The game had long since been past the stage of doubt, but Bill Walker and J.R. Giddens couldn’t help but put on a little bit of a show.  Walker drove to the right, jumped over and through Josh Boone, and finished with a right-handed kapow.  The next play, Giddens took a pass down low and rose for a reverse dunk that looked so easy, so effortless, it almost made me think I could have done it.

So that’s why everyone was clamoring for the young guys.

But the Celtics’ 111-87 victory wasn’t about the C’s young fellas dunking in garbage time.  It was about the inept nature of New Jersey’s play and Boston’s workmanlike effort in dispatching them during the first half.

Paul Pierce and the Celtics had a lot to cheer about against the New Jersey Nets.

Despite the large margin of victory, I’m actually not sure the game will affect the C’s win total…

I’m pretty sure the NBA doesn’t count wins against high school teams.

As bad as the Nets were, I couldn’t even tell how well the Celtics played.  It looked like they did a good job… but it certainly could have been largely attributed to the Nets’ lack of effort and pride.  The Celts shot 67% in the quarter, and the worst +/- for a starter in that quarter was Ray Allen’s +16.  By halftime, the C’s had already racked up 21 assists, placed five players in double figures, and raced to a 71-35 lead.

They mailed in the second half, but wouldn’t you be bored after that first half, too?

Seriously, though, it’s hard to imagine an NBA basketball team being worse than the New Jersey Nets.  In fact, I would go so far as to say they’re the single worst team I’ve seen in my entire life. That doesn’t mean they are the least talented team I’ve ever seen; they  actually have a couple good players (Not a lot, but a couple).

The thing that really sets the Nets apart from all the other bad teams I’ve seen in my life is that they simply don’t give a damn.  The first play of the game was a wide open Paul Pierce three-pointer and, a couple plays later, he drove down the middle of the lane — where no defenders were there to meet him — for an easy two-handed jam.  The sad thing is, the Nets didn’t offer any more resistance after those plays.  If anything, their effort level got even worse.

Their crowd had about 200 people in it, and that might be generous, but would you go to watch such a pathetic bunch?  You couldn’t pay me enough to watch the Nets give away games while laying over and playing dead.  The Celtics completely mailed in the second half, and still won by over 20 points.  At no point in the game did the Nets make you think they had a chance, or that they even had a pulse.

They were so bad I’m going to go ahead and say it:  The Nets aren’t an NBA team.  They can’t be.  They’ve won three games more than I have this season.  They don’t rotate on defense, don’t hit the open man on offense, and don’t care about a single thing that happens on the court.

You know who the Nets remind me of, far more than they remind me of an NBA basketball team?  The lady who owns the Indians in the movie Major League.  You know, the one who wants to tank games and assure that her team loses every single night.  The one who wants to do everything in her power to lose games, rather than win them.

The Nets might not try to lose games, but they sure don’t do anything that makes you think they’re trying to win them, either.  At least earlier in the season, the Nets had a little bit of life.  They were injured and outmanned, but at least they were scrappy.  But that was then, and this is now.  I can now safely say the Nets are not an NBA team.

The C’s were led by Paul Pierce’s 24 points, Rajon Rondo’s 14 assists, and Kendrick Perkins’ 8 boards.  Ray Allen (15 points), Glen Davis (13 points), Perk (12 points), Tony Allen (11 points), Brian Scalabrine (11 points), and Rondo (11 points) joined Pierce in double figure scoring…

But statistics hardly matter when you’re playing a joke of a team, one that seemed to care very little about the game at hand.