The NBA's foul-begging problem, NHL Hart trophy picks, Hockey East tourney

Saturday 3/14/26

Jaylen Brown needs to give it a rest with the referees. Anytime I see a clip of him, he's talking about the officiating. It takes away from his focus.

College basketball makes for better watching than the NBA does right now. These conference tournaments before the big tournament make that plain. There's more flow to the game. The teams go up and down the court. It's a more physical game.

The NBA needs to adopt a policy of letting more go. The problem is, the league loves the offense, the big scores. Go back and look at the scores of, say, a typical Bulls game during the second three-peat era. They'd win 92-87. It was a rugged league.

And at time, it was thought of as less rugged than the mid to late 1980s were, when you had Celtics clotheslining Lakers and the Bad Boy Pistons.

I'm not suggesting you make it know that guys can now maul each other, but players need to stop thinking that practically anything should called a foul if they're trying to score. The way to achieve that is to holster the whistle to significantly greater degree.

You can actually have a power forward in college basketball, whereas they don't exist in the NBA now. I miss two-point ball. Mid and short range jumpers, cutting, backdoor passes, players playing with their backs to the basket, low post moves. You know, basketball.

That's the thing about the four major North American sports now--they have all become less like themselves. They are less themselves. They're this kind of scaled down, inorganic bastardization of themselves.

They're designed to be other things now for other reasons that are ancillary from the sports themselves--fantasy leagues, betting, national stupidity, the lowest common denominator, the parasocial. None of these things, for instance, is organically a part of baseball, for example, as in the game between the lines. But these things have been made to overmake these sports.

I touched on the BC-Maine men's Hockey East tournament game yesterday in that text to my buddy Bruce up in Maine, saying I liked Maine to come out with the victory, so BC went out and won 5-0 because you can't predict these things and if I can't do it as I freely grant then how do you think it's going for the wizards of the couch who lick the cheese dust off their fingers before placing their latest wager with some betting app?

In a sense, I wasn't that surprised. BC has had a bunch of no-shows this year, and sometimes a few in a row, but then they turn around and win. Kind of an odd identity. It's like their modus operandi is to not show up, then play strong as if they needed to no-show for a while first to gather resources or energy or something.

They'll play at the Garden next Friday against TBD. Three other Hockey East tourney games are on NESN+ today back to back to back, so I'm sure I'll see some of that between work and stairs.

Nineteen-year-old Macklin Celebrini has a strong case for the NHL's Hart trophy this year as MVP. He might be my pick as of right now. It's him or Nikita Kucherov. That Sharks team wasn't supposed to do much of anything, and here they are, knocking on that playoffs door.

Their second-leading scoring behind Celebrini is Will Smith, who is in the 40s. I like Smith and think he's going to be a nice player, and could well be a star, and this season has had him moving in that direction, but the production gap between Smith and Celebrini is vast right now.

The problem is that NHL people try to give every damn award to Connor McDavid, a hugely overrated player. They can't bestow enough honors on this guy. His team loses? Well, shoot, give that man an award anyway!

It's like they're trying to apologize for his team losing by giving whatever form of an MVP is nearest to hand.

McDavid has a guy on his team that his almost as good as he is. Sometimes he's better.

Celebrini and Kucherov are the guys on their teams.

I didn't realize how good Celebrini was during his one year at BU. He was good, but I saw some lapses, especially early. But wow is he a fantastic player. The Bruins didn't have an answer for him the other night and that wasn't even one of the better games I've seen Celebrini play. You're looking at someone who may become the best player in the world for a three, four year run.

And if that sounds like a small window, then I'd respectfully suggest familiarizing yourself a bit more with hockey (and sports in general) history, because it's exceedingly rare that anyone has a run longer than that. When someone is the best player in the world, it's usually for a year or two, and more typically a year.

I'll talk about this more soon. In a bit, for instance, I'll go into who the best baseball player in the world was...in 1982, which people will find surprising/eye-opening. And then after that, I'll premiere my novel theory as to who the best baseball player in the world was for a two-year period between 1977-1978...hint...it wasn't Jim Rice! Or George Foster.

Saw a post on a Boston College message board--which has a large contingent of people who graduated in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s; that is, people who tend to be more intelligent and knowledgeable than people who have come of age in the internet age--in which the poster said that James Hagens is the most talented BC hockey player and is poised to be the best BC player in the NHL since Johnny Gaudreau.

I find this...almost ridiculous. I mean, you don't know, and I could be wrong. I've said what I've said about Hagens going back to last year. I just touched on Will Smith above. He was just at BC. Cutter Gauthier could finish the season with 40 goals for the Anaheim Ducks. He has 33 goals in 64 games, and leads Anaheim--a team going to the playoffs--in scoring. He's twenty-two.

Is Hagens ever going to have a season in the NHL as productive as a 40-goal season? Is he ever going to lead a team in scoring? A team that is first in its division? He could...but what are the chances? I don't think that's remotely who he is. And it's not like Gautier is Macklin Celebrini.

These are recent BC guys. Matt Boldy went to BC. He has 74 points in 62 games right now in his age twenty-four season. I can give you fifteen BC guys since Gaudreau probably who I think are better than or ballpark with Hagens.

I expect Ryan Leonard to probably end up being better at the NHL level. Definitely was in college, though they're not the same thing, of course. For instance, Celebrini looks more dominant in the NHL than he did in a Terriers sweater. Your style of game can have something to do with it.

Hagens had three points last night (with two coming on empty net goals).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyoSR9lT6sI