeping, according to NFL types, Tom Brady slipped in and out of town to get a progress report on his foot in the wake of offseason surgery and was told that everything is progressing nicely, meaning that Brady should be ready to go some time during training camp.

  Assuming there is a training camp.

  We just figured we should tell you that now rather than wait for a more relevant occasion.

• Tiger Woods will win a major this year.
• Here's another prediction: Patrice Bergeron will play in the NHL Eastern Conference finals between the Bruins and Tampa Bay Lightning.

  And when he does, he will receive an ovation like no other in recent memory when he steps onto the TD Garden ice.

• What Andrew Bynum did to Jose Juan Barea was nothing short disgraceful and the NBA should have suspended him for 10 games, not five.

  And it has nothing to do with the fact that Barea went to Northeastern.

• Speaking of those Lakers, don't you just love how they go down fighting?

  I mean, in the last two games that ushered them out of the playoffs, the Lakers have lost by 36 points to the Dallas Mavericks (in Game 4 of this year's Western Conference semifinals) and 39 points to the Celtics (in Game 6 of the 2008 NBA Finals).

  No quit in that team, I tell you.

  How is that not a reflection on both Phil Jackson and Kobe Bryant?

• The Blue Jays have now stolen 11 bases in five games against the Red Sox, which cannot help but make you wonder if former pitching coach John Farrell wants to show up his former team every chance he gets.

  Can you imagine what Farrell would do against the Red Sox if he had, say, Carl Crawford?

• What, exactly, does Bill Belichick have against pass rushers? Has anyone ever asked him this on the record? Does he believe that a pass rush is the product of scheme more than skill or ability?

  I want details on this.

• If the Bruins were to get to the Stanley Cup finals, defeating the San Jose Sharks and Joe Thornton would be the most symbolic way to end a 39-year drought without a championship.

  In retrospect, after all, dealing away Thornton was the blow that dealt the franchise a severe concussion.

  Nonetheless, I fear that Broken Joe and the Sharks are up to their old tricks, about to collapse against the Detroit Red wings in the NHL Western Conference playoffs.

  And that Red Wings-Canucks series would be a doozy.

• Years ago, some of us mocked Major League Baseball for the manner in which the sale of the Red Sox was conducted, the process so seemingly shady that the state attorney general got involved.

  In the end, we ended up OK, didn't we?

  And given how things are going in Los Angeles at the moment, one can only wonder what we would be saying and doing now if Frank and Jamie McCourt had acquired our beloved baseball franchise.

• As far as the positional players go, Adrian Gonzalez has been the most consistent performer for the Red Sox. To his credit, Jacoby Ellsbury is second. All things considered, Ellsbury is playing his tail off and is having a nice bounce-back season so far.
• I'll take Dennis Seidenberg on my team anytime, anywhere, against anyone.
• Same for Delonte West.
• Brad Marchand, too.

  Sorry, I mean Marshmont.

• Betcha Doc Rivers wishes he never came back.
• In the last two weeks, we have the celebrated the 25th anniversary of Roger Clemens' first 20-strikeout game and the 41st anniversary of Bobby Orr's Cup-clinching goal on Mother's Day, which is further reminder of something we should never, ever forget.
• This remains the single, best sports town in America.

And, as a result, this is the best time of year to live here.

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

I think it's over. I think the Celtics will win Game 3 vs. the Heat, preserve some dignity, but ultimately fail. And if for some strange and unexpected reason they come back to win this series against the Miami Heat, it will have far more to do with the ineptitude of LeBron James and Dwyane Wade than it will with the brilliance of the Celtics.

Clearly, these are desperate times for the most decorated franchise in NBA history, and the Celtics themselves know it. Maybe that is why they Celtics seem intent on trotting out Shaquille O'Neal for Game 3 tomorrow night as if he were Willis Reed. O'Neal can provide only a small measure of help for these Celtics, assuming he can stay on the floor for any stretch of time at all, because their problems in the first two games of this series with Miami demonstrated far greater problems than many of us might have been willing to acknowledge.

The Celtics look old, folks. They look slow and uninspired. The Miami Heat are playing like a team on a mission, like the Bruins are against the Philadelphia Flyers, and one can only wonder now whether the window closed exactly when it was supposed to, in year three last summer, in Game 7 of the NBA Finals against the Los Angeles Lakers.

Really, isn't that what this is about? It's not about Kendrick Perkins or the bench, Rajon Rondo or Shaq. It's about the fact that James and Wade are younger, faster, stronger and better than Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen, and there is not a single thing the Celtics can do about that unless they can turn back the effects of time.

What we seem to have here is precisely what colleague Dan Shaughnessy suggested in the immediate aftermath of Game 2: a changing of the guard.

For that matter, it's a changing of small forwards and power forwards, too.

Objectively, let's examine the first two games of this series. The Celtics were beaten to most every loose ball in Games 1 and 2, all while being dominated on the perimeter (critics of the Perkins trade might want to examine this). Miami has shot better than 45 percent from 3-point distance - during the regular season, Miami's number against the Celtics in this area was roughly 25 percent - and many of those jumpers have been relatively uncontested, if for no other reason than the fact the Celtics have been too slow to defend.

Meanwhile, on the other end, Rondo's inability to shoot consistently from 18 feet is again becoming a detriment. The Celtics were supposed to have a clear advantage in two areas in this series, at point guard and power forward, and they are, at best, 1-0-1, in those matchups. Rondo has been decent. Garnett has been fair. Meanwhile, Wade and James have taken turns ripping the Celtics apart.

Whether all of that can change is highly questionable, particularly with the Celtics demonstrating positively no fight.

In this way, of course, vice president of basketball operations Danny Ainge must similarly take his share of responsibility for a midseason maneuver than will now be questioned forever. At the time the Celtics dealt Perkins, the team assured us the deal was made with the present in mind. Shortly thereafter, Ainge told Jackie MacMullan of ESPN that, had Perkins been re-signed, he "probably" would not have made the deal. Whatever the truth, casting off Perkins has made the Celtics look terribly soft, something Ainge clearly did not account for.

That said, shame on the players, too. So Perkins got traded. So what? Garnett, Pierce and Allen are longtime veterans who have been through far worse. They should have been able to withstand it and push on. Instead, the Celtics look as though they have been neutered, Pierce and Rondo bickering with one another during a timeout while coach Doc Rivers addressed his team in futility. Are the Celtics serious with this kind of nonsense? At this stage, Rivers must feel like a substitute teacher at the local middle school. The kids are just plain ignoring him. He must be kicking himself for ever coming back.

Meanwhile, the principal acquisition for Perkins, Jeff Green, hardly looks ready for prime time. Nenad Krstic looks useless. The Celtics are starting to come up with a succession of ailments - Pierce's Achilles, Rondo's back, Allen's chest - which is never a good sign. Hurt teams are defeated teams. And this one looks like toast.

Think of it: a year ago, James was the one with a bad elbow and bad body language, turning in the worst playoff performance of his career in pivotal Game 5 of the second round series between the Celtics and Cavaliers. Now he is going 14 of 25 from the field and pumping his fist emphatically after driving to the basket with the force of a locomotive. Fans in Cleveland would have every right now to further believe that James out and out quit on them last spring, because the man who played Game 2 against the Celtics on Tuesday night was not the same man from a year ago.

LeBron believes in this Heat team. He believes in Wade, too.

The Celtics, on the other hand, do not currently seem to believe in themselves at all. It has been quite some time since they did. When Ainge assembled this nucleus during the summer of 2007, the general belief was that the Celtics had three years to win a title. The Celtics won the championship in Year One and fell just short in Year Three. Now they look as if they are ready for assisted living. Rasheed Wallace went out and Shaq came in. Perkins went out and Green came in. Garnett is far healthier this year than he was last, and yet the Celtics look far worse overall, the effects of time having taken their toll.

The window is not just closing now.

It is being locked.

Paul Pierce and the Celtics dropped Game 1 vs. the Heat Sunday, while Zdeno Chara and Tim Thomas were all smiles after beating the Flyers Saturday. (Celtics: Jim Davis; Bruins: Barry Chin/Globe Staff)

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

The second round is where the true separation occurs, where championship hopefuls are dismissed in favor of bona fide threats. The Celtics have oft viewed the second round as a stepping stone. The Bruins have oft discovered it to be an insurmountable obstacle. And yet, at the moment, the latter looks far more equipped to endure.

Here in Boston, we are in the thick of the playoff season now, and a funny thing happened over the weekend on the first step to the conference championship: the Bruins looked far more capable than the Celtics did. Exploiting the ineptitude of Philadelphia Flyers goaltending – is that an oxymoron? – the Bruins methodically punctured their way to a 7-3 victory in Game 1 of the NHL Eastern Conference semifinals. Game 2 is tonight.

Meanwhile, the Celtics all but came apart at the seams in a 99-90 loss to the Miami Heat in an NBA Game 1 that was hardly so close, Boston enduring both the ignominious ejection of its captain, Paul Pierce, and a deficit that generally hovered between nine and 19 points.

Just wondering:

If you could bet on one team today to reach the conference finals, which would it be?

Yes, in the case of each, we are talking about one game. The Celtics lost Game 1 of their second-round series to the Cleveland Cavaliers last year and actually trailed the series after three games, 2-1. The Bruins lost the first two of this year’s first-round affair against the Montreal Canadiens and rallied back to win. We can all agree that Game 1 means relatively little with regard to the bigger picture, and the Bruins last year proved that Games 1, 2 and 3 combined can mean relatively little, too.

Still, there are continuously developing themes with each of these clubs as we venture into May.

The Bruins appear to be maturing.

The Celtics just look like they’ve gotten old.

Let’s start with the hockey team. Trailing the Canadiens by a 2-0 series score entering Game 3 in Montreal, the Bruins have since won 5 of 6 without the benefit of a single power-play goal. Think of that. They overcame deficits of 1-0, 3-1 and 4-3 in Montreal during Game 4. They demonstrated a resiliency throughout the series. The Bruins had the chance to fold on numerous occasions – after deficits, bad penalties and accompanying power-play goals – and they continued to push forward.

We all know the shortcomings of this Bruins team. Frequently, they play not as if they are afraid to lose, but rather that they are afraid to win. Up until Game 7 of the Montreal series, the Bruins were 2-8 in potential series clinchers under coach Claude Julien. In the postseason, the Bruins seem to have played their best at the most desperate times, stumbling most notably when they have been ahead or when their opponent had the same level of desperation that they did. (Translation: Game 7.)

In that way, maybe Game 7 of the Montreal series served as a breakthrough for them. The Bruins tried to give the game away and couldn’t. When Nathan Horton beat Carey Price on a deflection in overtime of Game 7 at the TD Garden last week, you could all but hear the entire fan base exhale, as if the Bruins were putting their past behind them.

Whether the Bruins did – or didn’t – remains to be seen. They still have demons to exorcise. But as long as the Bruins can avoid special teams – both ways – there is suddenly sufficient reason to believe that they are capable of winning more than one round.

Of course, nobody should assume anything with the Bruins at this point, but you get the general idea.

They look invested.

As for the Celtics, maybe it is time for everyone to admit that the first-round series victory over the New York Knicks had as much (or more) to do with the ineptitude of the Knicks as it did with any level of execution by the Celtics. Quite simply, Boston was lucky to win Games 1 and 2. The Celtics certainly played better in Games 3 and 4, but their core problems remain. Their bench stinks. Rajon Rondo disappears for games at a time. And in Game 1 yesterday against the Heat, the Celtics were repeatedly beaten to lose balls, Miami demonstrating far more of a desire to win than a Celtics club seemingly in the midst of a perpetual confidence crisis.

Oh, right. And now their captain – their captain – is getting ejected from playoff games, rightly or wrongly, because he can’t keep his mouth shut.

Do not be fooled by yesterday’s final score. A 99-90 game looks reasonably competitive, but this one wasn’t. The Heat took control of the game late in the first quarter and never let the Celtics back in it. The Celtics made James Jones look like Glen Rice. The Celtics were slow to defend on the perimeter, missed more open shots than many are willing to acknowledge and played with a general passivity will have them soon sipping cocktails in the Caribbean if they are not careful.

And here’s the thing:

Do Celtics players really care? Do they? Or have they resigned themselves to the fact their time has come and gone, that the impending labor problems will signify the end of their era?

Yes, yes, yes – each team has only played Game 1. We all know that. But this morning, during the onset of the second round, one Boston playoff team looked like it had more to prove than its opponent did. The identity of that team is ultimately for you to decide.

But here’s a hint:

They were wearing skates.

Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

Ultimately, of course, this is not about the Celtics and Miami Heat. Not really. What this is about, truly, is the Celtics and LeBron James, a rivalry that says so much about a self-centered star of the league who regards himself as the axis for, well, everything.

Think of it: rivalries are almost always between teams or individuals, the wires almost never crossing between the two. Larry had Magic, for sure, but it was never Larry vs. the Lakers or Magic vs. the Celtics; it was Larry and Magic, Celtics-Lakers. On the ice this week, we will have the privilege of watching Bruins-Canadiens and Bruins-Flyers, just as we did in the ‘70s. And earlier this millennium, it was always Red Sox-Yankees, with Randy Johnson serving as a response to Curt Schilling in the same way that Keith Foulke served as an answer (at least for a year) for Mariano Rivera.

Almost always, the individuals were the subplots folded into an arms race between superpowers.

But not this time.

This is about LeBron, of course. It almost always is. Over the last three years, it was never about the Celtics and Cleveland Cavaliers. James himself proved that last summer when, after again failing against the Celtics, this time in disgraceful fashion, he took it upon himself to alter the balance of power in the NBA Eastern Conference. The player changed teams instead of the other way around, James making it quite clear that the Cavs were responsible for his individual shortcomings.

Of the top six players in this upcoming Eastern Conference semifinal series between the Celtics and Heat, James is the only one without a title to his credit. Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Rajon Rondo all have one. So does Dwyane Wade. That leaves the self-proclaimed King – please, do not bring Chris Bosh into this conversation or you will embarrass yourself – who has done everything but throw himself a royal wedding.

For the record, in postseason play, James is 5-8 against the Celtics, losing one series in seven games (in 2008) and another in six (last year). In Games 4, 5 and 6 of last year’s conference semifinals between the Celtics and Cavs – the Cavs had a 2-1 lead in that series, folks - James shot 18 of 53 from the field, a woeful 34 percent. He went 2 of 13 from 3-point distance, an even more laughable 15.4 percent. James all but quit entirely in pivotal Game 5, collecting seven assists and six rebounds while taking just 14 shots, fewer than he has ever taken in any postseason game against the Celtics and tied for the third-lowest postseason total of his career.

OK, so we looked it up. James has played 76 games in his postseason career. There was only one occasion in which he had fewer than 20 points while simultaneously totaling fewer than 10 assists and fewer than 10 rebounds. That came in Game 5 last year. In every other postseason game he has played, James has had at least 20 points … or 10 rebounds … or 10 assists.

Except, of course, against the Celtics in Game 5 of his final year in Cleveland, in what was then a 2-2 series, and with free agency looming.

Nice timing.

In a previous life, maybe James also played for the 1919 Chicago White Sox.

As one would expect, James has had some monster games against the Celtics in the playoffs. Facing elimination in Game 6 in 2008, he went for 32 points, 12 rebounds, and 6 assists while connecting on 13 of 15 free-throw attempts. In Game 7 of that series, albeit in defeat, James scored 45 points in a mano-a-mano duel with Paul Pierce. In the two Cleveland wins last year, James scored 35 and 38 points, respectively, connecting on 26 of 46 shots from the field while averaging 7.5 rebounds and 7 assists.

Naturally, all of that only made it more reprehensible and noticeable when he went into Operation Shutdown.

During the regular season, the Celtics defeated the Heat in 3 of 4 meetings, losing only a late-season finale at Miami that proved costly; as a result of solely that game, Miami has home-court advantage in this series. Overall, James played quite well in the four games – he averaged 28.8 points, 6.5 rebounds and 6.5 assists while shooting 48.8 percent from the field – but the Celtics often seemed far more interested in controlling Wade than James.

Could it be that the Celtics know what everyone else knows, namely that Wade is to be feared far more than LeBron?

Whatever the case, James has no excuses this time around. Despite their Games 3 and 4 performances against the Knicks, the Celtics look more vulnerable now than they have at any other point during Garnett’s healthy existence in Boston. James is locked into the Heat for a while. He chose Miami over, among other places, Chicago. And before anyone suggests that this season is merely the first of many attempts for King James to dethrone the Celtics, let us all remember that the Celtics won their 17th championship in the very first year that Garnett, Pierce and Allen were united.

Prior to the start of that postseason, Celtics coach Doc Rivers dismissed any talk of their first postseason together being a learning experience for the new Big Three, eschewing such theorizing as a cop-out.

"I didn't buy into that," Rivers said. "I think that's what everyone else was saying, but that's not what I believed and I thought it was important for our team to not buy into that."

Now the Celtics are running out of time, leaving little question to the urgency with which the Celtics must operate.

James, meanwhile, still has his entire career in front of him.

Think he’ll use that as an excuse, too, should he lose again?

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com columnist

A year ago, in Games 1 and 2, the scores were Boston 85, Miami 76, and Boston 106, Miami 77. The Celtics were a plus-38. The developing sentiment was that the Celtics flipped a switch and turned it on for the playoffs, a theory proven when the Celtics rather methodically marched through Miami, Cleveland and Orlando en route to the NBA Finals.

Now the Celtics are up 2-0 in their first-round series against the New York Knicks, and the questions remain: are they good enough? Is anyone really convinced? Even Doc Rivers sounded a little uncertain in the wake of the Celtics’ 96-93 victory over the New York Knicks last night, a game that was far closer than the final score suggests.

“We won the game,” Rivers told reporters, sounding almost ashamed. “In the playoffs, the whole key is to win games, and that’s what we did.”

So why, then, does it feel as if the Celtics are being exposed in this series more than their brilliance is being revealed?

Yes, a win is a win is a win. Or is it? The Knicks began last night’s game without Chauncey Billups. They finished it out without Billups and Amar’e Stoudamire, the latter departing with back spasms and and playing just 18 minutes. And even then, the Knicks held a 93-92 lead with 19.2 seconds left, the second time in two games that New York has held an advantage with just seconds remaining on the clock.

Maybe you feel good about this, but there are some of us who don’t. Quite simply, this series shouldn’t be this hard. And it certainly shouldn’t be so challenging against Carmelo Anthony and four guys, at home, just as it wasn’t terribly challenging against Dwyane Wade and four guys in the first round a year ago.

Those Celtics played possum during the regular season. With this group, we can’t be so sure. And that is especially true following a game in which Rajon Rondo took a career-high 23 shots, making 13 (56.5 percent) while finishing with 30 points and seven assists.

Rondo went to the basket in this game, which is usually the first key to a Celtics team that often struggles in the halfcourt game. And yet, Boston’s deficiencies still took this game to the final seconds, something that is as important to remember as the 42 points, 17 rebounds, 6 assists and 2 blocks totaled by the otherworldly Anthony.

The bench stinks, folks. Nenad Krstic got on the floor for precisely 2 minutes 59 seconds last night and had donuts across the board. In exactly 12:12, Jeff Green shot 2 of 8 from the floor and finished with nearly as many fouls (five) as points (six). Glen Davis took three shots, none from beyond four feet, as if he were chastised for shooting too much … or trying to make to make a point … or both.

But hey, did you hear? Shaquille O’Neal might be back soon.

Oh, right, the rebounding. Did we mention that the Knicks were one of the worst rebounding teams in the league during the regular season? And that was with Stoudemire, who led the team with 8.2 boards per game. Last night, the final rebounding numbers were New York 53, Boston 37, a complete reversal from Game 1. And while much of that difference came when Kevin Garnett was off the floor – the Knicks outrebounded the Celtics 18-6 and played handball against the offensive glass while Garnett sat – the Celtics must find someone, anyone, willing to at least help in limiting those maddening second-chance points.

The good news, meanwhile, is that the Celtics are executing in crunch time, at least offensively, thanks largely to the continued ingenuity of their coach. As clutch as Ray Allen was at the end of Game 1, the diagramed alley-oop to Garnett trimmed a three-point deficit to one point while taking a mere half-second off the clock. Last night, while everyone assumed the ball would be going to Allen, Rondo or Paul Pierce, Rivers called for a low-post entry to Garnett, who promptly flipped a jump hook over the head Jared Jeffries, even if the Celtics did leave far too much time on the clock.

Of course, it is certainly worth noting that the current NBA postseason is off to a rather compelling start, if for no other reason than the fact that the large majority of first-round games suggest a level of parity that generally does not exist in the league. The Lakers lost Game 1 at home to New Orleans. The Spurs did the same against Memphis. The Chicago Bulls, top-seeded in the Eastern Conference, have labored against the Indiana Pacers. And the Oklahoma City Thunder – despite the addition of alleged secret weapon Kendrick Perkins – had to grind out a Game 1 victory at home against the Denver Nuggets.

In the NBA this spring, it seems, there are no sure things.

But if that is true for a questionable Celtics team now – one that Rivers himself has called “lucky” – what will that mean for Boston in subsequent rounds?

Former Celtics assistant coach Tom Thibodeau has led the Bulls to a 51-19 record. (Associated Press)

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com Columnist

What we keep saying, of course, is that the Celtics are just bored again and that, as Paul Pierce has reminded us, they have “another gear.” We assume the Celtics will play when it is time to play, as the No. 1 seed or as the No. 2, and that they remain the most fearsome team in the NBA Eastern Conference.

All of this may be true.

We have every right to believe it.

And yet, we again have every right to doubt, too.

To be sure, the Celtics closed with a flourish on Monday, outclassing the New York Knicks in the final minutes of a 96-86 win that restored a good deal of faith in this team at this time. The Celtics have won and the Celtics can close, and so there is no real point in comparing them to, say, the Bruins. But we all know who the Celtics are and what they are about, even in the wake of a Kendrick Perkins deal that chemically altered their nucleus.

This all goes back to the window, really, to the three-year period we all identified when Danny Ainge brought Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen here during the summer of 2007. The Celtics are now on bonus time. There is as much reason to question them now as there was a year ago – maybe more – particularly as the Celtics meander through a mid- to late-season stretch of games during which they have produced a relatively pedestrian 17-10 record.

“I haven’t used the word ‘soft’ with us in maybe four years,” coach Doc Rivers told reporters following Monday’s win. “But at halftime, I used that word a lot.”

So there you go. Even the coach of the Celtics, it seems, needed to see some sort of sign from his team, some sort of heartbeat, some sort of evidence that the Celtics can still turn it on when they need to.

Show me.

Under the circumstances, can you blame him?

Let’s remember something here, folks: the Celtics didn’t win the championship last year. As valiantly as they played, the Celtics failed in the end, averaging 73 points in Games 6 and 7 of the Finals, forced to play on the road in the wake of catatonic 54-game stretch to end the season. Their level of disinterest cost them in the end. We can all point to any number of factors that contributed to all of that, from the fourth-quarter officiating in Game 7 to the Perkins injury to the complete ineptitude of the Boston bench, but all of those things might have been survivable had the Celtics been playing in Boston.

With last night’s dismantling of the Atlanta Hawks, the Chicago Bulls (51-19) are now a whisker ahead of the Celtics (50-19) in the race for best record in the East. The teams still have one meeting remaining this year, albeit in Chicago. The Celtics also have a meeting with the Spurs in San Antonio, and a smart man at the moment would place his betting money on the Bulls to finish ahead of Boston.

So much for those theories that Bulls coach and former Celtics assistant Tom Thibodeau was a lieutenant and not a general, eh? Since starting the season 9-8, the Bulls are 42-11, a pace that would produce 65 wins over an 82-game schedule. Under Thibodeau, the Bulls’ defense has improved by eight points per game over a year ago, jumping from the middle of the pack in the league to No. 2 behind only the Celtics. The last time Rivers took the Celtics into Chicago, the Bulls held Boston to 79 points.

Fact: while transitioning to Thibodeau, the Bulls allowed opponents to score 100 or more points in eight of their first 18 games. They have allowed just eight other occasions since. The Bulls have figured it out on the defensive end, something that should strike fear in you if you’re a Celtics fan.

From the start, we have all understood the implications of the Perkins deal: the Celtics got a little softer on defense, a little more skilled on offense. Or so we believed. And yet, in their last nine games, the Celtics have cracked 90 points just three times, those coming in games against the Clippers (a loss), the Pacers (who stink) and Knicks. All three of those clubs rank in the bottom half of the league in defense.

Maybe swapping out Perkins for Jeff Green wasn’t as big a move as we thought. Maybe we needed to put more emphasis on the shooting troubles of Rajon Rondo, who has played much of the last two weeks as if on an emotional strike. (Yes, he was better on Monday.) The Celtics lost the Finals last year as much for the ineptitude of their halfcourt offense as anything else, and we all know where the offense on this team starts.

In the interim, here’s the problem: the Celtics have just 13 games left. In the next three weeks, the Celtics need to get Shaquille O’Neal back into the mix, sort out their rotation and stabilize their bench. Along the way, they need to beat the Bulls, who outmatch them at the point. And they need to do it all for more than the simple fact that their window continues to close.

They need to do it, too, because Chicago’s window is now just opening.

And if the Celtics don’t beat the Bulls this year, the challenge next year and beyond will only be more difficult.

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com columnist

And so just when, exactly, did Kendrick Perkins become Bill Russell? When did he become the indisputable X factor? When did he become the piece that would put the Celtics over the top, that would assure them of an 18th championship and another celebratory land-and-sea tour of Boston's historic neighborhoods?

Tell me: when?

Make no mistake, Danny Ainge shook the ground yesterday with the news that the Celtics had dealt away Perkins, their starting center, in a trading deadline maneuver that, under the circumstances, qualified as a significant shakeup. Almost nobody saw it coming. Perkins was a member of the championship team here in 2007-08 and one of the few young Celtics who endured Ainge's ultimate makeover, a cataclysmic event that had many Celtics fans screaming about the departure of Al Jefferson.

Then the Celtics went 66-16 en route to their 17th title while Jefferson dissolved into the relative muddle of mediocrity (at best) that houses the large majority of teams in the NBA.

We all liked Perkins. We still do. We like his toughness and his work ethic, his intensity and his defense. Perkins was a good man to have on a team built around Hall of Famers, if for no other reason than the fact that he was willing to do much of the dirty work. And yet, somewhere between there and here, the perception of him as a vital ingredient has reached levels of utter silliness.

The guy ain't exactly Kareem in the low post, folks. Given those hands of his, you'd be bold to entrust him with the responsibility of holding your precious newborn. Guys like Perkins are relatively ordinary commodities in the NBA, which is why the Celtics offered him a four-year deal worth a reported $22 million earlier this season. When Perkins turned it down, we should have known then that he viewed himself as something more than the replaceable role player he is.

Seriously. Do you really believe Perkins to be a $10 million player? If you do, you're thinking with your heart more than your head. And as we all know, Ainge is hardly the sentimental type.

As for Game 7 of last year's NBA Finals, it has somehow become an accepted fact that the Celtics would have defeated the Lakers had Perkins been healthy. Of course, this is both highly speculative and completely unfounded. Perkins certainly would have helped negate the Celtics' rebounding issues against the Lakers, but he also would have been a complete liability in what was, at times, a grossly stagnant half-court offense. To suggest that the Celtics lost that series on the boards in an overly simplistic attempt to justify defeat. Far more worrisome in that series was Boston's ineptitude in the half-court.

Go back and look. The Lakers beat the Celtics at their own game, by digging in and playing ferocious defense when it mattered. The Lakers averaged 90.6 points per game in the series. The Celtics averaged 87.1, including a whopping 73 in the final two games. When the Celtics broke 90 in the series, they won. When they didn't, they lost. Defense and rebounding weren't the real problems. Offense was.

Which is why, as we all know, Ainge went out and picked up Shaquille O'Neal during the offseason. The idea was to give the Celtics an offensive presence in the low post, someone to create better floor spacing and open looks for Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and others. The plan worked beautifully through the early part of the season. But then Shaq went down and Perkins came back, and everyone started buying into a refrain that Doc Rivers continued to sell right up through the Game 7 loss to the Lakers.

You know, we still haven't lost a playoff series when our starting five has been intact.

To his credit, Phil Jackson threw those words in the Celtics' faces yesterday ¬- "They go down as never having lost a playoff series," said the typically insufferable Jackson - because that assertion is now what it was then: an excuse. Nobody in Boston lamented the absence of Andrew Bynum when the Celtics cleaned up on the Lakers in June 2008. The Lakers were the better team last year, just as the Celtics were in 2008, and there is no point in crying or rationalizing. Sometimes you win. Sometimes you lose. Deal with it.

If the Celtics are to miss Perkins this season and beyond - and in some areas, they will - the loss might seem most noticeable in any meeting with Orlando, if only because Perkins historically has done a commendable job on Dwight Howard. Of course, nobody was talking about Perkins' defense when Orlando came here earlier this month, a 91-80 Celtics victory in which Howard totaled 28 points and 13 rebounds while Perkins went scoreless. The Celtics nearly defeated the Magic in the 2008-09 playoffs without Kevin Garnett and they will defeat them now without Perkins because they have a better, deeper team than Orlando does.

A title? That is open the debate, just as it was two days ago. Perkins played 31 minutes against the Lakers on Feb. 10, at the Garden, and the Celtics lost 92-86. San Antonio is loaded. Pending buyouts and further maneuvers, the Celtics are still the best team in the Eastern Conference, just as they were Tuesday, and there is every chance they will be better from Thursday's dealings.

Lest anyone forget, recent Boston history is spotted with aggressive, unexpected maneuverings that turned out quite well after being met with public outcry. Theo Epstein traded both Nomar Garciaparra and Manny Ramirez at the trading deadline, getting the Red Sox a World Series title on the first occasion and advancing them to Game 7 of the 2008 American League Championship Series on the second. Bill Belichick cut Lawyer Milloy in 2003 and the Patriots went on to win the Super Bowl. Last year, Belichick traded Randy Moss and the Patriots went a shocking 14-2.

In the grand scheme of things, despite the response of many, the Kendrick Perkins deal is not nearly as stunning as those moves were.

And while there is still every chance that the Celtics will not win a championship this year, let's get this out there right now:

If they lose, it won't be because they missed Kendrick Perkins.

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com columnist

Carmelo Anthony is in New York and Deron Williams in New Jersey, and so a little more sand has slipped through the hourglass for the Celtics. Of course, Boston was on borrowed time to begin with. But the events of recent days only reinforce the point that the time for the Celtics is now.

Fittingly, the Celtics are in Denver tonight to continue their four-game trip through the West, and a stop in Utah is scheduled for Monday. In the short term, the Celtics will benefit. Anthony and Chauncey Billups are no longer with the Nuggets, and Williams is no longer with the Jazz. Just like that, the Celtics' most challenging road games on this four-city swing turned into must wins, albeit at the price of a future threat.

Nobody really knows what the Knicks will be now under Mike D'Antoni, at least not yet. But in Anthony, Billups and Amar'e Stoudemire, the Knicks have a trio that will wobble some knees in the Eastern Conference, at least as long as the 34-year-old Billups is under contract.

"I think New York needed a moment like this. When they got Amar'e, it brought some excitement back to the city," Anthony told reporters last night at Madison Square Garden, where the Knicks defeated Milwaukee 114-108 in his New York debut. "Now, as Amar'e said, New York basketball is back. Will we win a championship this year? Who knows? That takes time. But this team is headed in the right direction."

Indeed it is.

And as surely as the Patriots have the Jets and the Red Sox have the Yankees, the Celtics now have the Knicks.

Do not misunderstand. The Celtics are still the favorite in the Atlantic Division and, for that matter, the Eastern Conference. In the short term, that will not change. Nearly a full month will pass before the Celtics see the Knicks again for a March 21 affair in New York, by which point the new-and-improved Knicks will have played precisely 15 games. Anthony, Stoudemire and Billups have a lot of catching up to do, though it will be interesting to see how they fare Sunday against Dwyane Wade, LeBron James, Chris Bosh and the rest of the Miami Heat.

In their first try, what if the Knicks can do to the Heat what the Heat have been unable to do the Celtics? What if New York can win? What if the Knicks, like the Celtics of 2007-08, can prove that chemistry can be almost instantaneous instead of making excuses like the detestable Heat?

For some of us, this much seems clear: the Knicks have been assembled with a far more logical blueprint than the one used to build the Heat. In the short term, the Knicks have a championship-caliber, battle-tested point guard, a pure scorer and more interior presence than the Heat. If New York is willing and capable of playing any kind of defense, the Knicks could be a factor come springtime.

At the very least, unlike James, Wade and Bosh in Miami, Billups will not make excuses.

For the Celtics, the NBA maneuverings of the last several months obviously have far greater implications over the long term than the short. Since losing the Lakers in Game 7 of the Finals, the Celtics have made an obvious effort to beef up their interior and add depth, the latter of which they are now testing. The Heat landed perhaps the single greatest free agent in sports history. The Knicks now have completely rebuilt themselves through free agency and trade.

As for the Nets, they are still an afterthought, albeit one with an elite point guard in a division that suddenly grew a great deal more challenging.

In the short term, during the four weeks that will pass before the Celtics face the Knicks, Boston will work through an important part of the schedule. Beginning with last week's win over the New Jersey, the Celtics opened a 15-game stretch during which their most threatening games were to be at Denver and at Utah. Now, even those contests have grown considerably softer. The simple truth is that the Celtics have a cream-puff schedule over the next four weeks on which to fatten up their record and nurse their injuries, at which point it will be time to start gearing up for the playoffs.

Will the Knicks be a real factor by then? Only heaven knows. But the further we advance in this extended era of Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen, the more the factors shift from their favor. The Celtics will only get older. The road will only get steeper. The quest for a championship will only grow harder.

And, of course, the competition will only get better.

By Tony Massarotti, Boston.com columnist

Watching the icicles drip while wondering if Tiger Woods will ever win again ...

By the time the Bruins play their next game at the TD Garden, the trading deadline will have come and gone. What the Bruins do between now and then will go a long way in determining their playoff potential, particularly in an Eastern Conference where the Philadelphia Flyers seem to be the consensus favorite.

But, in the wake of the injury to Pittsburgh's Evgeni Malkin, the Bruins are a threat for the conference finals as much as anyone else. The regular season means relatively nothing in the big picture, of course, but the Bruins have had success against the Tampa Bay Lightning, Washington Capitals and Pittsburgh Penguins this season. They have done well against the Flyers, too. The team that has given the Bruins the most difficulty is the Canadiens, whom the Bruins currently would be paired against the first round of the playoffs.

When the Bruins return to the Garden in March, their first game will be against the Lightning, who currently stand as the No. 2 seed in the East, one place ahead of the Bruins. Boston's ability to claim that No. 2 seed could therefore result in a host of first-round matchups that would increase the Bruins' chances in the early round - of course, the bottom of the conference standings could also change - but it would also accomplish something else:

It would all but ensure that the Bruins would not see the Flyers, if at all, until the conference finals.

Think there would be any hype for that series?

* If you're into minutia, general manager Theo Epstein listed the following three concerns about the Red Sox yesterday during an interview on 98.5 The Sports Hub: organizational catching depth, organizational depth in the starting rotation, and potential vulnerability to lefthanded pitching. Epstein then qualified that last remark by noting that all four players on the projected Opening Day bench have a history of excelling against lefthanders.

So what does that mean? In addition to Mike Cameron, Jed Lowrie and Jason Varitek, Darnell McDonald seems to have the inside spot on the 25th and final roster spot. This suggests that Ryan Kalish will open the year in the minors as insurance for Jacoby Ellsbury and/or J.D. Drew.

Now let's take this a step further: we already know that the Red Sox' lineup is more lefthanded than in years past and that manager Terry Francona has indicated he might hit for David Ortiz (or sit him entirely) in certain situations. Assuming that Cameron effectively platoons with Drew, that means McDonald could be the one to hit for Ortiz in a given situation or that he could replace Ortiz in the lineup entirely against lefthanded starters.

Just wondering: did you ever think you'd see the day where Darnell McDonald hit for David Ortiz?

* So much for that LaMarr Woodley idea as reports indicate that the Pittsburgh Steelers will use the franchise tag on the linebacker. Maybe the Patriots would have made a run at Woodley, and maybe not. But now even the dream is about to die.

* The time has almost come for the Celtics to start making hay and opening up distance on the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference. Out of the All-Star break, the Celtics will not play back-to-back games again until March 18-19. And while the Celtics will be on the road for a chunk of that time, they will play all 12 of their games against poor or relatively mediocre competition, not a single opponent currently ranking among the top four teams in either conference.

During that same period of time the Heat will twice play the San Antonio Spurs, and the Spurs also will play the Lakers. If the Celtics take care of business in the next month, they could put themselves in position to have home-court advantage throughout the entire postseason, something that would still have great value to them, as we all learned last year.

* Since being benched, Tyler Seguin has two goals and three points in three games while logging an average of about 13 minutes of ice time per game. Whether or not you believe that Claude Julien is the coach who can take the Bruins to the next level, give Julien credit for his ability to work with young, impressionable players.

At the very least, Seguin is learning from a good teacher.