Celtics’ Kristaps Porzingis Excited To Join ‘Historic Franchise’

BRIGHTON — When Kristaps Porzingis heard there was a possibility he would be traded from the Washington Wizards to the Boston Celtics, the decision to opt-in was pretty much a no-brainer for the big man.

The 27-year-old was introduced with his No. 8 Celtics jersey at the Red Auerbach Center on Thursday alongside head coach Joe Mazzulla and president of basketball operations Brad Stevens.

“Very excited when I first heard the news,” Porzingis said. “That was a pretty easy decision for me. Not much else to say.”

Porzingis talked about the opportunity to go deep in the playoffs with an already-established team like the Celtics.

“It’s the opportunity to play for a really good team already,” Porzingis said. “And to be able to add to that hopefully. To help these guys, make their lives even easier. And just being on a high-level organization like Boston. Historic franchise. Iconic franchise. Made it extremely easy for me to make a decision.”

Much like Celtics fans, Porzingis wasn’t sure if the deal was actually going to get done before the midnight deadline on June 21 and awaited the news from his home in Latvia.

“It was a crazy day for me. I was about to go to sleep and then I heard the news that the trade didn’t go through so that kept me up for a little bit longer,” Porzingis explained. “Then by like 4 a.m. back home, I was like, ‘OK, I’m going to sleep and see what happens.’ I woke up in the morning and saw the trade happened and I was just extremely excited and extremely happy.”