Kyrie is impressing his teammates early in camp


After just two days of training camp the Celtics most recently acquired superstar, Kyrie Irving, is impressing his new teammates. While many of the Celtics are accustomed to playing against Irving, particularly fellow guards Marcus Smart and Terry Rozier, seeing him up close in practice has them appreciating his abilities on another level. Via Marc D'Amico of Celtics.com:

“He’s a tough one to guard, probably one of the toughest guys I’ve ever had to guard in my life,” Rozier said. “I just feel like he has so many counters,” he stated. “If you cut off one counter, he’ll go to the next one. He’s just so smart. He gets his teammates open and he knows the game.”

Battling against one of the NBA's best in practice everyday is sure to help both Rozier and Smart develop their games as they head into their 3rd and 4th seasons respectively, just the way playing against Isaiah Thomas in the midst of his MVP caliber campaign last year helped their development immensely.

Rozier also noted that Irving has blended into the team seamlessly, as if he's been for years:


Before battling each other in scrimmages and drills all day Rozier and Irving had a go playing 1 on 1, and Terry insisted he's got a few tricks to teach the new guy in green:


Celtics rookie Jayson Tatum, who's known Irving for a while due to their connection as Duke alums, was also amazed seeing Irving up close on the practice floor:

“[Being his teammate is] different,” said Tatum. “Seeing him every day and being with him, and just seeing the type of player he is. It’s different when you’re watching on TV than when you’re in practice and team meals … It’s just something you see on TV, and now it’s like, it’s right in front of you. You see how tough it is to guard somebody like that.”

While Irving is on the record saying he wants to become more of a traditional point guard in Boston, running the offense and focusing on distributing the ball, coach Brad Stevens noted that the Celtics will be using him just as much off the ball as well:

“As good as he is with the ball, he’s just as good off of it,” said Stevens. “So we’ll do a lot of both, and the key is to do it with some pace.”

With a handful of great ball-handlers and a big man who can distribute in Al Horford the Celtics offense is sure to be dynamic. I'm excited to see what coach Brad does with his new weapons and how they all come together. Irving is going to play a big role in helping all these new players gel and it seems he's embracing that.


Related: Danny Ainge waiting to fill 15th roster spot- what's he up to?

Photo Credit - Celtics.com

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