What if free agency had played out differently?

[Roy H.]

First, a disclaimer:  I know that not everybody enjoys "what ifs", because they're impossible to predict.  I like them as an intellectual exercise.

Let's go back in time to the beginning of free agency.  Two confirmed targets of Brad Stevens were Jason Richardson and Pat Beverley.  Let's assume they both sign here.  How do things play out beyond that?

Do we still sign Brissett and/or Banton? 

Do we still make the Jrue trade?

Do we keep Grant Williams?

Most importantly, how is our team doing?  What's Pritchard's role?  How's chemistry?

[liam]

I think both of those guys are headaches but we probably do the Jure trade but we trade Prichard for something. We still let Grant walk. I'm not sure the chemistry is as good and I'm not sure there's that much playing time for those guys. They both play behind Holiday, White, and Jaylen. They need to split Pritchard's 10-15 minutes a game. I think I like it better the way it is now...

[Vermont Green]

If we signed Richardson and Beverley, we wouldn't have signed someone, probably Lamar Stevens and Mykhailiuk don't make the team.  Brissett was signed early so we probably still end up with him.  I don't think this changes the calculus on Grant at all.  He didn't want to be here anymore thinking he was going to be a starter in DAL.  Nor does it change anything relative to Jrue Holiday.

I don't think Richardson or Beverley beat out any of the core 8 or 9 for minutes so they would be playing the same as Stevens and/or Mykhailiuk and/or Banton (meaning not much).  Pritchard and Hauser are not great players, they are just useful bench players, but they know the system and they work well with the other lead players.  Also, I am not sure either wanted to be in Boston so it isn't just about what Brad would have or could have wanted to do.

[johnnygreen]

Was Brad going to pull Jason Richardson out of retirement? 

I think you meant Josh.

[Surferdad]

We still do the Jrue trade because Brad has wanted him for years, according to some sources.

Grant is gone for the reasons others have stated.

The other players are just fiddling with the fringes at 8 or 9 as Vermont Green indicated:

If we signed Richardson and Beverley, we wouldn't have signed someone, probably Lamar Stevens and Mykhailiuk don't make the team.  Brissett was signed early so we probably still end up with him.  I don't think this changes the calculus on Grant at all.  He didn't want to be here anymore thinking he was going to be a starter in DAL.  Nor does it change anything relative to Jrue Holiday.

I don't think Richardson or Beverley beat out any of the core 8 or 9 for minutes so they would be playing the same as Stevens and/or Mykhailiuk and/or Banton (meaning not much).  Pritchard and Hauser are not great players, they are just useful bench players, but they know the system and they work well with the other lead players.  Also, I am not sure either wanted to be in Boston so it isn't just about what Brad would have or could have wanted to do.

[Who]

I don't think they change any plans. They are not good enough. The Jrue deal still goes through.

I expect Pat Bev would beat out Pritchard for playing time. Pritchard may be traded. That is the only difference that may happen. Or they may keep both since they could play together in the same backcourt as Pat Bev regularly does in Philly and before in Chicago alongside a 2nd PG.

Josh Richardson would compete with Hauser for the backup wing spot. This would be similar to the battle last season between Hauser and Grant Williams. A battle between superior offense or superior defense. Grant gave physical big forward defense whereas Josh Richardson gives quick footed wing / guard defense. Hauser beat out G Williams last season and would probably be preferred over Josh Richardson most of the time as well. Josh would be a strong alternative to Hauser come certain mathups particularly in the playoffs and would be a valuable bench piece even if he was not a rotation regular.

I expect Grant Williams would still leave. Mazzula chose Hauser over him as his preferred backup SF. Mazzula preferred going small with Tatum at PF alongside shooting SF than staying bigger (at least in terms of bulk) with Grant at PF and Tatum at SF. There wasn't enough of a role left here for Grant to justify the money.

Overall, I don't think much would change. It would mostly be the same team as we have now. I would swap out Pat Bev for Pritchard in the rotation. Other than that, same same.

[Celtics2021]

I actually think things would have been substantially different.  Reportedly we offered Pat Bev the taxpayer MLE of $5 million (maybe a couple hundred thousand under it if we were short on space).  If he had accepted that, we would have been hard-capped at the second apron.  Currently we’re about $5.5 million over, and swapping out Beverley for Svi, for example, would mean that we would have had to send out roughly $8.5 million more in the trade to get Jrue (or in a separate deal to allow that to go through).  That means we’d probably have sent out both Pritchard and Horford to make all the dollars work, or sent out White and Brogdan.  So either the Jrue deal wouldn’t have happened or we’d have had a very different team with Jrue.

So thanks, Beverley, for turning us down!

[Roy H.]

I actually think things would have been substantially different.  Reportedly we offered Pat Bev the taxpayer MLE of $5 million (maybe a couple hundred thousand under it if we were short on space).  If he had accepted that, we would have been hard-capped at the second apron.  Currently we’re about $5.5 million over, and swapping out Beverley for Svi, for example, would mean that we would have had to send out roughly $8.5 million more in the trade to get Jrue (or in a separate deal to allow that to go through).  That means we’d probably have sent out both Pritchard and Horford to make all the dollars work, or sent out White and Brogdan.  So either the Jrue deal wouldn’t have happened or we’d have had a very different team with Jrue.

So thanks, Beverley, for turning us down!

I had heard that we'd offered PB more money than Philly, but I assumed that that was just like a vet minimum with a player option or something.  It would have been fairly disastrous to have hard-capped the team for Beverley.

Here's one interview he gave:

On the July 5 episode of “The Pat Bev Podcast With Rone,” Patrick Beverley explained why he signed with the Philadelphia 76ers over the Boston Celtics. The three-time All-NBA defender said he likes new Sixers head coach Nick Nurse, who replaced Doc Rivers.

“I talked to representatives of mine,” Beverley said. “It might be Philly. It might be Boston. It might be Washington. Imma have a little bit more money in Boston or Washington. Let’s wait on it. Let’s wait on it. I tell my agent, ‘[bleep] it. Pull the trigger. I ain’t gonna wait.’


“I like Nick Nurse. Obviously, I took a pay cut, but it’s never been about the money. You feel me? It’s always about the basketball.”

[Celtics2021]

I actually think things would have been substantially different.  Reportedly we offered Pat Bev the taxpayer MLE of $5 million (maybe a couple hundred thousand under it if we were short on space).  If he had accepted that, we would have been hard-capped at the second apron.  Currently we’re about $5.5 million over, and swapping out Beverley for Svi, for example, would mean that we would have had to send out roughly $8.5 million more in the trade to get Jrue (or in a separate deal to allow that to go through).  That means we’d probably have sent out both Pritchard and Horford to make all the dollars work, or sent out White and Brogdan.  So either the Jrue deal wouldn’t have happened or we’d have had a very different team with Jrue.

So thanks, Beverley, for turning us down!

I had heard that we'd offered PB more money than Philly, but I assumed that that was just like a vet minimum with a player option or something.  It would have been fairly disastrous to have hard-capped the team for Beverley.

Here's one interview he gave:

On the July 5 episode of “The Pat Bev Podcast With Rone,” Patrick Beverley explained why he signed with the Philadelphia 76ers over the Boston Celtics. The three-time All-NBA defender said he likes new Sixers head coach Nick Nurse, who replaced Doc Rivers.

“I talked to representatives of mine,” Beverley said. “It might be Philly. It might be Boston. It might be Washington. Imma have a little bit more money in Boston or Washington. Let’s wait on it. Let’s wait on it. I tell my agent, ‘[bleep] it. Pull the trigger. I ain’t gonna wait.’


“I like Nick Nurse. Obviously, I took a pay cut, but it’s never been about the money. You feel me? It’s always about the basketball.”

I don’t think it was a player option. I don’t think Beverley would be worried about finding a vet minimum the following season such that a player option would even register.   We had MLE room at the time, and Washington had theirs plus the BAE of $4.5 million.  It also tracks with why he would have needed to wait on our offer — we needed to sign-and-trade Grant first, because hard-capping ourselves for Beverley would have meant we renounced Grant and he could just sign in Dallas.

[Vermont Green]

Hard to know all this but I would not have wanted to get hard capped for Patrick Beverley.  That we could make a trade for Holiday is exactly why you don't want to give up that flexibility.  I too had assumed that in this hypothetical, that Beverley was coming in on a min contract.  If that was not the case, then yes, a lot could have changed.