Kyrie Irving is expected to sign elsewhere in free agency. Same goes for Al Horford in a rather surprising development.
Oh, by the way, Anthony Davis reportedly is heading to the Los Angeles Lakers after rampant speculation over whether the Boston Celtics would pull off a blockbuster trade with the New Orleans Pelicans.
In other words, this offseason hasn’t gone according to plan for the Celtics, who are coming off a tumultuous 2018-19 campaign in which they floundered despite NBA Finals aspirations. As such, Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge must change course in building Boston’s roster for the 2019-20 season and beyond.
The Celtics’ first opportunity to make a splash comes Thursday night in the 2019 NBA Draft, as Boston owns three first-round picks — Nos. 14, 20 and 22 — thanks to deals made in recent years. There’s been a lot of chatter about how the Celtics will tackle draft night — namely whether they’ll trade one or more selections — and Boston Sports Journal’s Brian Robb shed some light on one potential offseason strategy in light of the organization’s recent developments.
Here’s what Robb wrote in a piece published Thursday, hours before the draft:
The Celtics have remained active in the days before the NBA Draft. League sources told BostonSportsJournal.com that Boston has had discussions with multiple teams about absorbing a large veteran contract with their anticipated salary cap space. The team is exploring leveraging that cap space into additional future assets (players and/or picks) in exchange for taking on a contract another team is looking to get rid of.
It feels like we’ve been talking about Boston’s cupboard of draft picks for years, just waiting for Ainge to cash in his assets at the perfect time to land a superstar. Now, the C’s aren’t just without said superstar. They’re also on the verge of losing their two best players — Irving and Horford — as their draft capital dwindles.
The much-discussed Memphis Grizzlies pick — top-six protected in 2020 and unprotected in 2021 — represents the only additional first-round pick the Celtics own for 2020 and beyond, meaning Ainge must start wheeling and dealing if he’d like to (again) stockpile assets that ultimately could be of interest to other teams in potential trades involving high-profile talent. Absorbing a large veteran contract this offseason represents a means to the end.
Here’s more from Robb:
With Kyrie Irving and Al Horford poised to walk out the door in free agency, Danny Ainge and his staff are considering leveraging their own unexpected cap space to gain additional assets from a team via future draft picks or young players with potential. Those assets might then be used as a tool to target future acquisitions since the team’s current pool of draft assets will run thin after Thursday night.
This isn’t the only strategy for Ainge to consider, obviously. But it makes sense over the long-term with Boston poised to build around up-and-comers Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, and the Celtics already appear to be taking steps toward further improving their cap situation by reportedly shopping veteran center Aron Baynes, who recently exercised his $5.4 million contract option for the 2019-20 season.
