How is this possible?
It's not like we have Pierce and Garnett to trade to a contender, for hopefully, a couple of 3 overall picks with potential.
We're not looking at a 50 win team, we're looking at a 30 win team.
Don't get me wrong, rebuilds are never a guarantee of anything. They often end up in the same spot that the Celtics are in now ... capped out with a core that isn't good enough.
But that's the life cycle of NBA teams ... you go through your asset collection / player development phase, put together the most talented core you can, try to maximize around that group, and then when you've hit a ceiling or you can't sustain any longer, you start over.
As I've stated earlier in this thread, I do not expect the Celtics to trade the Jays and start a rebuild in the short term. They will play this out further. They will look to trade anybody not named "Jay" and hope that a new mix will yield different results. Maybe bank on health / COVID luck improving.
But if that doesn't work, and we're sitting in more or less the same spot as Jaylen approaches the final year of his deal, with Tatum having just two years left, the only smart option left will be to look to deal those guys for a rebuilding package. Holding onto them until they're gone would be franchise suicide.