**BOSTON —** The substitutions flowed furiously again on Sunday night at TD Garden.
While the five-man line changes from Toronto reminiscent of a Maple Leaf game didn’t return, Celtics players swapped in-and-out of the a blowout win over the Cavs 19 times, three at a time at most, before slowing to 15 in the second half. **Joe Mazzulla** later explained that he had searched for five players, any five, who would rebound. Boston allowed 21 Cleveland offensive boards and fell to 25th in defensive rebounding percentage (64.3%) this preseason. That’s down from 69% at this time last year. Even **Jaylen Brown** got yanked for a minute in the third quarter.
The Celtics’ substitution patterns in the preseason addressed rebounding effort, the stress of the pace the Celtics played at and allowed for typical training camp experimentation. Mazzulla said not to read into any lineups, even saying on Sunday that he _doesn’t give a s\*\*\*_ about them, instead searching for five players who would go hard.
Boston might alter them constantly, in part, so that the team can be _chaotically structured_.
“This is the advantage that we have in this four-minute segment,” Mazzulla said said. “Most sub patterns are in that 6-7 minute segment, and so, hey, this is what makes the most sense now … we may do it for three games in a row and then we may lose it for two games because the other team presents just as much of a challenge and just as much ability to adapt in real time.”
It’s the mentality-building, tough and at times bizarre coaching approach some in the locker room have grown used to and others experienced for the first time. It’s not one-size-fits-all, Mazzulla stressed, and it’s one that became notorious around the league. Many players who have joined the team saw the press conference clips. Sunday’s rebounding responses and frustration over a question he said he’s answered repeatedly for three years joined his greatest hits.
The experience can be entertaining, frustrating and informative all in one. On many days, he’s the most interesting man on the team. Maybe on most. He rarely says things publicly without intention. And whether they aim to inform or deflect, or to have fun, he sees his approach as the voice of the team, battling narratives and protecting his players, as legitimately helpful. He just wishes what he views as an inaccurate depiction of that approach wasn’t proliferated league-wide.
It’s not about him, he argued a day after stealing the show on the podium after a 138-107 preseason win.
“It’s unfortunate that it’s gotten to that point,” Mazzulla said on Monday at practice in a less turbulent media session. “It shouldn’t be about me. At the end of the day, everybody’s different. **Chris (Boucher)** is a guy that you would motivate differently than you would **Hugo (Gonzalez)** or a **Josh (Minott)**. It’s getting to know that person and so I don’t want it to be, ‘you have to adapt to Joe.’ No, we have to work together, we have to adapt together about how can we can come about a process of what it looks like to get the absolute best out of you.”
“That’s what I think a relationship is. It’s a form of love and love is interpreted in many different ways depending on what you’re trying to do. Love can be graceful, it can be harsh, love can be a feeling, it can be an action, it can be a bunch of things. So I think it’s just coming together on that … it’s a constant, ever-flowing, two-sided relationship. It’s not my way or the highway or you have to adapt to me or do what I say. I have just as much responsibility adapting and growing to that person.”
Yet the Celtics, intentionally or not, became Mazzulla’s team. They play his style. Repeat his mantras. And won by valuing what he emphasized. Mazzulla, who rejected the _Mazzulla Ball_ label in favor of Celtics basketball earlier in camp, could potentially benefit personally from overseeing his least talented roster. He’ll inevitably receive more credit for his system’s impact on this team if they win. Of course, doubts will creep in if it falters.
The impact of the other stuff is harder to gauge. **Xavier Tillman Sr.** said over the weekend that Mazzulla constantly talks about fighting, even inviting players to his mixed martial arts workouts. Most decline.
He tests them mentally, beating up on **Jordan Walsh**, [challenging **Anfernee Simons** head-on about his defense](https://www.clnsmedia.com/exclusive-how-celtics-have-coached-anfernee-simons-to-thrive-on-defense/) and criticizing **Neemias Queta** in ways he couldn’t repeat. There’s also love and compassion. Mazzulla recently recalled how **Al Horford** became like family, Boucher’s baptism that he attended and he provided a spirited defense of rookie **Hugo Gonzalez** when an outlet erroneously reported him having language barrier issues. Of course, he noted that his early Spanish conversations with Gonzalez only included yelling at him.
“We weren’t playing to our standard,” Simons said of the first half in Toronto on Friday when Mazzulla waved five players off the bench into the game. “That was Joe being Joe, making it a point that we’re gonna go out there and play to a standard, and if not, guys are gonna come out. That time, he took everybody out because we weren’t rebounding it well.”
Everyone has a Mazzulla story, [and there are so many that the question becomes hard to answer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5FRDCTlg_U), **Payton Pritchard** and White explained on a recent podcast they did together. The lineup shuffling contrasts from recent years, when a veteran roster mostly slid into their roles and didn’t require as much prodding.
Rebounding rarely came up across the championship contending years. The reality emerging through three preseason games that it could become a regular issue set off Mazzulla in both of the past two games, and spilled into a tense post-game press conference — however much he noted feeling fulfilled during it while asking for more questions to swat away.
White, who’s been around Mazzulla into a fifth season now, admitted moments after Mazzulla left the podium that the head coach seemed to be approaching this season differently. It’s all about the battle. Brown noticed it too, who’s seen Mazzulla evolve from mostly keeping **Ime Udoka’s** approach intact in year one to growing more confident in his own imprint over time.
“Mentality,” Brown explained. “It’s all about effort. It’s all about the in-between, the game within the game and that’s what we gotta emphasize most. Winning the fight. I think Joe has put a big emphasis on that…crashing, rebounding, being the harder-playing team. There’s little room for error in that regard. Guys are getting used to that, whether it’s your conditioning or it’s the pressure of being able to come in and get taken right out. It’s a big emphasis right now on winning the margins.”
Some tactics Mazzulla employed this fall may not last into the regular season, and the challenging camp he oversaw (but wouldn’t admit was that hard) will inevitably fade into the management necessary for a team to survive the NBA schedule. Whether or not the Celtics can maintain their furious pace they’ve previewed throughout the preseason could, in part, determine how effectively Boston will play this season. He said not to expect the hockey subs evident at times this preseason, though he said that’s why he made such wholesale substitutions in Toronto.
Others could last, the fully-staffed shootarounds already a contrast over the sparsely-attended, optional sessions that the veteran team often had last year. Mazzulla himself even showed up to the two morning sessions on the road in Memphis and Toronto.
This team is different. Expectations, personalities and play styles have already changed compared to recent seasons. And a longer offseason ramp-up to training camp for many of the new players, who arrived at the Celtics’ facility for months prior to camp, already ingratiated them to their head coach’s true personality. Though it may not be _that_ far off from the viral videos they learned about him from, they’re buying into the approach so far, Minott smiling as he and Mazzulla jabbed at each other to the side of a media scrum as Minott waited to speak after a recent practice.
That buy-in is as evident on the edge of the rotation as it is at the top, where Brown still speaks about being the _smartest_ team.
“He’s trying to push me to my limit, trying to get me to play harder,” Minott said on Monday. “Even when I think I’m playing hard, he’s trying to get me past that point. It’s just been learning, I see it as lessons. I usually know when I’m coming out. I just see it as a lesson every time. We’re just learning, it’s preseason, I understand it’s a lot of new people, and he’s just trying to instill that Celtics mentality for those of us that are new.”