When the Celtics traded Georges Niang to the Utah Jazz, the acquired undrafted rookie RJ Luis Jr. Luis, who was the lone early college entrant to go undrafted, had signed a two-way contract with Utah. As a result, he slides into one of the Celtics two-way spots.
However, while not officially, the Celtics already have three two-way players. Miles Norris is the lone two-way guy to return and 57th pick Max Shulga has already signed his two-way deal.
That leaves the 46th pick in the draft, former Kentucky center Amari Williams as the last unsigned drafted player by Boston. On Draft Night, then ESPN draft analyst Jonathan Givony reported that Boston planned to sign Williams to a two-way contract.
However, Williams has yet to officially sign with the Celtics. He will play for Boston and Maine next year, but it is unclear if it will be on a standard deal or a two-way deal. With the addition of Luis on a two-way, the Celtics can not sign another two-way player. Teams are only allowed to carry three, unless they waive one of them. Thus, it leads to speculation on what Boston might do.
One of the reasons why the Celtics traded out of the 32nd pick when the Suns jumped up and selected Rasheer Fleming, the guy Boston was going to select, was that they didn’t want to add more money. While standard contracts count against the cap, luxury tax and the aprons, two-way contracts don’t. As a result, a trade down, while it also netted them extra picks, allowed them to sign players to two-way deals. Yet, with the deals of Jrue Holiday, Kristaps Porzingis and now Georges Niang, Boston has gotten far enough under the 2nd apron that signing Williams to a standard minimum deal won’t push them over it.
Still, I don’t think that the Celtics will sign Williams to a standard deal and will waive one of Luis or Norris instead and I would lean towards Luis getting the boot out of those two guys.
Luis had a good college career and a great season last year for St. John’s where he averaged 18.2 points and 7.2 rebounds per game as St. John’s won the Big East Tournament, the first for them in 25 years, and made the NCAA tournament as a #2 seed. You may also remember he was benched in the 2nd round of said tournament, the last game of St. John’s season, where they were upset by Arkansas.
Norris, meanwhile, played three games for the Celtics last season playing 11.7 minutes per game, he averaged 2.3 points and 3.0 rebounds in those games after being signed on March 4th.
Neither of Luis or Norris likely play a big factor into the Celtics 2025-26 plans or future plans. Boston has liked to keep 14 players on the roster during the regular season over the past couple of years and I don’t think that either of those guys would change those plans for this upcoming season either.
