SATURDAY, 10:23am: The signing has occurred, according to the RealGM transactions log, though there has been no official announcement made by the team.
4:30pm: Miller’s deal will be partially guaranteed for $25k, Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders tweets.
FRIDAY, 2:27pm: The Celtics will bring summer-leaguer and former Holy Cross small forward Malcolm Miller to training camp on a one-year deal for the minimum salary, a league source tells Kevin O’Connor of SB Nation’s CelticsBlog. The arrangement will be non-guaranteed, O’Connor adds. It gives the Celtics contracts or verbal agreements with 21 players in the wake of the news earlier today that Coty Clarke will also sign a camp deal. Teams may only carry as many as 20 signed contracts during the offseason, but Boston reportedly intends to offload Zoran Dragic.
Miller averaged just 4.0 points and 12.1 minutes per game across seven appearances for the summer league Celtics, but he canned five of his six three-point attempts during that span. He was a 39.3% three-point shooter over his last two college seasons, and he put up 14.7 PPG in 31.7 MPG as a senior for the Crusaders this past year. The 22-year-old worked out for the Celtics and Jazz prior to this year’s draft, but he wasn’t selected on draft night.
At 6’7″, Miller carries much the same profile as does Clarke, who spent last season playing in Israel. Still, both face steep climbs to make the opening night roster for Boston, which has 17 fully guaranteed contracts, including Dragic’s. Shooting guards Corey Walden from Eastern Kentucky and Levi Randolph from Alabama are reportedly set to join Miller and Clarke in Celtics camp, with all four of them candidates to end up on Boston’s D-League affiliate. The C’s can protect the D-League rights to as many as four camp cuts. Still, it’s not surprising to see the Celtics, who are heavily loaded with point guards and big men, concentrate on wing players as they build their preseason roster, so that offers a glimmer of hope that one of them can stick for the regular season.
Which camp invitee do you think has the best chance of playing NBA regular season games for the Celtics or another team? Leave a comment to let us know.
Johnathan Holmes will get a chance to play in LA if he makes it through camp — stretchy big who can complement Randle in small ball lineups and be a safety valve for Dangelo Russell as a pick and pop big.
What about CJ Fair? He was really good in Summer League?
Why didn’t the C’s try to sign Hlomes
I imagine it’s because he’d prefer a team like the Lakers, who have fewer than 15 fully guaranteed contracts and ostensibly give him a better shot to make the opening night roster.
C’s needed another 3-pt threat at the stretch-4 position and he would have been a decent fit with his rebounding and defensive skill set. A partial guarantee could have seen him in camp and in the worse case on the D-League as an affiliate player if no other roster spots opened up via trade by the start of the season. Lakers picked our pocket using the partial guarantee to sign him.