Across all of NBA history, Isaiah Thomas 2016 is the 5th most efficient guard season and 7th most efficient season overall with least 30 points per 75 possessions.
You just had to be there man. Unstoppable year for The Little Guy, most impressive individual season I’ve seen in my 30 years of being a Celtics fan.
Yeah and talk about an absolute lightning rod of crowd energy. Dude would absolutely feed on it.
Those years turned me from an extremely casual fan to a lifer.
True or not, it felt like it propelled us into our latest championship. On a team where championships are paramount, those IT4/bridgie teams were some of the best to watch. God, that shit was great. Never forget.
King of the North was easily top 5 enjoyable non-championship seasons. Beyond how much fun IT was to watch, the offense as a whole was masterfully designed and executed. That team was the epitome of the sum was greater than its parts. Everyone seemed completely bought in to the scheme and seemed like an extension of Brad’s mind.
Brad moved to the front office for a lot of reasons, but I think that he just did the math that there wasn’t much to excite him in coaching in a league that has declined into a glorified one-on-one 3 point contest (either shooting from behind the arc or getting fouled around the rim). Those teams had great ball movement, and wickedly creative inbounds plays. Furthermore, the regular season is even more dumbed down to this style of play, since teams don’t want to put their best plays on film.
King of the fourth*
calling him the little guy seems so disrespectful to me lmao
Man I miss that dude. I’ll never forget him and the short time he was here …
loved that era of the celtics
As much as I love stats I don’t need them for him. 16-17 was still the most exciting season just from pure entertainment. I watched pretty much every game that season for IT. always a legend in Boston.
People will argue that he shouldn’t be in the HOF. I was as impressed by what I saw with him as what I saw with Jordan. He defied every expectation.
Does anyone argue that he should be in HOF? That year was amazing, but no one is getting in the HOF based on one season.
Just me mostly. I don’t do it often because I know he doesn’t fit the profile and people don’t understand. Nevertheless, he was an outlier in the truest sense. What he was able to accomplish didn’t make sense. It doesn’t need to make the same sense as everyone else because for a moment in time he didn’t.
It might not fit the numbers you are looking at, but for my money, the most similar season I can remember would be AI’s MVP year.
what expectations did jordan defy? he was expected to be great and he was. being even greater than expected is hardly what id call defying
Talking about IT, but Jordan did defy expectations. He kept leveling up. He wasn’t expected to have 3pt range for example.
2017 oops*
FTR, TS Add On is a stat which measures how many points over excepted (league average TS% ) a player/team scores on their FGA + FTA.
It’s a great way to show how much a player is contributing to team TS% and hence offensive rating.
IT lead the league in 2017 in TSAO with (+256.3) points.
The rest of the entire team combined had a TSAO of (-33) points.
The previous season when Steph had the GOAT scoring season lead the league in TSAO with (+454.7) points the rest of GSW had an incredible TSAO of (+364.5) points outside Steph for instance.
It was a generational carry job to convert that offence into the 1st seed and second best offensive rating in the east and 8th best in the league.
IMO if Steph did not have the down year in 2017 and instead had the same season that IT had, momentum would have carried him easily to his third consecutive MVP, regardless of KD joining.
The analytics behind the amazing season he had. Think sometimes and I include myself in that, maybe only true Celtics fans recognize just how good he was then. He really was a special offensive talent at his peak.
Probably the the Celtics season I enjoyed watching the most. Pure joy watching him play.
Fav player of all time bc of that season tbh
That’s one of my favorite Celtic seasons to watch
Top 3-5 favorite Celtic season for me
Oh we’re gonna be bringing up IT a lot this season aren’t we?
Literally an unforgettable season for anyone who witnessed it. The highs and the lows were crazy.
Us almost beating the warriors and ending their streak in a 4 OT game where we lost, only for the jazz i think to beat the warriors their next game because we completely gassed them out. IT’s sister passing away, seeing him crying with avery bradley in an empty arena hours before the game starts, then he drops 53 on the wizards head (also shoutout to john wall for the 40 ball). One of my all time favorite playoff games, and he did all that shit on a bad hip that we didn’t realize was basically career ending. IT4 doesn’t get the credit he deserves league wide, but in MA that man is a king.
One of my all time fav players. That season was so much fun to watch
It was like watching a magic show every night.
Maybe if he were to STFU about the Brinks trucks and took a paycut, he would have still been a Celtics?
Loved IT, but if Ainge didn’t assemble the team the way he did and if Brad Stevens didn’t have that system in place for him to succeed, this would have never happened.
Al Horford deserves a lot of credit for making every guard on the team look great.
Brinks trucks wasn’t a “pay or else” statement. Hi back and watch the tape”it didn’t have a damn thing to do with why it went down as it did. why Danny wasn’t going to pay him what he worked for and deserved.
No one doubts that he didn’t work hard, but when you want to win as a team and you (not you, but IT) think a defensive liability deserves a max? It’s clear delusion. It completely ignores the fact that maxing Horford and IT at the same was not going to help the Celtics. Was IT ever the same afterwards? The injury is one variable, but the other variable involved here is that the Celtics MADE IT POSSIBLE for IT to succeed.
I love IT and always will, he gave many of us some of the best moments, and will always be grateful because I went through a difficult time during that period.
But come on, a max IT would have crippled the team.
We need to look at the reality here.
Jaylen Brown needs a reality check too, for example, he said they are going to win multiple championships, it’s not gonna work with both Jays on a max, hence the Celtics trading away KP and Jrue. I don’t care about the fact that KP is injury prone, neither do I care that Jrue is getting older, Al is gone too. That was the core.
Celtics should tank as hard as they can.
Was my son’s favorite player when he first started to like the Celtics. His class won a fitness challenge and IT came and visited them with ice cream. When IT got traded he didn’t cry. He wept.
I still wonder sometimes what an “All In” push around a healthy IT would’ve looked like.
If he was healthy, I’d argue they would’ve gotten past LeBron in Tatum’s rookie season & probably pushed for a title before Tatum’s 1st extension. The chances double or triple if Hayward isn’t injured or they used his money to get a star Center to pair with Horford.
IT, JB, Tatum, Al
Terry, Smart, Mook, Baynes
Was at The Garden for the overtime playoff game against the Wizards when he took control in OT Win with 50+;points
Wow! Just wow! The little guy really was something else. Sucks an injury completely derailed a promising career
Unreal year for sure.
But also… good god Steph Curry was absurd…
Steph’s the most absurd offensive year ever.
In terms of points added over league average TS% (adjusted for season and pace), the gap between Steph and the second best season is bigger than the gap between second and the 25th- best season.
The best non-championship season I will ever watch in my life. That Wizards series will forever be on my all-time list. A fucking shame how it all ended.
Doesn’t matter yall traded him