What It Means:

"A lot of guys don’t know where we’re going to play, or what time we’re going to play," Crowder said. "It’s affecting us a little bit. We’ve got to figure it out as a unit, figure it out as a coaching staff. We’ve got to build our identity in who we want to be." Marcus Smart (leg) returning will help Boston coach Brad Stevens establish some consistency, but we expect the revolving door rotation to continue until Stevens finds some consistent success. Teammate Isaiah Thomas agreed with Crowder, for what it's worth.

The Celtics currently sit at 9-8, but they have dropped three of their past five contests, including the loss to the Magic on Sunday. Our metrics still currently rank the Celtics as the ninth-best team in the league, based on overall efficiency, largely due to a defense which is ranked fourth overall.