Indiana Basketball: How Romeo Langford fits with the Boston Celtics

Defense

Though Langford wasn’t known for his defensive abilities in college, he got better as the year went on.

With his length, Langford has the skillset to be a lockdown defender in the NBA and could ultimately find his role as such as his career develops.

Most of the knock for his defense has come in the effort category, but once he started to play harder on every possession, his ability was shown. In a Brad Stevens defensive system, I don’ think effort will be too difficult to find.

The Celtics, and NBA in general, like to switch most ball screens, something the Hoosiers didn’t always do. This tweak in gameplan will help Langford tremendously.

With his versatility, he does have the ability to guard multiple positions, something the Celtics in particular like about their wings.

While Langford is in very good weak side help on most occasions he often struggles to keep tabs on his man, allowing for many weak side cuts by the opponent.

One part of his game he will have to get better at is his ability to guard in the isolation game. He often times struggles to quickly change direction laterally, and with a Celtics team that has no shot blockers on the roster, his one-on-one defense needs to get better in order to stay on the floor.