Green's scar is a testament to how successful and satisfying his season was.

There are three (and only three) players about whom I feel confident saying they will return from this year’s squad. The list, in order from least confident to most:

• Jared Sullinger. Sully presents an intriguing trade chip if Boston needs a sweetener going after bigger names, but his value is considerably higher as a Celtic. Very little reason to trade him on his own.
• Rajon Rondo. Rondo’s status may never seem certain around the trade deadline, but other teams will want to see him returning healthy before they pull the trigger on a trade involving him.
• Yourself, Jeff Green.

Why do I feel so confident? Consider the following (yes, more bullet points):

• One year after open heart surgery, you averaged 16.6 points per 36 minutes.
• Your 3-point shooting was unbelievable. According to mySynergySports.com, you shot 39.1% from 3-point range, which is excellent. What’s more, you finished at 40% if we remove nine missed half-court heaves that you chucked up, which brought down your average. In spot-up situations, which amounted for nearly 70% of your 3-point attempts, you averaged 46.8% from 3-point range. That’s unbelievable.
• Oh, and by the way, you averaged 1.17 points per possession in spot-up attempts, which was 33rd in the entire NBA.
• Your individual defense, particularly on LeBron James, was spectacular. In Synergy’s (admittedly somewhat flawed) defensive statistics, your opponents shot just 36.3% for the season.

Also this:

And this:

And we can’t forget this:

Those are just unkind, Jeff. I fully approve.

I think what was most satisfying about your season was the way everyone wrote you off before the year even began. Danny gave you a pretty large contract as the season began, and immediately writers began jumping all over it. I’m including myself in this; I thought it was a horrible risk to give a player like yourself (significant health risks, little actual production) four years/$36 million. I wasn’t necessarily against giving you $9 million a season, but why hand you the long contract right away? Why not overpay you for one season, then reassess at the end of it? Then, when the season began and you struggled, we all began to worry. What if Danny just threw away 36 million over four seasons? I despaired.

As it turns out, I was wrong to despair. This happens a lot.

Once you settled into a groove (which, incidentally, was something you never had a chance to do in 2011), you came out swinging. I remember that dunk on Al Jefferson in particular because I wondered if it might shake you out of your reverie and remind you that playing basketball is FUN, especially for an ultra-long, bouncy forward. I’m not sure if it was the dunk that did it, but you performed considerably better after it. You and Pierce, especially, seemed to develop a great give-and-take that resulted in some of the best games of your career including a MONSTER night against the Heat. Somehow we managed to waste your performance, which was depressing, but watching you single-handedly lay a beatdown on Miami was probably the most satisfying moment of the season.

It’s also difficult to complain about your playoff run. You averaged 20 points and 5.3 rebounds in 43 minutes per game, which was considerably higher in both categories than your regular season averages. You shot 45.3% from 3-point range (!!!!!!), which was excellent. Generally, you did just about everything Boston could have asked from you. The long minutes were beginning to get to you by the end, but they were getting to everyone else in Doc’s 7-man rotation. It was a lot to ask.

There are certainly areas in which you could improve. You are still not a great rebounder (or even a good one), which is disappointing for a player of your size and athleticism. If you could average seven rebounds per game, I’d feel a little bit better about the idea of you replacing Pierce, but at this point in your career, I’m just not sure those kind of numbers are realistic on the boards. Your help defense can be problematic. Your first step, although it’s long, still isn’t really quick enough to get around some of the faster perimeter defenders. I’m not sure how you would work on those things over the summer, but improving them would go a long way toward cementing your reputation as an excellent player.

We already hinted at this in an earlier section, but the next question for you is whether or not you can replace Paul Pierce. The easy (and correct) answer is no, you can’t. Pierce is a Celtic legend and his departure will be the cause for mourning. But can you produce numbers similar to his? Possibly. That remains to be seen, especially when Rondo returns. You never really got a chance to get comfortable with Rondo, which was disappointing given your similar skill-sets. Your interaction will be an entertaining subplot next year.

But that comes later, and it’s possible you may not even have to replace Pierce. All in all, your season was probably the most satisfying of any Celtic. You out-performed expectations and while I wouldn’t say you silenced your critics (because there are still plenty of them), I WOULD say that they should stay silenced. At this point, your contract is looking pretty damn good.

I’m looking forward to next year, Jeff. I think it will be a good one for you.

Follow Tom on Twitter: @Tom_NBA.

Chris,

Brandon Bass does two things on offense. This is one of them.

Brandon,

Interesting fact that I bet you didn’t know: When you search Google Images for “Brandon Bass,” a shirtless guy who clearly lifts more weights than me shows up a lot. So that’s a thing. Maybe I should go on a diet.

Anywho, it would be cliche and not quite accurate to call your season up and down. That phrase usually suggests that you went through a lot of lulls and rises. The reality is that you went through a prolonged lull and then a prolonged rise; a return to respectability that culminated in what, realistically, may have been a team-MVP performance in the first round of the playoffs.

For much of the season, you struggled to find your range. For you, offensively, that’s a pretty big hit. Your entire offensive game is predicated on two things.

1. Your pick-and-pop mid-range game, which became much more difficult when Rondo went down for the season since pick-and-pops are kind of his thing.
2. Your snail-speed monster dunks which unfold seemingly in slow-motion and end up with you looking like you are going to tear the rim off the backboard.

Obviously, without Blake Griffin-esque athleticism, you weren’t going to be able to base your entire game off the latter, which meant that you needed the former to have an impact offensively. And as the season progressed, you quietly began hitting a LOT more of your shots. You finished .06 below your career average, but you were actually better than last year from the field, so most people were willing to call your season a success.

But the success of your season actually had a lot more to do with the defensive end. In that series against the Knicks, you were shockingly effective against Carmelo Anthony. You were too strong for his bull drives, too big for him to get around consistently, too long for his jumpers and too smart for his pump fakes, which frustrated and limited him. Ultimately, of course, the Celtics were too limited to truly take advantage of your performance, but if any player can redeem a somewhat-disappointing season with a single solid playoff series (that his team lost), you did so against New York.

Next year is a contract year for you, and you will be a $6.9 million expiring contract, so you will definitely hear your name floated around this summer and up until the trade deadline (if you aren’t traded before then). It’s Danny. You’ve been warned.

It’s tough to say much more to you when you are such a known commodity. Everyone knows that you shoot pretty well from mid-range. Everybody knows you don’t do much else offensively. Everyone knows you don’t grab a ton of rebounds, but you are a pretty solid individual defender (it’s worth noting that your rebounding during the playoffs, 7.1 per 36 minutes, was actually pretty acceptable given that you were mostly defending Carmelo so far from the basket).

At this point, those are just the things you do, and it’s tough to see you expanding much on that repertoire. So…keep doing those things, and brace yourself. The trade rumors are coming.

Follow Tom on Twitter: @Tom_NBA.

Bradley's defensive prowess was recognized by voters this year.

Every time Avery Bradley cuts off a player bringing the ball up the court, forces them to change direction, beats them to the spot or bodies them off their desired path, I think the same thing: “Man, I would absolutely hate to play basketball against him.”

Apparently, opposing coaches think the same thing, which is why he received enough votes to make the All-Defense Second Team as a guard. Bradley finished third in the guard voting with 25 points (10 First Team votes, 5 Second Team), but he was 12 points short of First Team guard Chris Paul and 28 points short of ex-Celtic Tony Allen, who led all vote-getters with 53 points.

Bradley’s selection is made even more impressive by the two months he missed at the beginning of the season, as well as his disappointing performance in the playoffs. Still, it is a little surprising that only 15 of the 30 NBA coaches gave Bradley a vote at all (although, for what it’s worth, Bradley did get the most first team votes of any player who ended up on the second team). But when we factor in the time he missed at the beginning of the season, Second Team is probably where Bradley belongs for now. “For now” is, of course, the key phrase, since a strong defensive year next season could very well vault Bradley into First Team consideration.

Kevin Garnett, however, received no votes from any NBA coach. While I’m not particularly surprised by this, I am a little disappointed and I definitely don’t agree. Garnett remains, still, one of the more impressive team defenders in the NBA, and Boston’s on- and off-court statistics with KG will attest to that. I wouldn’t expect Garnett to make one of the teams, but I’m surprised that an Atlantic division team, who saw Boston regularly and was forced to gameplan for Garnett’s affect, didn’t at least spring a second-team vote for him.

Fluky things happen in these votings. Little-used Dallas Maverick’s guard Mike James received a First Team vote, which means either that a voter was confused by a drop-down menu and meant to vote for LeBron James, or Mike James’ mother is actually a head coach somewhere in the league. Defensive Player of the Year Marc Gasol somehow ended up on the second team (seriously, voters?). So KG’s exclusion from the list is disappointing but perhaps explicable.

Still, instead of complaining about Garnett’s snub, we should celebrate Bradley’s accomplishment. His on-ball defense is top-notch, and when he is on top of his game, it’s a joy to watch him perform (and a nightmare for opponents). It’s great to see him get some well-deserved recognition.

Follow Tom on Twitter: @Tom_NBA.

Danny Ainge may be giving the players some time away from basketball, but we are calling every player on the roster into our Celtics Town offices for their exit interviews for the rest of this week. Here’s the tenth in the series: Fab Melo.

Fab,

I’ll admit I entered the season with low expectations for you, and 36 NBA minutes later not much has changed. The bulk of my Fab Melo experience came during summer league, where I cringed every time you tried to break the backboard with a jumper and grimaced every time you were half a second too late with a block. There were times when I was afraid that your projected ceiling as a Brendan Haywood-esque player was too high, and your lack of minutes on a team desperate for big men did nothing to allay those fears. I’m also pretty sure you were offered to the Wizards in the trade for Jordan Crawford and that proposal was rejected, which was equally discouraging.

You were every bit as hilarious as I’d hoped however. Whether it was your impressively low-key destruction of a chair, or your epic encounter with a doorway that resulted in a concussion, I wish we could have had more Fab Melo if only for the entertainment value. I can only imagine the adventures you and Jordan Crawford might have together next season.

Your humorous exploits aside, you did make considerable strides in the D-League for a (relatively) new basketball player. In late December you set the D-League record for blocks in a game amidst a monster 15 point, 16 rebound, 14 block triple double. You were named to NBA D-League All-Rookie First team and (more importantly) the All-Defensive First Team as well. The real test will come this summer when you’ll have an opportunity to make a case for yourself during Summer League. Until then, keep practicing that jump shot and watch out for those sneaky doorways.

Follow Jordan on Twitter: @HiggsOnHoops

Danny Ainge may be giving the players some time away from basketball, but we are calling every player on the roster into our Celtics Town offices for their exit interviews for the rest of this week. Here’s the ninth in the series: Avery Bradley.

Avery,

Your mid-season return from surgery left all of Celtics Nation hoping you were the answer.  The unknown toyed with us all, remembering you as a glorified player who absolutely shut down the opposing guard and made enough backdoor cuts to provide 16 points a game on lay-ups.  This was our fault; we let our imaginations get the best of us.

Since your emergence during your second year you have been consistently one of my favorite players to watch.  Watching you wreak havoc on defense is truly a joy; seeing you beat the offensive player to the spot before they can even think about driving makes me giddy.  Also I love the times you got open looks off of screens, just to make the open mid-range jumper just like in your Dunkin Donuts commercial.

You did provide a lot of what we needed, another defensive stopper and someone to stretch the floor, but maybe you were not the answer.  You are still young and need time to develop.  Sorry for rushing that process a little bit.  After starting for the Celtics in the playoffs last year and having such a positive effect with Ray Allen coming off the bench, you appeared ready.  The insurance policy and perhaps the extra motivation of the greatest three-point shooter behind you on the bench has to mean something– maybe something changed a little bit.

At times you seemed to rush the shot, seemingly fresh out of a timeout where Doc encouraged you to “take the open looks!” and taking that directly to heart, shooting the next four shots regardless of the presence of potential defenders.  Other times, perhaps without Doc’s pep talk you disappeared on offense, sitting in the corner ready for the three point attempt, but mostly deferring to Rondo, Pierce, or Garnett.  The reality of the situation is that Ray Allen spread the floor in ways you could not.  The more condensed paint was difficult to penetrate for Boston’s offensively challenged sets.  This was not your fault, I promise, but it was difficult not to reminisce about what was.

This was a trend for you, as a great deal of undue pressure was put on your shoulders this season.  Having to fill a role you were not meant to– an outside shooter and a ball handler due to injuries and departures during the off season.  Rondo’s injury forced you into becoming one of the primary ball handlers.  Simply put, it just wasn’t meant to be.

These playoffs were particularly tough.  You seemed to disappear for long stretches of game play, getting in early foul trouble and never being able to rediscover your rhythm.  It looked like the Knicks could have had some permanent damage on your career, with Iman Shumpert out ‘Avery Bradley-ing’ you for much of the series.  Then the fourth quarter of game six happened– you got back to the Avery Bradley we know and love, harassing mediocre ball handlers and hounding the opposition as they attempt to set up their offense.  The Knicks were a lot less effective with isolation plays when they could only work for 10 seconds as opposed to 15 seconds.  Doing the small things began to come naturally for you once again.  Your impact highly contributed to the Celtics cutting a 24-point deficit down to four during the almost heroic game six comeback.  You gave Celtic Nation the entire offseason to re-expand all of our expectations for the line-up of the future with you playing alongside Rondo, Green, and Sullinger.  Hope was restored, and for that I thank you.

The next step for you should be identifying good shots from bad.  You tend to make the open looks, but sometimes force it, already determining what you are going to do as opposed to reading the defense and reacting to how they are playing you.  Next year you should be able to return to your more natural shooting guard position with the return of Rondo so you can begin to regain your confidence at both ends of the floor.  Also, while I am at it — whether it is your fault or the referees not knowing how to handle the ‘Avery Bradley experience’ there needs to some adjustments as to not getting so many foul calls.  The Celtics need you on the court, so picking and choosing times to be aggressive on both ends on the court will truly take your game to the next level.

You are  and continue to be  a huge piece for the Boston Celtics franchise, and will always be one of my favorite players to watch.  Thanks for all your hard work this season, hopefully next year you will be able to feel more comfortable and be able to expand on your contributions to close the season.

Follow Jesse on Twitter: @J_duderanch