Doc Rivers told reporters before Sunday’s Game 4 at The TD Garden that Avery Bradley will start, despite needing his shoulder to be popped back into the socket during Game 3.  Via Gary Dzen of The Boston Globe:

Bradley warmed up twice before tonight’s game under the direction of team doctor Brian McKeon before being cleared to play.

“It’s a concern,” said Rivers. “It’s a concern tonight and moving forward as well. We’re just going to throw him out there … I guess each time it comes out you lose strength. But he’s ready to go.”

Atlanta potentially had some good health news as well, as Al Horford was placed on the active list and is considered a game-time decision following his warm up. Via Royce Young of CBS Sports:

For the first time in four months, Al Horford will be in uniform for the Hawks. He’s active for Game 4 against the Celtics in Boston, though he’s still a gametime decision. He warmed up pregame, but it isn’t a sure thing he’ll play.

Horford has been out since January when he tore his left pectoral muscle. He was expected to miss the entire first round of the playoffs.

In case you haven’t heard, Al Horford just inked a five-year contract extension that will net him $60 million. The deal is the same length and amount as Joakim Noah’s, signed before the season began.

Normally Horford’s extension wouldn’t be mentioned here, but it’s part of a developing market that will shape Kendrick Perkins’s contract in the offseason. Let’s take a look at how big men comparable (or not-so-comparable) to Perk have gotten paid in the past year:

• Brendan Haywood – Six years, $55 million. In a word, robbery. In another word, stupid. In a few more words, Haywood is averaging 4.0 points, 4.3 rebounds and 22.3 minutes per game. Not a great return on investment, so far at least.
• Darko Milicic – Four years, $20 million. Manna from heaven, my ass.
• Horford – Five years, $60 million. A fair deal for the undeserved All-Star.
• Noah – Five years, $60 million. I love Noah’s game. His effort and underrated skill are definitely worth $60 million, if you ask me.
• Brad Miller – Three years, $15 million. Is it just me, or is it tough to justify giving $5 million a year to a 34-year old backup center who can barely move?
• Joel Anthony – Five years, $18 million. In other words, overpaid.

The market has been set, and — barring any huge CBA changes, which could certainly happen but are also unpredictable — Perk should be looking at something in the vicinity of Haywood money. (Cue Ron Browz: “We getting Haywood money! We getting Haywood money!” And… moving on.)

If Perkins does command such a big contract, should the Celtics be willing to pay it?

On first glance, the answer seems like an easy yes. Perk is one of the game’s best low-post defenders. He’s 25 years old. He has improved every year. He’s tough, and he’s rugged, and he’s had a lot to do with the Celtics’ winning ways the past few years. He’s kryptonite, for fuck’s sake!

But the Celtics are freeing money for a spending spree in 2012 or beyond. Signing Perk to a big contract could keep them from being big players in the free agency market once the Big Three Era finishes. The C’s will be rebuilding around Rajon Rondo, but they’ll need scorers to surround him with.  Dishing out a big contract to Perkins might not be the best way to spend their money.

Why not? They’ll also need a center to rebuild around, right?

But they already have Jermaine O’Neal and Shaquille O’Neal signed for next season, and also Semih Erden. Erden looked good in the preseason and has impressed Doc Rivers. Rivers even said, “He’s going to be a good big in this league and he’s going to be a good big in this league for a long time.”

If Erden can prove himself a keeper (and yes, I know it seems like a big stretch for a player who has registered three DNP-CDs in his first three games), he could make Perkins expendable. Think about it: all the things Perk is known for (rebounding, blocking shots, yada yada yada) are the same areas in which Erden should excel. And one has to believe Erden would come a lot cheaper.

I’m not at all saying the Celtics should let Perk go without a thought. I’m not at all saying, “Semih Erden is better than Kendrick Perkins!” Not even a little bit. I understand Perk’s worth as well as anybody. But if Perkins’s contract demands start to get too high…

I guess what I’m trying to say is this:

If you think re-signing Perk is an automatic, you might be wrong.

C'mon, Lakers. You can't be so indecisive about whether you're giving a fist pound or a high five.

There was nothing finesse about last night’s Lakers victory. They didn’t do anything special, they brought no tricks, and they weren’t trying to fool anyone. They were determined to beat the Celtics the same way the C’s beat them back in 2008 — with brute force and smash-mouth basketball.

And they did just that.

I would say I’ve never seen the Celtics get so thoroughly outworked, but I saw them this regular season. I’ve seen Andray Blatche and Al Horford do the same things to the Celtics that Pau Gasol did yesterday. I’ve seen the Celtics get punched in the mouth and stagger to the floor rather than punch back.  But to do it in the playoffs?  Against the Lakers? In the motherf*cking NBA Finals? Now THAT was surprising.

This series was supposed to be about tough vs. finesse, and heart vs. length and skill. It was supposed to be the Big, Bad Wolf Celtics vs. the Little Red Riding Hood Lakers. Instead, Game 1 was toughest vs. soft. Little Red Riding Hood grabbed some very heavy artillery and the Big Bad Wolf got a Grade A ass-whipping.

The only good thing about getting punked is that the Celtics know it. They are a prideful team and they do not take getting humiliated well.

“You saw it in guys’ faces,” Paul Pierce said. “You heard it, from reactions after the game, just how guys felt. It wasn’t a typical-loss locker room. There were some angry people in there and they showed it. The guys in there got pride and don’t want to lose the way we did.

“We can deal with losing because it’s part of the game. You lose games, you win games. But you can’t deal with it when you lose the way we did. We’re down 20, they beat us to the hustle plays. That don’t sit well with me at all.”

It don’t sit well with me at all, either. As bad as losses to the Nets and Wizards were earlier this season, at least they were during the regular season. At least there was nothing on the line. At least those losses weren’t in the Finals, against the Lakers, with the Larry O’Brien Trophy going to the series winner.

It’s pretty fitting that pictures of Charles Oakley getting his ass beat came out on the same day that the Celtics got manhandled by the Lakers. Never in a million years did I think any person, or crew of people, or even any army, would be able to batter Charles Oakley. Everything I’ve heard about the guy says he’s the baddest mo’fo to ever walk the face of the earth. I mean, he’s a real life Denzel Washington, except he stands 6’9″ tall and weighs in at somewhere around 250 lbs. And someone beat his ass? I was more surprised hearing about Oakley’s beating than I was to hear that the guy in Sixth Sense was actually dead the entire movie.

And that’s how I felt yesterday about the Celtics getting bitch-slapped by LA. The Celtics were supposed to be the tough ones. They were the indestructible bad guys who get aroused by life in the trenches. Yesterday wasn’t supposed to go down like that. The Celtics weren’t supposed to go down like a bunch of sallies.

There’s a lot on the line this series — a championship, legacies, history, an enormous ring, an 18th banner. There’s so much on the line that pride is probably towards the bottom of that long list. But if the Celtics are to turn this thing around, if they are to regain the collective toughness and swagger that has characterized this team over the past three years, it all starts with pride.

After last night’s game Kevin Garnett said, “I’m better than I was tonight. I played like horseshit.” No kidding, Kev, but you weren’t alone. Everyone else on your team could have uttered the exact same words.

The stakes were high and the Celtics shriveled up and went into hiding. The good news is that it was only one game, only one bad night.

The bad news is that it might represent something far more than that.

This is something I noticed a couple days ago during the game, and Paul Pierce pointed it out after practice today: The Celtics struggled with Jameer Nelson coming off the pick-and-roll. (WEEI)

The Celtics also want to figure out their pick and roll coverage. Jameer Nelson burned them in the second half when they went under the screen. He’s too good a shooter to allow him open looks.

“We’ve got to figure out a way to stop Jameer Nelson in the pick and roll,” Pierce said. “He really got hot in the second half. We’re far from being where we want to be.”

When the Magic scored yesterday, it was Nelson doing a lot of the damage. Paul Flannery noted that Nelson did damage when the C’s went under the screen, and he did. But he also did damage when the C’s went over the screen.

He’s surprisingly quick for a guy who kinda looks like a chunker and does a good job splitting the coverage to get into the middle of the lane. When he’s aggressive coming off the screen, it’s going to be tough for Boston. Because Nelson is a good shooter, Rajon Rondo has to defend him over the top of the screen, leaving the big man alone with Nelson. Being quick, skilled and aggressive, Nelson is able to attack big men, get penetration, and make plays.

Here’s a still picture of Nelson at the point of attack coming around the screen (yes, I know it’s against the Hawks — couldn’t find one of Nelson running p/r against the C’s). Even though it isn’t the C’s, the defense was very similar to how the C’s played it — a flat hedge by the big man, a trailing defender trying to get over the screen to no avail.

Nelson continues to attack the big man, isolating against him as the defender still trails the play. Even for a big man as mobile as Al Horford (or KG/Perk), it’s tough to stay in front of an attacking Nelson. The key is to make Nelson take a step backward, to give enough time for Rondo to get into the play. Horford fails to do that here, and Nelson is in the driver’s seat.

Though the Celtics were shredded by Nelson in the pick-and-roll, not all was bad. He finished with only 2 assists, so his influence was pretty much limited to his own scoring. The pick-and-roll didn’t help to get everyone else involved. It could start to pay benefits for all the other Magicians, though, should the Celtics not tighten up the defense.

Rondo has said on more than one occasion that Nelson is the most important Magician (at least on offense), and Game One showed why. Nelson is one of two Magicians (Vince Carter being the other — with apologies to J.J. Redick, who pretended like he could for parts of Game One) who can create their own shot or opportunities for others.

Look for the C’s to make an adjustment in Game Two, if they want to continue to stop the dangerous Magic.

"Why, Kendrick, this is mighty comfortable don't you think?"

What happens after you contend against a contender? What good does it do to push a team to the brink if you eventually succumb? Can a playoff loss be a springboard to greatness?

Two years ago, the Atlanta Hawks gave the Boston Celtics everything they could handle in a first-round series.  Tempers flared, and play was fierce.  Mike Bibby said the Celtics fans were fair-weather, and had hopped on the bandwagon.  At the time, Kevin Garnett said, “If I was back in my younger days I probably would have said something, but I learned. Let your play do your talking.”  But Garnett never lets his play speak alone, and neither team would during the series.

Al Horford taunted Paul Pierce after a jumper, and Pierce responded with a gang sign — or ‘B’, or whatever symbol he made. Marvin Williams decked Rajon Rondo, and Kevin Garnett leveled Zaza Pachulia.  It was a 1 vs. 8 matchup, but the Hawks played like equals with nothing to lose.  After a 34-point, game seven drubbing sent Atlanta home fishing for the summer, they were dismissed with pride.  They hadn’t won, but they’d proven to themselves they belonged in the postseason and, to a young team searching for an identity, that was almost as important as advancing to the second round.

Two years later, the Hawks are looking for more.  Sick of early-round exits, they are now borderline title contenders.  Not quite favorites, or even in the select group of two or three favorites, but in the conversation.

And they own the Celtics.  Though the C’s — by way of the miracle that is the NBA division rule — still hold the tiebreaker between the two teams, the Hawks swept them four games during the regular season.  Young, brash, and athletic, just like they were two seasons ago, the Hawks have finally added the next piece to the puzzle — experience.

“(Losing to Boston in 2008) put us right in the position where we are today,” Hawks coach Mike Woodson told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Monday. “When we lost Game 7, after learning how to play playoff basketball, it left a sick feeling in all of our stomachs that summer because we knew that we pushed the best team in basketball to the max, but we just couldn’t get it done. Then, coming back into last season, these guys were hungry. Once you taste it, you don’t want to go the other way. (Since then) we’ve been playing basketball looking ahead and that’s how you build your team.”

So Boston created the monster that now preys on the C’s old, aging blood.  Terrific news.  That tough 2008 series wasn’t only a confidence booster.  It screamed to the NBA with a megaphone, “HAWKS HAVE NEXT!”

“The fans of Atlanta weren’t really following us (in 2008) and then it was, ‘Hey, this team might have some potential,’ ” said Zaza Pachulia. “Since that time we’ve been going forward and forward. This team is still going up.”

After playing the Celtics, the Hawks hadn’t arrived yet but there could be no questioning they were on the rise.  And they loved their first taste of playoff basketball.

“There’s a different intensity (in the playoffs),” said Pachulia. “There’s harder fouls, which is so much fun. I like it because it’s like real basketball. During the season you play one game and move on. But in the playoffs, one possession might beat you and send you to vacation. It’s so much fun that you want to stay there. So you make sure you do everything the right way.”

But the Hawks still haven’t done everything the right way.  Not yet.  They have become a team to reckon with, but still haven’t beaten an elite team in the postseason. The 2008 loss to the Celtics was followed by last season’s sweep at the hands of the Cleveland Cavaliers, leaving the Hawks with still more to prove.    With Jamal Crawford joining the same nucleus Boston saw two seasons ago, this could be the year they take the next step.

“You’ve got to get in (the playoffs) first,” said Woodson. “Then anything is possible.”

But there’s one caveat.

“The experience we get, we’ve got to use it,” said Pachulia.

And use it at the right time.  Playoff time.

Celtics fans have reason to dislike Al Horford: Whenever he plays the Celtics, he tends to be very chirpy.  It’s like he takes a page out of college teammate Joakim Noah’s playbook, and just tries to be as annoying as possible.

But whatever you feel about Horford, his dunk on Tim Duncan yesterday was pretty damn sick. As for Duncan? Get out of the way next time, old man.