Thinking a little outside the box, but here are some reasons why I think we should keep Daniels instead of TA:
1. Injuries. Daniels was considered far and away the better player just 12 months ago. He got off to a good start with us, but was derailed by the thumb injury. After that injury he lost his confidence and was just never the same. Could a healthy off-season and another year in the system be a new beginning for him and jump start his Celtics career?
2. Money. Daniels struggles means that he's unlikely to command much in the open market. We would be able to re-sign at roughly the same money (1.5-2M per) and could add a team option just in case he does bounce back. In addition, we are not going to get anyone better or with more upside than him with only the veteran minimum (would like to use the full MLE on an impact player).
3. Other teams interest in Tony Allen on the open market. There have been a lot of interest thus far, and I expect that interest to only get stronger as the max guys begin to strike deals. That said, he'll likely get a multi-year deal worth somewhere in the range of 2.5-3.5M per season. That's a big risk to match when you consider the inconsistency, injury history, and lack of basketball IQ he's shown throughout his up and down career.
4. Needs. Right now we have several of them and only have the MLE and the sign and trade of Sheed's contract to get better. By working out a T. Allen S & T, we would have yet another realistic option to better our squad. If he were to get between 2.5M to 3.5M, we would be able to get between 3.1M-4.4M back in contracts. Even more (5M-6.25M) if we would include the non-guaranteed contracts of Gaffney and Lafayette. For example, we could do a sign and trade with the Heat (a team rumored to have interest in TA) for Beasley, once the Heat have signed all their FA's and no longer have cap room to sign TA. This would allow us to obtain a 3/4 in Beasley while still having the MLE and Sheed's deal to add a shooting wing (M. Miller, Redick, or Morrow) and a big man (B.Miller, Shaq, Haywood).