Exclusive 1-on-1: Boston Celtics Summer League Preview with Head Coach Matt Reynolds #SummerLeague

Exclusive 1-on-1: Boston Celtics Summer League Preview with Head Coach Matt Reynolds #SummerLeague

What’s up folks? Mark Demo here for Celtics Insiders here with Celtics summer league head coach Matt Reynolds. Matt, you got to dive in right away. Talk about a few of the guys on the roster this year. Baylor Shyman, let’s start out with him. Number 30 overall pick last year. He certainly looked different at the end of the regular season than he did at the start. What do you think changed most for him during that timeline getting to the end of the season? Yeah, I’d say, you know, first year in the NBA, there’s a lot to learn both, you know, on the court and just like the rhythm of your season. You know, in college, they’ll play 35 to 40 games max, whereas the NBA it’s, you know, three, four games a week. And so, just that alone is enough of a variable. Um, let and then, you know, you get on the court and you’re playing against the best players in the world. Um, so there’s a lot being thrown at new players and I think Baylor, you know, he’s a savvy player. he plays very hard and you know you have those two characteristics and it can kind of you know speed up that development process that learning curve and you know I think that’s that’s going to show in Vegas. He was here early in June with Jordan and Miles working hard uh kind of getting an early look at some of the concepts we’re trying to employ out there. But you know all three of those guys are super committed to developing and getting better in our system. One more on Baylor. And when you when you and the coaching staff get together and then when you get together with Baylor and you guys are talking about the future, what is the one area of growth that you guys talk about most for him that’s going to be like, okay, this is what we want and need for you to do and be able to do next season? Yeah, I’d say, you know, he got some some playmaking responsibility in Maine. Um, but that was never really something he was asked to do with the Celtics. And so, you know, regardless of who he’s on the court with, we want him to be either a primary or secondary creator, whether it’s, you know, hunting his own offense or or finding finding an open shooter or a cutter, whatever it may be. I think, you know, his his crashing, his communication, his positional defense, like he’s got all that that, you know, every player is looking to continually improve upon. Uh, but I’d say out in Vegas, we’re looking to see him take on a playmaking role. All right. From last year’s first round pick to this year’s first round pick, Ugo Gonzalez. is a guy who he’s a relative unknown to like most of us. We haven’t really gotten to see him play in games. We have we definitely haven’t seen him playing practices like you have. What stands out to you most about this guy that is coming in here and it seems like the basketball operations group is like really excited about him. Yeah, I can understand why. You know, uh the motor that he plays with is something you can’t teach. like he he plays very hard. And it’s the same thing where uh Baylor’s uh learning curve this time a year ago, you know, now you’re taking someone who’s 19 years old, never played in the States, and we’re throwing so many new terms and concepts and whatever at him in a foreign language, right? No. So, so, so you have to be, you know, kind of equal parts understanding of that while also like, hey, man, like this is what this is what we do here. And so I think, you know, his his effort is going to make up for any uh delay in what I I I don’t think the language barrier has been a thing at all. Um but he uh is, you know, he’s got a great energy about him. And I think, you know, with given, you know, some some time with our players, he was much more comfortable day one or day four than he was day one. And that’s just how it’s going to go. And so each day we’re just looking to see that, you know, the everybody, you know, cliche the game slows down. you know, I don’t think he slows down, but I think, you know, what he how he processes the game, you know, that that’s going to come along. Yeah. That being said about him coming to the US, first time being in this environment, all that, he’s 19, but he’s been a pro technically for a decade, which is crazy. How long have you been at the Celtics? 12 years. 12 years. He’s been a pro since he was nine technically with Real Madrid. How does that show through in what you’ve seen on the court of like, you know, this isn’t the first time this guy’s been in a professional environment? Yeah. And I sometimes it’s just like he makes a play that may not be something we’ve talked about as like a couple days in practice there’s a rotation that he made where it’s just like that’s a guy that knows how to play. Like he cracked down for a for a rotation and deflected the ball, forced a turnover uh when it was probably going to be a dunk if he doesn’t make it. And so things like that where just just kind of seeing that court sense and you can tell that that’s you know people come over from Europe and you see that all the time let alone you know 27 28 year olds who played over there and and they have all these you know cutting principles so they’re used to seeing that stuff. I think the main thing for him is you can just tell that he knows how to play and then you know that’s what makes introducing a new concept you know pretty easy for him to to adapt to and exciting for us to throw more and more at him. Yeah. looking forward to seeing him out there in Vegas. Uh moving on to the next guy, Jordan Walsh. Um he probably didn’t have the season that he was hoping for last year, but here he is coming back season three for the summer league. What do you guys want to see out of him? Um and what what is the one area that maybe he can concentrate on that would unlock kind of like that next phase of his career? Right. I think uh when when he did uh play early in the season, the the effort that he played with was like that was gamechanging. you remember a couple games where he’s crashing the glass creating extra possessions for our team. We’re not asking to do anything that he hasn’t done uh during the regular season. He plays incredibly hard. He’s a physical player on ball hawk. Like I would say that’s the thing that I’m looking to to tr truly accentuate for him is to pressure the ball and create havoc uh for the other team and that’s something that I think he’s taking ownership of and it’s what we’re going to hold them accountable to. Okay. All right. Last guy we’re going to talk about, and we can’t hit on the whole roster, so we’re not going to go down every single player on the team, but Amari Williams, right? Another draft pick this year, number 46 overall in the second round. This guy is just a physical freak. 76 wingspan. Everyone says that he’s a great passer. Got the vision. Does the passing live up to the hype? Because that that’s all we’ve heard about. No, and that’s, you know, it’s the the thing where, you know, players know that he’s a passer. So, all of a sudden, guys are Yeah. just free flying all over the place hoping hoping to get Spoonfed a layup. and he and he wants to make plays. Uh so we’re going to try to put him in positions to do that. Uh but he he can’t be, you know, a onetrip pony. We don’t want him to just be a passer. We’d even be a screener, a rebounder, all that stuff. So we we can’t just say that he’s a great passer and hope that that’s what carries a day for him. You know, we need to we need to put more on his plate as well. You know, he didn’t run a whole lot of pick and roll in college. That needs to be something that that we we give him a lot of reps at. Um only the most important play in all of NBA basketball, right? Well, that being said, like what you you told me what you’ve been giving to him, what maybe has stood out about what he has been doing outside of the passing. Yeah. So, you know, I I’ I’d like to think that we’re doing a pretty good job of playing aggressive defense across the board one through five. And he’s a player that allows us to do that, whether that be protecting the rim, switching out under a guard, whatever it may be. Like, he’s a pretty versatile athlete. And again, it’s going to be something that we ask him to do, but it’s because he’s able to do it. All right, last one here. This is just a general summer league question. we all look and and we’re all watching every single thing that happens in summer league and thinking, “Oh, that’s going to translate to the NBA.” It’s probably not the case. As a coach and as a head coach of this team, like what can you take from summer league that is applicable to what these guys might be doing next year with the Celtics? It’s a good question. I think a lot applies like it may not necessarily translate to like for like this guy did this in Vegas, he might do this in summer league, but every game there’s a couple things you see a player do where it’s like whatever role they’re in, they can take that and kind of build upon, you know, whether it be an offensive rebound, like every team is going to be emphasizing rebounding, crashing, whatever. And that’s a skill. And, you know, to me, ball pressure that to a degree is a skill. Like effort’s a skill. And so, we can develop those things. and the opportunity to translate that over, you know, a couple weeks of workouts here and then four days of practice. You turn that into game reps, like you’re you’re honing all of those skills. All right, game reps coming up Friday at 4 Eastern. Celtics versus the Grizzlies. That’s Matt Reynolds, the head coach of the Summer Celtics. We appreciate the time and congrats on getting the gig, man. Thank you for seeing it. You too.

#NBA #SummerLeague #BostonCeltics #lasvegas

Summer League has arrived! Before the Summer Celtics take off for Las Vegas, Boston Celtics Summer League Head Coach Matt Reynolds sat down with Marc D’Amico to talk through all of the team’s headline players. He covered Baylor Scheierman’s development, how Hugo Gonzalez has stood out in practice, what the next step is for Jordan Walsh, and how talented big man Amari Williams is.

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