Joe Mazzulla looks for an edge wherever he can find one. That includes… the cricket pitch?
The Boston Celtics head coach has already waxed poetic this season about the possibility of integrating hockey-style power plays (and fights) into the NBA game and setting up a “loan” system similar to those in top-level European soccer leagues.
On Wednesday, Mazzulla turned his attention to a sport that’s a little less prevalent in the States: cricket.
“I like watching other sports and seeing how the free-flowing sports do things differently,” Mazzulla told reporters after Boston’s practice. “I just enjoy the ‘what if’ scenarios of, ‘What if one sport adopted the rules of another sport like I like?’
“I like in cricket that you can just keep wearing the pitcher down by fouling off on purpose. It’s like a huge mental (and) psychological component to just wearing this guy’s arm out by just fouling foul balls until he can’t pitch anymore. I love the idea of that. So, I just like watching the different sports and the different rules that go into those things.”
If you’re unfamiliar with cricket, it has some similarities to baseball, where a “bowler” (aka the pitcher) hurls a ball toward the “striker” (aka the batter), who tries to hit the ball away from the fielders who are stationed in a wide circle. Just as in baseball, cricket doesn’t have a game clock, so strikers can try to wear down bowlers by intentionally hitting foul balls (think an extra-long at-bat in baseball).
If you’re wondering why the heck Mazzulla is watching cricket matches, this is the same coach who motivates his players with lessons from the animal kingdom and began a preseason film session by showing clips from a Red Sox game.
Mazzulla’s cricket reference was just part of an entertaining media session that included him suggesting the NBA should shorten its shot clock — “Why not? Mess up the game even more” — and defending the league’s 3-point explosion with a reference to the NFL.
The Celtics have played just two games in the last 10 days, so Mazzulla has had plenty of time to search the sports world far and wide for lessons he can apply to his team. The C’s are back in action Thursday night against the Chicago Bulls at TD Garden, with tip-off set for 7:30 p.m. ET.
