This season has been a best-case scenario for the Celts:
1. They cleared over $300 million in salary + tax commitments, plus will now (likely) receive a luxury tax distribution;
2. They acquired a 17/9 veteran center who is a very good fit for Joe's offense;
3. Jordan Walsh is a contributor, and Hugo Gonzalez looks like a future rotation fixture;
4. We're contending, and there's a realistic chance of Tatum coming back;
5. It only cost the team a net of three second rounders if I'm counting right.
In the end it appears obvious that there was a mandate from ownership to get under the tax this season. Looking strictly at what the C's gave up its hard to be too angry about that decision in a vacuum. They swapped Simons for Vucevic, which is probably pretty close to a wash talent wise and probably a better fit positionally for the roster. They basically dumped all three of Boucher, Tillman, Minott. No big loss there. The entire salary dumping process from Holiday/KP to where we are today cost only 4 2nd rounders total.
But still, I'm a bit worried about ownership's willingness to spend. I don't think its anywhere CLOSE to a bets case scenario. A couple points on this: 1) There was clearly a goal to get under the tax. That's fine for this season. But my worry is they will try to stay under next season to stay out of the repeater. If they do that it will significantly handicap their ability to add salary this offseason and build a title contender next year. Teams BELOW the tax pretty much never win it all. It's very difficult to do.
2) It makes me question every move going forward. For example, DID they do the Simons/Vucevic swap because they like Vucevic? Or do they actually think Simons was better but did it to save money? If they are going to be penny pinching going forward you have to examine every move they make a little differently. You can no longer take them at their word that they like a player and think he'll improve the team; you have to factor in money now.
3) Did they screw over Josh Minott? I know this is a small thing but given the way he started the season vs how he finished you have to wonder if he ended up nailed to the bench because the optics of dumping a starter to save money are A LOT worse than dumping a guy who's barely played for a few weeks.
4) They didn't submarine the team's chances this year, but they certainly did not HELP the team's chances. There's a world in which they don't care about the tax this year and rather than dumping everybody they ADD and stayed right below the 2nd apron but get better on the floor. Instead they accepted "neutral" as the option and elected to save money. That's not a great sign to me, even if it is defensible.
5) Chisholm is really not that rich (at least on the "own an NBA team" scale). That itself doesn't worry me, but until he pays the tax it should be something to keep in mind.
A bets case scenario would be ownership willing to spend into the tax every year, without re-setting the repeater. That would 100% be the best case for maximizing talent on the team. They aren't going to do that. That's bad, to some degree, we'll see how much.
Topic: Brad understood the assignment (Read 1160 times)