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You know the deal up front.

We’re fucked running.

The Celtics will not become the 2009 NBA champions.

Ever the optimist..

You won’t be teased.

But my bangs look terrible!

You won’t be living through one of those tedious, agonizing, will-he-or-won’t-he scenarios. Barring some unforeseen medical miracle,

Robo-Knees!

Kevin Garnett is O-U-T, out of the playoffs.

Sorta like how Bob is O-U-T, out of Fritos.

They now have a new goal - the Eastern Conference finals.

The real NBA Finals. (Suck it, LA.)

That remains quite attainable. Orlando’s good, but not scary good.

So relax.

Sigh.

/kicks off shoes, puts feet up on desk

The pressure’s off.

/puts hands behind head, stares off into distant future with look of complacent happiness on face

//shoots self in head

Sit back and watch an entertaining team do the best it can, whatever that happens to be.

CONFIDENCE!

There is no other sane way to look at this.

Yeah, but we’re Boston fans, Bob. Sanity never comes into the equation.

But wait. I gather that some people are - I can hardly believe this - angry. Disappointed, I can see. I’m disappointed, too, but angry? About what?

ABOUT YOU AND YOUR NEW FACE, BOB RYAN!

And maybe the fact that you already proclaimed we won’t be repeating this year, since, you know, you’re a Boston sportswriter and therefore one of the only people in America that has the right to speak about Boston sports in a positive light and yet still doesn’t do it. Everybody else hates our stupid smelly guts. The least you & Shaughnessy could do is lie to us and say we’re gonna do it all over again. We’re not stupid, we know our chances are slim to nill. But it’s nice sometimes, when the situation is especially dire, to fool yourself into a false sense of positivity. Tell us our glasses are half full, you bag of old wind.

Everyone else is against us. It’d be nice if the two guys who wrote about us were on our side once in a while.

Is there some kind of entitlement clause I never heard about?

Yes, we passed it in the early eighties. Don’t you follow local politics?

Have fans forgotten that when the Big Three were assembled there was an agreed-upon three-year window to produce title No. 17, and that the goal has already been achieved?

Might as well pack it up then. Basketball is closed on account of too many championships. From now on, please enjoy hockey, baseball, football and frolf.

People have no right to get greedy,

Coming from the guy who finishes off the deviled egg plate at Globe banquets every year.

especially when two excellent teams such as the 66-16 Cavaliers and the 65-17 Lakers are on the prowl. I’m not saying a healthy Celtics team couldn’t have beaten either the Cavs or the Lakers, but I would not have expected them to. Big difference.

I don’t have a complete lack of confidence in my team; just a very very very very large lack of confidence in my team. Big difference.

Now there is a legitimate question here, I’ll grant that.

Why do you still have a job?

To borrow a phrase, what did the Celtics know, and when did they know it? Some are asking if perhaps there’s more going on here than a “sprain,” and, if so, why wasn’t it addressed immediately, perhaps surgically?

Because he would’ve missed the playoffs anyway. Why give the enemy an advanced scouting report?

My answer is that I don’t know for sure,

Jeez, I’m just the top basketball journalist in this city with more connections than any other Boston writer besides Shaughnessy. Gimme a break!

but I doubt there was any information evasion going on.

But again, I don’t know; ’cause I’m a shitty old journalist who just doesn’t give a crap anymore. I’m too busy getting facials & skin peels that frighten small children to worry about my job that they pay me money for, which I in turn spend on facials & skin peels that frighten small children.

I think the brass is a bit gobsmacked by this development.

That’s seriously the second time I’ve heard that word today. Also the second time I’ve heard that word in my entire life. I s’pose it’s better than being gobstopped.

As recently as Monday, here is what Danny Ainge had to say.

“Garrrrggghhhh! My heart!”

“I’m optimistic.

Bob Ryan had to dictionary.com that one..

Hopeful. We’re just waiting to see. Hopefully, we will be 100 percent healthy, I think we will be.”

Yeesh, that’s ironic on multiple levels..

I doubt he was referring to Gabe Pruitt.

‘Cause that guy’s fuckin’ banged-up.

But I think we all know what’s really going on, and it’s pretty simple.

Kevin Garnett’s a Communist spy!

The Big Ticket has been punched for 1,128 games, regular season and playoffs combined. And Garnett minutes are unlike anyone else’s minutes. A Garnett minute is at least a minute and 20, and maybe more.

Minute-twenty-three?

Nobody plays as intensely as Kevin Garnett - nobody. His right knee is saying “Ouch,” or words to that effect.

I think it’s more like, “RARRRRRREEEEEAAARRRRGGHHHHHHHHHHRREEEEEAAAARRGGGHHHHHH!!!!”"”

And then this happens:

It’s got to be bad. This is Kevin Garnett we’re talking about.

Ohhh, I thought we were talking about the small town of Garnett, Kansas!

“After watching him run,” Doc Rivers told WEEI yesterday morning, “there’s no way . . . This was an honest run today. You couldn’t fake your way through it; you know what I’m saying?”

Sadly, yes.

I know exactly what you’re saying, Boston Celtics Head Coach Doctor Rivers. And it saddens me.

A Garnett-less Celtics is still a formidable foe.

Geraldo Rivera guest-wrote that last sentence.

They were 18-7 without him this season, with seven of those victories coming over teams with winning records (Phoenix, Denver, Cleveland, Miami twice, and Atlanta twice). They score the ball, as they like to say nowadays, just fine.

Who says this again?

“I scored the ball! Basketball-Touchdown!”

The problem comes at the defensive end, where Garnett was the physical and spiritual leader.

The rest of the team were filthy Presbyterians before KG came along.

They simply do not defend as well without Kevin Garnett in the lineup and - stop me if you’ve heard this - defense is what wins championships.

Stop.

I’ve heard it.

Stop forever.

We’re going to find out a few things in these playoffs.

For instance, will my face ever heal?

We will see, for example, just how far Glen “Big Baby” Davis has come in the past two months.

He’s up to four Big Macs a day.

Anyone watching this team in the 25 games since KG sustained his knee injury Feb. 19 in Salt Lake City knows that no individual on the team has personally prospered as much as Big Baby, who has broadened his offensive game by making himself a reliable face-up jump shooter and who just plays with more overall poise and presence than he did before.

He’s just gotta stop shootin’ those twenty-footers, though. For the love of Frank..

Baby ended the season nicely, averaging 12.6 points since March 1 while putting up such numbers as 24, 19, 19, 19, 22, 15 and 21 in seven of the final 12 regular-season games. Can he maintain that pace in the most important games? That’s a good question.

You should buy yourself something pretty for that great question you asked yourself, Bob.

Baby and Leon Powe

POW!

will be vitally important. Powe is well-established as a walking double-double waiting to happen. The biggest difference between the two is that Baby has at least grasped the basic concept of the vital defensive rotations from the beginning, whereas Leon still has a way of getting lost.

Meh, he’s from Oakland. I’m surprised he can ties his shoes correctly.

But there are few more relentless forces coming off a bench in terms of attacking the glass and taking it to the hoop than Leon Powe.

Do I hate him? Do I love him? I don’t know! I’m Bob Ryan.

But let’s get serious.

Finally, my sides are killing me! STOP TICKLING MY FUNNY BONE, BOB RYAN!!!

The man who will have to produce, who will have to bring nightly A games, who will have to be as good as he likes to think he is: The Captain.

Wow, Jason Varitek already has enough pressure on him as it is with the baseball stuff..

Paul Pierce came away from last season’s Finals with an enhanced reputation as a prime-time player.

Probably why he didn’t get that SNL job..

But that didn’t seem to be enough for him.

The greedy bastard!

Unless I mistook what he was saying, he couldn’t understand why people were hesitating to put him on the same level as Kobe and LeBron (and now, Dwyane). OK, Cap. If you really are that good, now’s the time to prove it.

Because winning a championship - something Lebron hasn’t done & Kobe hasn’t done on his own - is just not enough.

I, for one, won’t hold him to that.

Even though I just told him to prove it.

It’s no insult to be a great player, as Pierce is, and still be a cut below that reigning Holy Trinity of Hoop.

Chicago reminds me somewhat of last year’s Hawks,

Segues? We don’t need no stinkin’ segues!

with all those bouncy legs

Whoa, hey. Do you need to be alone, Bob? ‘Cause we can leave..

(John Salmons, Joakim Noah, Tyrus Thomas, etc.). They’ve got a great young point guard in Derrick Rose and lots of veteran savvy coming off the bench with Brad Miller, Kirk Hinrich and Tim Thomas, a guy who’s always capable of dropping a quick 20 on you.

Is he talking about some sort of Alternate Universe Tim Thomas who listens to his coaches & plays efficient basketball?

But the Celtics should get by them.

Jinx! Jinx! Jinx!

That would bring up Orlando,

Not according to the Lowposts Combos® Playoff Previews!

with that great front line of Dwight Howard, Hedo Turkoglu and Rashard Lewis,

Even though Hedo & ‘Shard are playing hurt and may not even make it through Philly..

but they will miss All-Star guard Jameer Nelson, and the Celtics have a very good chance of beating them.

Jinx! Jinx! Jinx!

Then it’s all house money. The pressure would be completely on the Cavs. Should you hope? Sure.

Thanks, Bob. I wasn’t sure if I should hope anymore.

Should you expect? No.

Done & done.

I feel like I have to poop. Should I poop, Bob?

They’re pretty good. Excuse me, He is pretty good. In fact, He is transcendent.

Meh, Jesus ain’t that great.

If LeBron James

Oh, Lebron. Yeah, He’s awesome.

can bring his team within a minute of beating the Celtics last season, why would you think he won’t find a way to beat a Garnett-less Celtics team this year?

Anyway, you’ve already gotten your reward. Stop whining.

Wow.

Bob Ryan is a Globe columnist and host of the Globe’s 10.0 on Boston.com. He can be reached at ryan@globe.com.

~~~

Bob Ryan. A class act. Berates his readers for believing in things. STOP HAVING FAITH, YOU STUPID ASSHOLES!

You know what, Bob? I wish you did have face cancer.

Stop whining.