2010 NBA Playoffs: Did Kevin Garnett's Elbow Help or Hurt the Boston Celtics?

The Boston Celtics defeated the Miami Heat 85-76 on Saturday night in game one of their first round playoff series.

It certainly wasn't vintage Celtics—they trailed by 14 points with about seven minutes to play in the third period—but you don't get extra credit for style points.

The Celtics were able to summon up enough defensive intensity to essentially shut down Dwayne Wade (thank you, Tony Allen) and the rest of the Heat for the last 18 minutes of the game—enough to secure a much needed victory.

But at what cost?

With about 40 seconds to play in the game, Paul Pierce was hit in the back of the shoulder by Udonis Haslem (no foul called). Once getting rid of the ball, Pierce slumped out of bounds near the Heat bench and clutched his shoulder.

Kevin Garnett rushed over to him to call for the trainer and to make sure Pierce had enough room. Miami's thuggish Quentin Richardson also rushed over. Richardson attempted to stand over Pierce and was talking trash. Garnett took exception to this ghetto behavior and gently nudged Richardson away and started jawing back at him.

Glen Davis rushed over to help after seeing several Heat players had joined the fun. This created an outright scrum—pretty much a baseball fight, lots of pushing and jawing without any punches being thrown.

While being dragged out of the pile, Garnett delivered what appeared to be a deliberate elbow to Q's face. For this he was given a double-technical foul and was ejected from the game.

We found out Sunday night that the league, after reviewing the film of the fracas, had decided to suspend KG for one game.

Losing your starting power forward for a pivotal game two (must-win in order to maintain home-court advantage) sure seems like a bad thing—could lead you to wonder what in Hades was Garnett thinking. Was he even thinking?

Now we're left with either the woefully under-sized Glen Davis starting at PF, or we can trot out Rasheed Wallace's Corpse (worst acquisition in the history of the Celtics) to fill in for "The Big Ticket." Mrs. Candace Parker (Sheldon Williams) is now going to have to play more minutes than he did in game one (zero).

Here's the big question—was it really a bad thing?

I would argue, no.

Let me explain.

The Celtics finished their disappointing season limping to the finish line. They dropped 8 of their last 13, and just didn't look like the Celtics. We were told by Wallace, Garnett, Kendrick Perkins and others that the team would rise to the challenge of the playoffs.

Well, for the first 30 minutes of the playoffs, the Celtics looked exactly like that team that couldn't keep pace with the Cavs, Magic, and Hawks. That's not very promising—especially when the Cavs are exactly who will be waiting for the Celtics if they make it past the first round.

Now Kevin Garnett is not an educated man, but he is not a stupid man either. I would argue that he knew exactly what he was doing when he delivered that "message" elbow to the side of the punk's head.

I argue that Garnett was trying to light a fire under his team's lethargic butt—create some bad blood between the teams in order to jack up the intensity.

Richardson's post-game comments, if my theory is correct, have served to kick the animosity up another level. When asked about the confrontation, Richardson referred to KG and Pierce as a couple of "actresses," and flat-out declared that it is no secret that he doesn't like them.

Many are saying that KG has created a window for the Heat to crawl though and steal home-court away from the C's. Well what if, instead, this incident serves as this team's "McHale Clothesline" or Larry Bird's declaration that his team was "playing like a bunch of women"—what if, like those two playoff sparks, this year's Celtics decide that playtime is over...time to ass-kick?

Anyway, it's just a theory. I think it's a sound one. Maybe I'm giving Garnett too much credit—maybe I'm not.

I didn't think the Heat could beat the Celtics anyway, but I did see the series running six or seven games. That would likely leave nothing in their tank for the Cavs. Now I see the Heat going down in five.

Book it.

All thanks to KG's perfectly thought out elbow.