Surprises, disappointments, predictions, and other Boston Celtics mailbag answers

Thank you everyone for the thoughtful questions. Here are my answers:

Will Queta start at center this year? If so, is he just a stop-gap measure until the Cs trade or sign someone else? Can you see him and Garza playing alongside each other in certain situations or will Boucher be the more likely running mate for either one?

The center rotation reminds me of a group of people lined up shoulder to shoulder. Then when the person in charge asks for volunteers, everyone except one person takes a big step backwards, leaving a bewildered person standing alone and suddenly tasked with a lot more responsibility.

Yeah, I do think Queta will start at center, at least for stretches of the year. But yes, I certainly hope that he’s either just a stopgap solution, or primed for a major leap in his abilities. Neemy is a perfectly capable bench big, preferrably the 3rd or 4th option.

I don’t know much about Garza other than he’s skilled on offense and defense is …and adventure. Boucher seems like a stretch 4 who can occasionally fill in as a smallball center.

Part of me is still holding out hope that the team will acquire another true center, but the other part of me thinks this might be Brad’s way of roster-tanking. We’ll see.

What’s your thought on the offensive identity of this team? Without the gravity of JT, and bigs who are plus shooters from deep, do you think Joe and his staff will up the tempo and focus on cutting and off-the-ball movement? That would seem to align more with JBs strengths then playing in a slow half court game. If summer league is any indication…which who can say, at least 1 member of the Celtics coaching staff was focusing on cutting and off the ball movement.

Obviously Jaylen is going to see his usage increase, and I don’t mind that because he can get lots of reps in. I think he works better as a play finisher than as an offensive initiator, but why not let him make some mistakes and learn from them on the fly?

With all that said, from a pure production standpoint, I’d like to see the ball initially in Derrick White’s hands more. He makes good reads and heady plays and can find cutters like JB or spray the ball out to the shooters.

I think we might also see Pritchard do his best Steve Nash impression where he gets the ball into the teeth of the defense, turns his back on the net, and finds open shooters or cutters.

I’m always skeptical of the pace and tempo promises because every single coach that has lived has preached tempo in training camp and usually by November the team decides that they want to slow things down a bit. Generally teams follow the lead of the number one guy. Brown’s game is more suited to getting up and down the court (compared to Tatum who likes to assess and probe), so we could see it work for a while. We’ll see.

OK, Employee No. 8 — here’s a pupu platter of scenarios. How do you rate their likelihood?

1. Brown and White each play no more than 55 games, thanks to load management or phantom injuries

2. Sam is traded

3. Boucher plays at least 60 games

4. Tillman is healthy and becomes our first big off the bench, relegating Garza to spot duty

5. Baylor avoids a sophomore slump

6. Hugo starts earning regular minutes after the All-Star break

7. None of other of our other three rookies plays more than 12 games with the big club

8. Pritchard repeats as 6MOTY

9. Simons is still a Celtic at the end of the season

10. Walsh or Minnott emerges as a rotation player; the other is gone by the trade deadline

Oh, you want some early SWAGs from me? I’m yer huckleberry.

I predict that Hauser is NOT traded and Simons is. I just feel like Sam is a great value on his contract and Simons isn’t necessarily in the long term plans. I mean, I wouldn’t wager anything on this, but I feel pretty strongly about the Hauser part.

As for games played, I would assume that nobody plays more than 55 games. Except maybe Pritchard because he’s a gym rat. That said, I’m not sure if he wins 6MOTY again, in part because he could start a lot of games.

Realistically, given my above answer, I think every young player will get at least a stretch of a dozen or more games where they get to showcase themselves. This is an evaluation year and they are all auditioning for roles beyond this year. I don’t really have a lot of basis for this, but based purely on vibes and wishful thinking, here’s my power ranking of the kids.

Is 300 million in tax savings enough, or is Brad going to keep tearing it down until they get under the luxury tax? The non-tax MLE would be a nice option when Tatum returns.

Is ownership and by proxy Brad’s real goal to get under the tax line this year and next to reset the repeater tax penalties?

My prediction is yes, and he’s going to likely trade Simons to get there if he can find a trading partner.

(Lumping these two similar questions together)

The Celtics are so close to getting under the 1st apron, I don’t see why they don’t find their way under it by the end of the year. As you mention, getting under it opens up the ability to use the NTMLE and Bi-Annual Exception. They also have more trade flexibility and have an easier time using the TPEs they created this summer. Plus, they could restart the clock on the repeater taxes, which might matter to the new owners.

The only way I can see them staying over the 1st apron is if a can’t miss, no brainer deal becomes available for a player that fits Tatum’s timeline going forward. I wouldn’t put it past Brad, but I’m not holding my breath either.

Does Payton Pritchard start his year?

I see this question a lot and I can see the merit of keeping him in a super-sub situation. However, I think he can take on a bigger role and I see Anfernee Simons ultimate role as a microwave bench scorer in this league. So I tend to lean toward Pritchard starting, in particular if Simons isn’t the long term answer.

Greetings from Costa Rica. Is there any chance Big Al is considering “resting” this season (aka his time in OKC) and returning next year with Tatum fully recovered?

Greetings! I love the creativity of this question. It reminds me of when Roger Clemens played for the Astros and basically said he’s only going to pitch home games. At times I’ve wondered if older players like Horford could take a similar stance (DNP-Old).

With that said, I think we have to remember that Horford will (and should!) do what’s best for him and his family. If he wants to play another year for Golden State or whatever, he should. There’s no guarantee a year of rest is going to make him come back any fresher the next year. I love Al and will always think of him as a Celtic, but I think those days are over.

Are you going to put AI to the test again this year? I’m curious whether AI has anything insightful to say about this group since since there are a lot more variables than last year.

If you are using AI ask it it if has anything insightful to say.

AI means a lot of different things to people, but when it comes to sports writing, I’m not at all worried about losing my “job” to AI. What I’ve found is that the text/search AI tools are largely like advanced search engines that produce Wikipedia level research information. That is pretty useful for doing things like refreshing my memory on 1st and 2nd apron rules, but that doesn’t mean that it can produce intelligent analysis about our favorite basketball team in real time.

If Simmons absolutely balls out, does he fit with Jayson and Jaylen in ‘27?

I could see it happen. In fact, I predict that by January there’s going to be a movement among Celtics fans to encourage the team to keep him around long term. As I mentioned above, I think he’s a fantastic 6th man scorer off the bench. The problem is the salary. If he’s willing to take a pay cut and re-sign under a reasonable deal, I could certainly see him sticking around long term. With that said, I don’t know if that’s in his best interests

If Celtics acquire a player but fail to introduce rhe player to the public in a press conference, should the player buy a house in the Boston area?

The easy answer is “no.” But I think you really need to consider the value of investing in real estate. As long as you have good property managers and can leverage good debt, this might be a good way to diversify their portfolios.

Just wondering about Bassey now. Do we still have a place for him on this team? If not, I wonder what the reason/reasons were to not keep him? I thought he played really well in the summer league and he is still young to keep around and build around. Thoughts anyone?

Bassey strikes me as a guy that might be too good for the G-League but not a regular rotation guy in the NBA. There’s a reason he’s still available. With that said, given the state of our big man rotation, I wouldn’t rule out an invite to training camp and/or a spot on the 15 man roster if other moves are made (like say, Tillman dumped for salary purposes).

We have four young wings: Hugo, Walsh, Minott, Scheierman. If you had to pick one that was your bet to make our playoff rotation this year and one that will be waived or traded by the end of the season, who is your pick for each and why?

I kind of covered this above, but I think Hugo is here for the long term, even if he isn’t necessarily ready for huge minutes this year. I could see Minott getting big minutes this year, including playoff minutes (or play-in minutes?).

I think both Walsh and Scheierman get a chance a playing time this year, but I could also see either one being a toss-in for trade purposes. Walsh in particular kind of needs to show he belongs this year.

Of course I could be completely wrong on all of that. See my Antoine Walker comments from the open mailbag post.

Who do you think (and hope) might be a pleasant surprise? And who might disappoint? And why? Thanks

Literally any of the “kids” could surprise this year. I think fans are going to enjoy Minott’s dunks and Simons’ scoring. Tillman could surprise people just by being serviceable (I’m not ruling it out).

As for disappointments, I’m not so sure. People might be expecting Jaylen Brown to take another leap, and he’s capable of it, but there may be some learning curve issues there. Ultimately those lumps he takes might convince him that being a superstar 1B is a pretty sweet gig if you can live with that.

Thanks again for all the quality questions. I hope I either informed or entertained enough to do this again sometime. Cheers everyone!