How good is our defense?

[jmost]

Brett Brown said after the game in London that the Celtics were the best defensive team in the league, which impressed me, because I know stats, especially the "points allowed per game" stat, can be misleading since it doesn't account for pace of play.

So when I've seen this year that the C's are leading the league in this category, I wasn't all that impressed. Now, the eye test tells us that when we get after it, our D is pretty damn good, so it's no surprise that we'd rank pretty high in various defensive stats. But I didn't realized how high. And these stats seem more meaningful to me.

Overall FG % allowed: 1st
3 pt FG % allowed: 2nd
Adjusted FG % allowed: 1st
PPS allowed: 1st

And while we're not a dominant rebounding team, we're solid on the defensive glass, unlike in recent years when we'd get killed on second chance points. We're also middle of the pack in both steals and blocks.

Imagine if we add a real inside presence over the summer.

[Roadrunner]

BOS team defense is excellent. Top-3 on any night, and [HASH]1 on most nights. A lot of fans judge defense on blocks, and steals however those STAT categories are misleading. The Irving trade was a major upgrade, because teams can not attack the weak link, which was IT. A secondary upgrade was the duo of Baynes, and Theis because Amir Johnson was a corpse. Also secondary, the upgrade of one of the wings, Tatum because Crowder's defense had been trending downward for years.

[FLCeltsFan]

Our defensive rating is 99.6 and that takes all the defensive stats into consideration to give the rating. The Celtics are the only team with a defensive rating under 100. The eye test tells you that the Celtics can be unreal on the defensive end when they clamp down. I love defense and the old saying that defense wins championships is real.