sully lookin too good

[Greyman]

The way I see it, moving to a new place helps with this kind of lifetsyle change, so if he had stayed there's no guarentee he'd have lost this much weight. On top of that, if this change helps him and he looks really good this season, I still would worry about giving him a big contract for 4 years. Did he finally get into shape because now he's comitted to basketball or because now he can see exactly how much money he lost this offseason?

I like his game and his talent and I wish he had gotten it together for us but he never did. I'm fine with letting him walk.

TP. We will be better with Horford than we have been with Sully. Sully had enough time in the CBS system to show the best he could do.

If he does better in another system and he finds a new level, good luck to him. He did some good things but nothing to suggest he was going to get a lot better. Time will tell but I think DA has done a good job to ensure we are covered in the future for what we have lost.

[MBunge]

I haven't seen any reporting on this but I have to think that Sully and his agent told Ainge they were not interested in a Zeller-type deal where he would essentially be a trade chip fighting KO for minutes off the bench.

Mike

He had signed the qualifying offer.  Boston didn't have to do anything else.  Boston let him go.  So he didn't have to sign a Zeller type deal, Boston could have just kept him on the QO and waited to see if another team made a better offer and then decided what to do.  That is the problem I have with not bringing him back.

A player who accepts the qualifying offer cannot be traded without their consent.  So, keeping Sully would have meant losing Zeller as a player AND losing the trade value of that contract.  As I said, no one has reported this but I would be very surprised if Ainge would've let Sully go if he had been willing to take the Zeller deal.

Mike

No reason to trade Sullinger though.  He after all would have been starting next to Horford.  And with a guy that can actually play, both Johnson and Jerekbo become far more expendable (unlike Zeller who is essentially worthless aside from his contract).

Amir starts over Sully at PF.  There's a reason why Amir played PF with Sully at center because Sully was too fat and slow to be anything but a center.

And the point of a trade is to get a star.  Imagine not getting Cousins because Sully refuses to be traded.

Mike

[fantankerous]

Sully was a good player for us.  However, his limitations plus contract situation made moving on mutually beneficial.  Best of luck to him.

[MJohnnyboy]

I haven't seen any reporting on this but I have to think that Sully and his agent told Ainge they were not interested in a Zeller-type deal where he would essentially be a trade chip fighting KO for minutes off the bench.

Mike

He had signed the qualifying offer.  Boston didn't have to do anything else.  Boston let him go.  So he didn't have to sign a Zeller type deal, Boston could have just kept him on the QO and waited to see if another team made a better offer and then decided what to do.  That is the problem I have with not bringing him back.

Eh, even at that low cost, it might not make sense to keep him with how many bigs we already have. That would've then put us at 6 bigs that could deserve some sort of minutes - Horford, Amir, KO, JJ, Sully, and Zeller. I believe Brad just wants that four man group of Horford, Amir, KO, and JJ to take the majority of the big minutes, let alone when we go small with Crowder at 4, so keeping Sully even at that low cost might not have been beneficial and could have only led to locker room/playing time issues.

Sullinger is a better rebounder and low post scorer than everyone single one of those guys.  Those skills might just come in handy against you know basically every team in the league.

Yeah, like in the playoffs? Remember how much Sully was just murdering the Hawks? He was so good that Brad opted not to play him simply because he didn't want Atlanta to be embarrassed.

Did you watch the series, everyone was terrible.  I mean Crowder shot under 28% from the field and if you think that was bad, Olynyk was 11.1%.  Thomas, Turner, and Smart were all also under 40% (like Sulinger). 

Sullinger was still the best rebounder of all the regular rotation players in the playoffs, both by per minute production and rebound percentage.  He also only shot 4 threes all playoffs, making 2 of them, so he wasn't killing the team from there like he had at times during the season and like Crowder did during the series, you know by shooting 41 threes and only making 10 of them (nothing like a 24.4% to really win you a series).  heck even Bradley in his one game was 1 of 7 from three.

I get it, Sullinger isn't here anymore so it is ok to act like he lost the series against the Hawks, but that is just revisionist history.  Only Johnson and Jerekbo performed any where near their season averages (though even JJ was under 32% from three).  It was a terrible series from every single member of the Boston Celtics.  Sullinger wasn't any worse than anyone else.

Last time I checked, this was about Jared Sullinger. Not the rest of the team. What does the rest of the team have to do with my point?

I watched the series. I'm not arguing that a lot things didn't go wrong for the Celtics, nor am I saying Sulinger is the one that lost the series for the Celtics. What I'm saying is, out of all the performances from the team, Sullinger's awful play was the most noticeable not just because he was getting shut down by Millsap and Horford but also because they were tearing him apart in embarrassing fashion which led to his benching for Jerebko. You can argue all you want that his "skillset" didn't hurt the team, but after they benched him and started JJ, they played better. That really made Sully look awful because at a time where the Celtics needed him most, he faded.

Your point was Sully's skillset was handy against every team in the league. With Atlanta, that certainly wasn't the case. There are teams where Sully matches up well, like teams that have bigs that aren't active, but there are definitely others where he is a horrible match-up.

I don't even dislike wSully as a whole and I would have liked him back at the right price, but I'm not heartbroken he's gone. More importantly, if Sullinger was that useful, someone would have given him a nice contract. That didn't happen, which goes to show what the league thought of Jared Sullinger this summer. Also, I really think it came down to either adding Horford and re-signing Sully. I don't think that's a tough call unless you're Billy King.

[YoungOne87]

I think he looks and plays the same like last season...

[Moranis]

I haven't seen any reporting on this but I have to think that Sully and his agent told Ainge they were not interested in a Zeller-type deal where he would essentially be a trade chip fighting KO for minutes off the bench.

Mike

He had signed the qualifying offer.  Boston didn't have to do anything else.  Boston let him go.  So he didn't have to sign a Zeller type deal, Boston could have just kept him on the QO and waited to see if another team made a better offer and then decided what to do.  That is the problem I have with not bringing him back.

Eh, even at that low cost, it might not make sense to keep him with how many bigs we already have. That would've then put us at 6 bigs that could deserve some sort of minutes - Horford, Amir, KO, JJ, Sully, and Zeller. I believe Brad just wants that four man group of Horford, Amir, KO, and JJ to take the majority of the big minutes, let alone when we go small with Crowder at 4, so keeping Sully even at that low cost might not have been beneficial and could have only led to locker room/playing time issues.

Sullinger is a better rebounder and low post scorer than everyone single one of those guys.  Those skills might just come in handy against you know basically every team in the league.

Yeah, like in the playoffs? Remember how much Sully was just murdering the Hawks? He was so good that Brad opted not to play him simply because he didn't want Atlanta to be embarrassed.

Did you watch the series, everyone was terrible.  I mean Crowder shot under 28% from the field and if you think that was bad, Olynyk was 11.1%.  Thomas, Turner, and Smart were all also under 40% (like Sulinger). 

Sullinger was still the best rebounder of all the regular rotation players in the playoffs, both by per minute production and rebound percentage.  He also only shot 4 threes all playoffs, making 2 of them, so he wasn't killing the team from there like he had at times during the season and like Crowder did during the series, you know by shooting 41 threes and only making 10 of them (nothing like a 24.4% to really win you a series).  heck even Bradley in his one game was 1 of 7 from three.

I get it, Sullinger isn't here anymore so it is ok to act like he lost the series against the Hawks, but that is just revisionist history.  Only Johnson and Jerekbo performed any where near their season averages (though even JJ was under 32% from three).  It was a terrible series from every single member of the Boston Celtics.  Sullinger wasn't any worse than anyone else.

Last time I checked, this was about Jared Sullinger. Not the rest of the team. What does the rest of the team have to do with my point?

I watched the series. I'm not arguing that a lot things didn't go wrong for the Celtics, nor am I saying Sulinger is the one that lost the series for the Celtics. What I'm saying is, out of all the performances from the team, Sullinger's awful play was the most noticeable not just because he was getting shut down by Millsap and Horford but also because they were tearing him apart in embarrassing fashion which led to his benching for Jerebko. You can argue all you want that his "skillset" didn't hurt the team, but after they benched him and started JJ, they played better. That really made Sully look awful because at a time where the Celtics needed him most, he faded.

Your point was Sully's skillset was handy against every team in the league. With Atlanta, that certainly wasn't the case. There are teams where Sully matches up well, like teams that have bigs that aren't active, but there are definitely others where he is a horrible match-up.

I don't even dislike wSully as a whole and I would have liked him back at the right price, but I'm not heartbroken he's gone. More importantly, if Sullinger was that useful, someone would have given him a nice contract. That didn't happen, which goes to show what the league thought of Jared Sullinger this summer. Also, I really think it came down to either adding Horford and re-signing Sully. I don't think that's a tough call unless you're Billy King.

Boston kept him as a restricted free agent until basically every team, especially those that could have used a big man, had utilized their cap space.  Had Boston let him go immediately, I suspect Sullinger would have had a lot more interest.  Maybe not, but it is hard to hold his contract against him when he was restricted for the first couple of weeks of free agency.

[Celtics4ever]

Sullinger was still the best rebounder of all the regular rotation players in the playoffs, both by per minute production and rebound percentage.  He also only shot 4 threes all playoffs, making 2 of them, so he wasn't killing the team from there like he had at times during the season and like Crowder did during the series, you know by shooting 41 threes and only making 10 of them (nothing like a 24.4% to really win you a series).  heck even Bradley in his one game was 1 of 7 from three.

Per minute, is a way of skewing the stats in your argument.   Trouble is, it is inherently dishones.  You should go into politics, because he could not play many minutes because he ate himself to where his conditioning limited his minutes.  He only played 13.5 MPG because by the end of the season he was totally unreliable and out of shape.   But by the minute he was the team leader in production.   Are you kidding me!  I bet he lead the team in using his per diem too.

He averaged 4.5 RPG that series.   He was so washed up that he was unreliable.   Once, again he put his tummy ahead of his team mates, the fans and his career.

http://www.espn.com/nba/player/_/id/6624/jared-sullinger

Do you really believe this crap?   He had a bad series no matter how you twist it.  You should write speeches for politicians!

Boston kept him as a restricted free agent until basically every team, especially those that could have used a big man, had utilized their cap space.  Had Boston let him go immediately, I suspect Sullinger would have had a lot more interest.  Maybe not, but it is hard to hold his contract against him when he was restricted for the first couple of weeks of free agency

You have already been exposed on this one, yet you continue this false narrative.  Please look at this link folks, Sully signed on July 11th.

Here are deals signed since then, so teams still had cap space.   There were plenty of teams with cap space.

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/16647240/nba-free-agency-2016-latest-news-buzz-rumors

Here one can see teams with cap space still remaining.

http://www.spotrac.com/nba/cap/

That should put an end to the other teams had money narrative  and Ainge screwed narrative.   Ainge would not have matched on any deal anyways so if a team wanted they could have signed him.   Seven teams still have money and they passed on signing Sully.  Sully was considered a high risk/reward kind of signing and damaged goods after falling apart from April on.

I get it, Sullinger isn't here anymore so it is ok to act like he lost the series against the Hawks, but that is just revisionist history.  Only Johnson and Jerekbo performed any where near their season averages (though even JJ was under 32% from three).  It was a terrible series from every single member of the Boston Celtics.  Sullinger wasn't any worse than anyone else.

He didn't.  He didn't contribute much because of a glaring lack of personal discipline, once again, by gaining weight during the season.  This is where he is was worse.

[Moranis]

Sullinger was still the best rebounder of all the regular rotation players in the playoffs, both by per minute production and rebound percentage.  He also only shot 4 threes all playoffs, making 2 of them, so he wasn't killing the team from there like he had at times during the season and like Crowder did during the series, you know by shooting 41 threes and only making 10 of them (nothing like a 24.4% to really win you a series).  heck even Bradley in his one game was 1 of 7 from three.

Per minute, is a way of skewing the stats in your argument.   Trouble is, it is inherently dishones.  You should go into politics, because he could not play many minutes because he ate himself to where his conditioning limited his minutes.  He only played 13.5 MPG because by the end of the season he was totally unreliable and out of shape.   But by the minute he was the team leader in production.   Are you kidding me!  I bet he lead the team in using his per diem too.

He averaged 4.5 RPG that series.   He was so washed up that he was unreliable.   Once, again he put his tummy ahead of his team mates, the fans and his career.

http://www.espn.com/nba/player/_/id/6624/jared-sullinger

Do you really believe this crap?   He had a bad series no matter how you twist it.  You should write speeches for politicians!

Boston kept him as a restricted free agent until basically every team, especially those that could have used a big man, had utilized their cap space.  Had Boston let him go immediately, I suspect Sullinger would have had a lot more interest.  Maybe not, but it is hard to hold his contract against him when he was restricted for the first couple of weeks of free agency

You have already been exposed on this one, yet you continue this false narrative.  Please look at this link folks, Sully signed on July 11th.

Here are deals signed since then, so teams still had cap space.   There were plenty of teams with cap space.

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/16647240/nba-free-agency-2016-latest-news-buzz-rumors

Here one can see teams with cap space still remaining.

http://www.spotrac.com/nba/cap/

That should put an end to the other teams had money narrative  and Ainge screwed narrative.   Ainge would not have matched on any deal anyways so if a team wanted they could have signed him.   Seven teams still have money and they passed on signing Sully.  Sully was considered a high risk/reward kind of signing and damaged goods after falling apart from April on.

I get it, Sullinger isn't here anymore so it is ok to act like he lost the series against the Hawks, but that is just revisionist history.  Only Johnson and Jerekbo performed any where near their season averages (though even JJ was under 32% from three).  It was a terrible series from every single member of the Boston Celtics.  Sullinger wasn't any worse than anyone else.

He didn't.  He didn't contribute much because of a glaring lack of personal discipline, once again, by gaining weight during the season.  This is where he is was worse.

I'm confused by your list of transactions, because no one signed a free agent contract with a new team larger than Sullinger's contract after Sullinger's QO was rescinded.  And of the 6 teams with cap space, only Brooklyn actually has a need for a PF, but Sullinger is far too similar to Brook Lopez for them to be a good fit (and at the time Crabbe was still signed to the offer sheet, which was a huge portion of their cap space).

As for the stats, Sullinger's RB% was 17.3 in the playoffs.  Zeller was the only person better.  Sullinger played 53 less minutes than Johnson yet had only 1 less offensive rebound.  Last time I checked, those were worth possessions.  Sullinger averaged as many assists as Rozier did in the playoffs even though Rozier played more mpg and is a guard.  Look I get it, Sullinger was terrible, but he wasn't the worst player in that series.  That was Crowder.  Smart and Turner weren't much better.  Thomas was bad, though not as bad as those 4 guys.  It was a beat down all the way around.  The two games Boston won, were because Thomas actually played like an All Star.

[spikelovetheCelts]

Sullinger was still the best rebounder of all the regular rotation players in the playoffs, both by per minute production and rebound percentage.  He also only shot 4 threes all playoffs, making 2 of them, so he wasn't killing the team from there like he had at times during the season and like Crowder did during the series, you know by shooting 41 threes and only making 10 of them (nothing like a 24.4% to really win you a series).  heck even Bradley in his one game was 1 of 7 from three.

Per minute, is a way of skewing the stats in your argument.   Trouble is, it is inherently dishones.  You should go into politics, because he could not play many minutes because he ate himself to where his conditioning limited his minutes.  He only played 13.5 MPG because by the end of the season he was totally unreliable and out of shape.   But by the minute he was the team leader in production.   Are you kidding me!  I bet he lead the team in using his per diem too.

He averaged 4.5 RPG that series.   He was so washed up that he was unreliable.   Once, again he put his tummy ahead of his team mates, the fans and his career.

http://www.espn.com/nba/player/_/id/6624/jared-sullinger

Do you really believe this crap?   He had a bad series no matter how you twist it.  You should write speeches for politicians!

Boston kept him as a restricted free agent until basically every team, especially those that could have used a big man, had utilized their cap space.  Had Boston let him go immediately, I suspect Sullinger would have had a lot more interest.  Maybe not, but it is hard to hold his contract against him when he was restricted for the first couple of weeks of free agency

You have already been exposed on this one, yet you continue this false narrative.  Please look at this link folks, Sully signed on July 11th.

Here are deals signed since then, so teams still had cap space.   There were plenty of teams with cap space.

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/16647240/nba-free-agency-2016-latest-news-buzz-rumors

Here one can see teams with cap space still remaining.

http://www.spotrac.com/nba/cap/

That should put an end to the other teams had money narrative  and Ainge screwed narrative.   Ainge would not have matched on any deal anyways so if a team wanted they could have signed him.   Seven teams still have money and they passed on signing Sully.  Sully was considered a high risk/reward kind of signing and damaged goods after falling apart from April on.

I get it, Sullinger isn't here anymore so it is ok to act like he lost the series against the Hawks, but that is just revisionist history.  Only Johnson and Jerekbo performed any where near their season averages (though even JJ was under 32% from three).  It was a terrible series from every single member of the Boston Celtics.  Sullinger wasn't any worse than anyone else.

He didn't.  He didn't contribute much because of a glaring lack of personal discipline, once again, by gaining weight during the season.  This is where he is was worse.

Why did Brooklyn not throw money at him? Because he is not all that great. He is what Toronto needed a rebounder big guy with a great outlet pass. I am happy for him but it was al for Sully. I go with Al.

[Vermont Green]

Sullinger is  very skilled player who couldn't stay in NBA physical condition.  If he figures it out (how to stay in shape) he is going to be a good NBA player.  If he doesn't, he is going to wash out.  The Celtics decided to let him go and take their chances with Horford.  We don't have enough roster spots for everyone as it is.  I guess you could say we should have signed Sullinger over Zeller.  Zeller did accept a non-guaranteed second season which perhaps Sullinger wouldn't.

Maybe Sullinger was ready for a change too.  Sullinger could have accepted the qualifying offer, right?  Didn't he end up signing for about the same amount?  Not sure why he would like Toronto over Boston but this seems more like his choice than the Celtics.  All he had to do was say OK and he had a one season deal with the Celtics very similar to what he signed for.

[celticsclay]

Sullinger was still the best rebounder of all the regular rotation players in the playoffs, both by per minute production and rebound percentage.  He also only shot 4 threes all playoffs, making 2 of them, so he wasn't killing the team from there like he had at times during the season and like Crowder did during the series, you know by shooting 41 threes and only making 10 of them (nothing like a 24.4% to really win you a series).  heck even Bradley in his one game was 1 of 7 from three.

Per minute, is a way of skewing the stats in your argument.   Trouble is, it is inherently dishones.  You should go into politics, because he could not play many minutes because he ate himself to where his conditioning limited his minutes.  He only played 13.5 MPG because by the end of the season he was totally unreliable and out of shape.   But by the minute he was the team leader in production.   Are you kidding me!  I bet he lead the team in using his per diem too.

He averaged 4.5 RPG that series.   He was so washed up that he was unreliable.   Once, again he put his tummy ahead of his team mates, the fans and his career.

http://www.espn.com/nba/player/_/id/6624/jared-sullinger

Do you really believe this crap?   He had a bad series no matter how you twist it.  You should write speeches for politicians!

Boston kept him as a restricted free agent until basically every team, especially those that could have used a big man, had utilized their cap space.  Had Boston let him go immediately, I suspect Sullinger would have had a lot more interest.  Maybe not, but it is hard to hold his contract against him when he was restricted for the first couple of weeks of free agency

You have already been exposed on this one, yet you continue this false narrative.  Please look at this link folks, Sully signed on July 11th.

Here are deals signed since then, so teams still had cap space.   There were plenty of teams with cap space.

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/16647240/nba-free-agency-2016-latest-news-buzz-rumors

Here one can see teams with cap space still remaining.

http://www.spotrac.com/nba/cap/

That should put an end to the other teams had money narrative  and Ainge screwed narrative.   Ainge would not have matched on any deal anyways so if a team wanted they could have signed him.   Seven teams still have money and they passed on signing Sully.  Sully was considered a high risk/reward kind of signing and damaged goods after falling apart from April on.

I get it, Sullinger isn't here anymore so it is ok to act like he lost the series against the Hawks, but that is just revisionist history.  Only Johnson and Jerekbo performed any where near their season averages (though even JJ was under 32% from three).  It was a terrible series from every single member of the Boston Celtics.  Sullinger wasn't any worse than anyone else.

He didn't.  He didn't contribute much because of a glaring lack of personal discipline, once again, by gaining weight during the season.  This is where he is was worse.

Why did Brooklyn not throw money at him? Because he is not all that great. He is what Toronto needed a rebounder big guy with a great outlet pass. I am happy for him but it was al for Sully. I go with Al.

The idea that teams didn't throw money at him because he was restricted for a bit is pretty hard to take seriously. There were restricted free agents with worse pedigrees (tyler johnsons and crabbe come to mind for the Nets that actually had their offers matched). It is hard to believe if someone wanted Sully badly they feared Boston would have matched the contract when we really appeared tepid on him the last year and he tumbled to the bottom end of our rotation. Also as others have pointed out there are still teams now with Cap Space.

I think it is fair to question whether we will miss his rebounding at times cause he was good at that when he could stay on the court. However him getting screwed and having a bad cheap contract is a little silly to blame on anything but his play and value.

[Celtics4ever]

I'm confused by your list of transactions, because no one signed a free agent contract with a new team larger than Sullinger's contract after Sullinger's QO was rescinded.  And of the 6 teams with cap space, only Brooklyn actually has a need for a PF, but Sullinger is far too similar to Brook Lopez for them to be a good fit (and at the time Crabbe was still signed to the offer sheet, which was a huge portion of their cap space).

Sullinger signed for 6 Million

July 26 update

4:30 p.m. ET: Restricted free agent Maurice Harkless has signed a new four-year, $42 million deal to stay with the Portland Trail Blazers, his agent told ESPN.com's Marc Stein. The Blazers' signing of Harkless follows Monday's contract extension with reigning NBA Most Improved Player C.J. McCollum,

That is seven million which is more than six.

July 25 updates

3:05 p.m. ET: The Miami Heat and free agent guard Dion Waiters have agreed to a two-year contract worth $6 million with a player option in the second year of the deal, as first reported Monday by The Vertical and confirmed by ESPN. Waiters averaged 9.8 points for the Oklahoma City Thunder last season.

Same as Sully.

July 19 updates

12:55 a.m. ET: Veteran sharpshooter Mike Miller is nearing agreement on a two-year deal in the $6 million range to return to the Denver Nuggets, league sources tell ESPN's Marc Stein. Miller, 36, played last season in Denver after spending four of the previous five seasons alongside close friend LeBron James in Miami and Cleveland.

Same as Sully,

July 18 updates

12:29 p.m. ET: Restricted free agent big man Miles Plumlee is re-signing with the Milwaukee Bucks on a four-year deal worth $52 million, according to his agent. Plumlee averaged 5.1 points and 3.8 rebounds in 61 games with the Bucks last season.

This offer was more than double what Sully got.

July 14 updates

7:58 p.m. ET: The San Antonio Spurs completed a flurry of moves Thursday by signing backcourt mainstay Manu Ginobili to a one-year deal at an estimated $14 million, according to league sources. The Spurs announced the re-signing of Ginobili on Thursday night after first using their salary-cap space to sign former All-Star center Pau Gasol, Latvian import Davis Bertans, rookie Dejounte Murray, big man Dewayne Dedmon and young guards Ryan Arcidiacono and Bryn Forbes.

More than Sully.

July 12 updates

2:03 p.m. ET: The Detroit Pistons have signed center Boban Marjanovic to a three-year, $21 million contract. Detroit announced the deal Tuesday after the San Antonio Spurs didn't match Detroit's offer for the restricted free agent.

More than Sully

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/16647240/nba-free-agency-2016-latest-news-buzz-rumors

TEAMS WITH CAP SPACE REMAINING

Additionally, the Sixers have $19,290,799  in cap space and passed on Sully.
The Nets have $17,194,363 with cap space and passed on Sully.
The Nuggets have $15,357,278 in cap space and passed on Sully.
The Suns have $13,242,017 in cap space and passed on Sully.
The Jazz have $11,781,904 in cap space and passed on Sully.
The Timberwolves have $10,171,692 in cap space and passed on Sully.


http://www.spotrac.com/nba/cap/

So as you can see, quite a few teams had some money left and choose not to spend on Sully.   Free Agents were signed for more than he made after he signed as well.   Bottom line is he hurt his value but vanishing in the playoffs and gaining weight during the season once again.

[MJohnnyboy]

I haven't seen any reporting on this but I have to think that Sully and his agent told Ainge they were not interested in a Zeller-type deal where he would essentially be a trade chip fighting KO for minutes off the bench.

Mike

He had signed the qualifying offer.  Boston didn't have to do anything else.  Boston let him go.  So he didn't have to sign a Zeller type deal, Boston could have just kept him on the QO and waited to see if another team made a better offer and then decided what to do.  That is the problem I have with not bringing him back.

Eh, even at that low cost, it might not make sense to keep him with how many bigs we already have. That would've then put us at 6 bigs that could deserve some sort of minutes - Horford, Amir, KO, JJ, Sully, and Zeller. I believe Brad just wants that four man group of Horford, Amir, KO, and JJ to take the majority of the big minutes, let alone when we go small with Crowder at 4, so keeping Sully even at that low cost might not have been beneficial and could have only led to locker room/playing time issues.

Sullinger is a better rebounder and low post scorer than everyone single one of those guys.  Those skills might just come in handy against you know basically every team in the league.

Yeah, like in the playoffs? Remember how much Sully was just murdering the Hawks? He was so good that Brad opted not to play him simply because he didn't want Atlanta to be embarrassed.

Did you watch the series, everyone was terrible.  I mean Crowder shot under 28% from the field and if you think that was bad, Olynyk was 11.1%.  Thomas, Turner, and Smart were all also under 40% (like Sulinger). 

Sullinger was still the best rebounder of all the regular rotation players in the playoffs, both by per minute production and rebound percentage.  He also only shot 4 threes all playoffs, making 2 of them, so he wasn't killing the team from there like he had at times during the season and like Crowder did during the series, you know by shooting 41 threes and only making 10 of them (nothing like a 24.4% to really win you a series).  heck even Bradley in his one game was 1 of 7 from three.

I get it, Sullinger isn't here anymore so it is ok to act like he lost the series against the Hawks, but that is just revisionist history.  Only Johnson and Jerekbo performed any where near their season averages (though even JJ was under 32% from three).  It was a terrible series from every single member of the Boston Celtics.  Sullinger wasn't any worse than anyone else.

Last time I checked, this was about Jared Sullinger. Not the rest of the team. What does the rest of the team have to do with my point?

I watched the series. I'm not arguing that a lot things didn't go wrong for the Celtics, nor am I saying Sulinger is the one that lost the series for the Celtics. What I'm saying is, out of all the performances from the team, Sullinger's awful play was the most noticeable not just because he was getting shut down by Millsap and Horford but also because they were tearing him apart in embarrassing fashion which led to his benching for Jerebko. You can argue all you want that his "skillset" didn't hurt the team, but after they benched him and started JJ, they played better. That really made Sully look awful because at a time where the Celtics needed him most, he faded.

Your point was Sully's skillset was handy against every team in the league. With Atlanta, that certainly wasn't the case. There are teams where Sully matches up well, like teams that have bigs that aren't active, but there are definitely others where he is a horrible match-up.

I don't even dislike wSully as a whole and I would have liked him back at the right price, but I'm not heartbroken he's gone. More importantly, if Sullinger was that useful, someone would have given him a nice contract. That didn't happen, which goes to show what the league thought of Jared Sullinger this summer. Also, I really think it came down to either adding Horford and re-signing Sully. I don't think that's a tough call unless you're Billy King.

Boston kept him as a restricted free agent until basically every team, especially those that could have used a big man, had utilized their cap space.  Had Boston let him go immediately, I suspect Sullinger would have had a lot more interest.  Maybe not, but it is hard to hold his contract against him when he was restricted for the first couple of weeks of free agency.

I'm sorry man but I do not see that at all. I think it was pretty clear to everyone in the league that after the Celtics signed Horford, let Turner walk, and chase Durant that they weren't going to invest anything long-term in Sullinger and were willing to move on.

I'm sure the Celtics offered the contract they gave to Zeller to Sully first, but Sully wanted a situation where he'd get more time. The Horford acquisition was the final nail in the coffin.

[Redz]

New poster boy for " Subway"

he's got the right first name

[celticsclay]

I haven't seen any reporting on this but I have to think that Sully and his agent told Ainge they were not interested in a Zeller-type deal where he would essentially be a trade chip fighting KO for minutes off the bench.

Mike

He had signed the qualifying offer.  Boston didn't have to do anything else.  Boston let him go.  So he didn't have to sign a Zeller type deal, Boston could have just kept him on the QO and waited to see if another team made a better offer and then decided what to do.  That is the problem I have with not bringing him back.

Eh, even at that low cost, it might not make sense to keep him with how many bigs we already have. That would've then put us at 6 bigs that could deserve some sort of minutes - Horford, Amir, KO, JJ, Sully, and Zeller. I believe Brad just wants that four man group of Horford, Amir, KO, and JJ to take the majority of the big minutes, let alone when we go small with Crowder at 4, so keeping Sully even at that low cost might not have been beneficial and could have only led to locker room/playing time issues.

Sullinger is a better rebounder and low post scorer than everyone single one of those guys.  Those skills might just come in handy against you know basically every team in the league.

Yeah, like in the playoffs? Remember how much Sully was just murdering the Hawks? He was so good that Brad opted not to play him simply because he didn't want Atlanta to be embarrassed.

Did you watch the series, everyone was terrible.  I mean Crowder shot under 28% from the field and if you think that was bad, Olynyk was 11.1%.  Thomas, Turner, and Smart were all also under 40% (like Sulinger). 

Sullinger was still the best rebounder of all the regular rotation players in the playoffs, both by per minute production and rebound percentage.  He also only shot 4 threes all playoffs, making 2 of them, so he wasn't killing the team from there like he had at times during the season and like Crowder did during the series, you know by shooting 41 threes and only making 10 of them (nothing like a 24.4% to really win you a series).  heck even Bradley in his one game was 1 of 7 from three.

I get it, Sullinger isn't here anymore so it is ok to act like he lost the series against the Hawks, but that is just revisionist history.  Only Johnson and Jerekbo performed any where near their season averages (though even JJ was under 32% from three).  It was a terrible series from every single member of the Boston Celtics.  Sullinger wasn't any worse than anyone else.

Last time I checked, this was about Jared Sullinger. Not the rest of the team. What does the rest of the team have to do with my point?

I watched the series. I'm not arguing that a lot things didn't go wrong for the Celtics, nor am I saying Sulinger is the one that lost the series for the Celtics. What I'm saying is, out of all the performances from the team, Sullinger's awful play was the most noticeable not just because he was getting shut down by Millsap and Horford but also because they were tearing him apart in embarrassing fashion which led to his benching for Jerebko. You can argue all you want that his "skillset" didn't hurt the team, but after they benched him and started JJ, they played better. That really made Sully look awful because at a time where the Celtics needed him most, he faded.

Your point was Sully's skillset was handy against every team in the league. With Atlanta, that certainly wasn't the case. There are teams where Sully matches up well, like teams that have bigs that aren't active, but there are definitely others where he is a horrible match-up.

I don't even dislike wSully as a whole and I would have liked him back at the right price, but I'm not heartbroken he's gone. More importantly, if Sullinger was that useful, someone would have given him a nice contract. That didn't happen, which goes to show what the league thought of Jared Sullinger this summer. Also, I really think it came down to either adding Horford and re-signing Sully. I don't think that's a tough call unless you're Billy King.

Boston kept him as a restricted free agent until basically every team, especially those that could have used a big man, had utilized their cap space.  Had Boston let him go immediately, I suspect Sullinger would have had a lot more interest.  Maybe not, but it is hard to hold his contract against him when he was restricted for the first couple of weeks of free agency.

I'm sorry man but I do not see that at all. I think it was pretty clear to everyone in the league that after the Celtics signed Horford, let Turner walk, and chase Durant that they weren't going to invest anything long-term in Sullinger and were willing to move on.

I'm sure the Celtics offered the contract they gave to Zeller to Sully first, but Sully wanted a situation where he'd get more time. The Horford acquisition was the final nail in the coffin.

edit: I think maybe the poster was just joking now that I see all the other deals.