Hump and Wallace netting gain for Celtics

Gerald Wallace and Kris Humphries will be major players for the Celtics in the 2013/14 season.

That sentence will still make some fans feel uncomfortable, sad or maybe even depressed. In a day in which your men in green will visit the men in black from Brooklyn you will feel melancholically tempted to try to insert the names of Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett instead of the players mentioned above. You may try to add all those magical What If's and Remember When's to try to feel better about your team. I don't recommend you so.

Instead of an exercise of masochism on such a lovely mid October day, I will propose you to study in detail the first sentence in this article. Are you back from your nostalgic trip? There you go, welcome back.

Gerald Wallace and Kris Humphries are two solid players. They both deserve to be starters, Hump will probably be our center by committee and Wallace will not start because Jeff Green should be our star until Rondo returns from his injury. If you think about it, very few fans thought about the likeliness of these two players to be significant members of the team come October. When the trade with the Nets finally went official around my birthday (July 12th) we were all thinking of those future first round picks, the trade exception from the Nets, the future of guard MarShon Brooks or even on the wildly strange contract of Keith Bogans.

Wallace and Humphries? We instantly pictured them somewhere else. We figured that we were in a full rebuilding mood and that these two would be gone by now. Wallace remained more silent an invisible than Jeff Green in a preseason night and some fans cringed at the thought of Humphries even daring to wear the Celtics green.

Everybody thought about shipping Wallace's big $30 million contract to a contender and trying to obtain some other expiring contract (such as Ben Gordon's) instead of watching Hump playing center for us. In other words: a trade brought them then and a trade should make them leave. The sooner, the better.

Well, as you know Wallace and Humphries have been so far two of the most valuable players for this team in the preseason and training camp. Humphries came to town earlier, ready to find some chemistry with his new teammates and getting used to playing in Boston. Gerald arrived right at the end, but his actions are worth much more than his words. He is leading the team with his play on the court.

There is a reason they have those big contracts: they earned them in the past with their performances in the past seasons and they are more than willing to prove that to us this year.

Gerald Wallace is a slasher, a player who will attack the opponent with his still above average athleticism. He is tough, plays excellent one to one defense and can run and play on both sides of the court. A veteran who can still score at will when needed and teach his young teammates along the way.

Kris Humphries will be that tenacious player in the paint that will draw charges, grab some rebounds and be tough inside. He can also spread the floor with is mid range shot and he is faster than he looks like on both ends of the court.

Both players will get significant minutes and teach all of the young players important lessons about the league.

Yes, they make $22 million combined. But they earn them.

Welcome to Boston, guys.

Now, let's beat the Nets!

- by Bohemian