Suddenly, there are questions about the Green team that beat up on the NBA all year long. The Celtics were outhustled and outrebounded in Game 4. There were moments when they looked old. Ray Allen couldn't guard Joe Johnson. Paul Pierce couldn't finish a crunch-time drive. Kevin Garnett couldn't take his game to a higher level, opening himself to old criticism that he morphs into A-Rod in the playoffs. Doc Rivers made fans wish Isiah Thomas were coaching the Celtics (OK, that one's an exaggeration).
There was something else awry. The Celtics at times lost their composure. Garnett got into a jam with Zaza (don't call me Gabor) Pachulia and seemed stunned when the Hawk backup did not back down. For a minute, Zaza looked like he was going to go all Carl Everett on KG, but Pachulia settled for a head nuzzle instead of a head butt and peace was soon restored.
All this came just a few hours after captain Paul Pierce was slapped with a $25,000 fine for what the league deemed a "menacing gesture" toward the Atlanta bench in the final minutes of Boston's Game 3 loss. It would be impossible for any human to have less understanding of gang signs than yours truly (my experience is confined to a viewing of "Colors" at the West Newton Cinema in 1988), but Pierce had to know his gesture would be inflammatory.
Given the heat of the moment and the direction in which it was aimed, it strains all credibility to claim the gesture was no different from Pierce's "blood, sweat, and tears" low-five salute during pregame introductions.
The Celtics' in-house TV gang predictably minimized the moment, but the league obviously took it seriously, and given Pierce's near-death experience at a Boston nightclub in 2000, the captain's "menacing gesture" falls someplace between immature and reckless.
Yesterday, the Celtics fretted about potential Game 5 suspensions because during the Game 4 fracas Kendrick Perkins briefly left the bench and Garnett made contact with referee Ed Rush. Just before dinnertime, Boston management got word that there would be no suspensions, but Rivers acknowledged, "We, as a team, have to stop putting the league in this position. That's on us, not on the league."
