Question:
Is Boston better off without Hayward?
Answer:
Maybe.
Reason:
It can be argued that Boston had three major weakness last season that led to us struggling in the playoffs.
1. Our overall lack of rebounding
2. Our lack of a secondary who creator who can create offense and score in ISO situations
3. Our general lack of anything resembling a starting caliber PF (hence, our constantly losing battles at the PF spot)
Adding Hayward improves our team on the basis of talent upgrade alone - he's a better player then Jae Crowder, simply put. However I'm not convinced that adding him tot he team really addresses any of our main concerns from last year because:
1. Hayward isn't a plus rebounder
2. Hayward is a shot maker, but not really a shot creator
3. Hayward IMHO isn't equipped to play the PF spot for a full season
As much as we sucked at PF last year, at least we DID have some. We had Amir, we had Olynyk, we had Jerebko. Those guys were not good enough on a nightly basis for us to be competitive, but at least they were bodies.
But signing Hayward is going to require a max contract, and that means we need to renounce EVERYBODY we possibly can in order to make the space to sign him. That means Amir isn't coming back (he's already signed with Philly), it means we need to rescind the qualifying offer for Olynyk and let him walk, and it means we need to let Jerebko walk. That's in addition to cutting the likes of James Young and Jordan Mickey.
Once the above is all done, we literally will be left without a single proven PF on our roster. The closest we would have would be Jabusele, Tatum and Ojeleye - none of whom have a single minute of NBA experience, and none of whom can be depended on to realistically start at PF.
That means we need to either hope and pray that Danny is able to sign starting caliber PF for vet min / exception money (Danny's track record isn't great here) or else we have to force somebody like Crowder or Hayward or Brown to step out of position and play PF - far from optimal.
While Hayward has the big name and the star power about him, I can't help but wonder if it would actually help the team more if we used that cap space to sign two quality players who fill our needs.
For example, we could go potentially have enough cap space to go after Gallinari or Rudy Gay AND potentially still have enough left to go after Pau Gasol / Ilyasova / Patrick Patterson / Pekovic.
This way we fill multiple holes and should make significant improvement, rather then adding a big name player who may not necessarily actually give us that much. Also taking this route means there is a higher probability of being able to get a guy or two on shorter term (1 or 2 year) contracts so that we don't need to overcommit in the future - leaving us with more flexibility.
Another option would to take Gay / Gallinari and then use the left over cap space to retain Kelly Olynyk, who I feel is good enough to start for us at PF and does seem to play well with Horford.
If we sign Hayward, then it makes filling that PF spot very difficult unless we pull some kind of trade and move Crowder or Bradley in return for a big.
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Q: Is Boston better off with Kevin Love instead of Hayward?
A: I want to say no, since I dislike Kevin Love with a passion (both as a player and as a person) - but probably, yes. However not in the scenario you mention, which involves trading away existing core players in order to get Love. Gaining Love straight up (we could absorb his deal) without giving up Bradley or Crowder, would make us significantly better...
However there would be little incentive for Cleveland to do this. They would get worse if they give up Love without getting a good player back, and they get no cap relief by cutting his contract since they would still be over the cap anyway.
Topic: Celtics Better off without Hayward? (Read 8894 times)