- In a conversation with Adam Himmelsbach of the Boston Globe, Celtics majority owner Wyc Grousbeck discussed the departure of forward Gordon Hayward, the knee troubles of starting point guard Kemba Walker, and his excitement about Boston rookies Aaron Nesmith and Payton Pritchard. “[Team president] Danny (Ainge’s) excitement about Aaron Nesmith is about the shooting and skill and size on both sides of the ball,” Grousbeck said. “I’m not saying Payton Pritchard is (Rajon) Rondo, but Danny had that level of excitement about seeing this kid on the team.”
Several franchises are expected to bypass the option of competing in the proposed NBA G League bubble, which would likely be located in Atlanta next month, league sources told Hoops Rumors.
The Celtics (Maine Red Claws), Heat (Sioux Falls Skyforce), Lakers (South Bay Lakers), and Pistons (Grand Rapids Drive) are among the teams that have indicated plans of not participating in the bubble, sources said, with discussions ongoing about the final structure of a season. The Athletic first reported that Boston planned on bypassing the bubble.
Among the topics still being discussed are player salaries, committed teams, and a precise calendar for the season. Franchises would have an entry fee of $500K. The newly-introduced G League Ignite team is a major consideration in the league’s push to salvage a season.
Teams would be expected to play a minimum of 12 games during the campaign, which could then be followed by a tournament, sources said. As in past years, a G League draft would be held at a date to be later determined.
Despite some teams gradually beginning to reject the idea, other franchises such as the Sixers (Delaware Blue Coats) and Raptors (Raptors 905) have committed to playing this season, sources said. All in all, optimism remains that a G League bubble will commence, with a minimum of double-digit teams participating and an announcement coming in the near future.
Free agent addition Tristan Thompson will be sidelined for most of Celtics‘ training camp due to a strained hamstring, tweets Tim Bontemps of ESPN. Coach Brad Stevens is still optimistic that Thompson can be ready for the regular season opener December 23 against the Bucks.
The Celtics signed Thompson to a two-year, $19MM contract to help bolster their frontline. They revealed earlier this week that he suffered a minor injury to his hamstring during an offseason workout.
Thompson, 29, spent the first nine seasons of his career in Cleveland, where he made four trips to the NBA Finals. He became a free agent after averaging a career-best 12.0 points per game last season.
The Celtics have signed former Duke big man Amile Jefferson to an Exhibit 10 contract, according to Jay King of The Athletic (Twitter link).
Jefferson, 27, spent five seasons with the Blue Devils, including being team captain for three of them. The Philadelphia native helped lead Duke to the 2015 National Championship.
A right foot fracture in 2015/16 limited Jefferson to just nine games and he was granted medical redshirt approval by the ACC to return for a fifth season. Jefferson’s fifth season at Duke included being teammates with now Celtics All-Star Jayson Tatum.
Jefferson has spent parts of the last two seasons suiting up for the Magic, appearing in 30 games and averaging 1.4 PPG and 1.5 RPG for Orlando. He also had a stint in the G League with the Timberwolves’ G League affiliate Iowa Wolves.
Jefferson’s Exhibit 10 contract is a non-guaranteed one-year, minimum salary pact that allows a player to make a bonus of up to $50K if he is waived and remains on the franchise’s G League squad for at least 60 days.
Kemba Walker, who will miss the start of the season as he rehabs an injured left knee, won’t attempt to return until he’s confident that the knee is 100%, writes Tim Bontemps of ESPN. The Celtics support that decision and don’t plan to give any updates on Walker’s availability until the first week in January. Coach Brad Stevens said he will gradually increase Walker’s playing time when he does return, similar to how he was handled during the restart in Orlando.
Walker visited two specialists after the Celtics were eliminated from the playoffs. They decided to give him a stem cell injection in the knee and set up a 12-week strengthening program that Walker began in early October and will finish in January.
“There’s no rush. There’s no rush on my end,” he said. “I’m coming back when I need to come back and when I’m feeling good to play. So that’s it. … I want to be at my best. The last time in the playoffs, I wasn’t at my best, and that sucked. I don’t want to be that way no more.”
There’s more from Boston:
- Walker understands that Gordon Hayward‘s decision to sign with the Hornets is part of the business side of the game and he’s not upset about losing a teammate, Bontemps adds in the same piece. Hayward opted out of his contract with the Celtics for the upcoming season and got $120MM over four years to join Walker’s former team. “I spoke to him during the process, and I’m happy for him,” Walker said. “… He’s going to have a great time in Charlotte. It’s a great place to be. It’s a great city, great fans. They love basketball. They’re going to love Gordon. He’s a great player. He’s going to bring joy to that organization.”
- Among the Celtics’ young players, Grant Williams has the best chance to make an impact this season, according to Chris Forsberg of NBC Sports Boston. Boston was 21-5 last season when Williams played at least 17 minutes, and he provided an encouraging shooting display in Orlando, making 10 of 17 from three-point range. With Hayward gone, Williams could be in contention for a starting role, Forsberg adds.
- Tristan Thompson believes his performance against Boston over the years prompted the team’s interest, tweets Mark Murphy of The Boston Herald. “Coach always told me, usually the team that you have a lot of success against or beat up against a lot of years in the playoffs, they usually want you to join their side when you’re available or when you become a free agent,” Thompson said.
- Jeff Teague‘s new contract with Boston is for the veteran’s minimum, according to Eric Pincus of Bleacher Report (Twitter link).
2:20pm: The NBA has confirmed the opening night games detailed below, as well as the previously-reported Christmas Day schedule. The league also said that the Bucks will play the Celtics in Boston on December 23 (TNT), followed by the Mavericks playing the Suns in Phoenix (ESPN).
The full first-half schedule will be announced on Friday, December 4, according to the NBA.
10:47am: The tentative schedule for the NBA’s opening night TNT doubleheader on December 22 will see the Nets host the Warriors, followed by the Lakers and Clippers facing off in Los Angeles, reports Shams Charania of The Athletic (via Twitter).
All four teams are scheduled to be in action on Christmas Day as well, with the Warriors visiting Milwaukee, the Nets playing in Boston, the Lakers hosting the Mavericks, and the Clippers playing in Denver.
However, the two opening night matchups are arguably more intriguing than those December 25 games. The first game of the night will see Kevin Durant make his Nets debut against his old team, while the late game will be the battle of Los Angeles that we didn’t get to see in last season’s Western Conference Finals.
With opening night less than three weeks away, the NBA is expected to officially announce its schedule any day now. The league will reportedly just reveal the first half of the 2020/21 schedule for the time being, with the second-half schedule to be announced at some point in the new year. The NBA wants to maintain scheduling flexibility due to possible COVID-19 complications.
In his first public comments this week after leaving Boston for Charlotte, veteran forward Gordon Hayward said he holds no “ill will” toward the Celtics, as Nick Friedell of ESPN writes.
Addressing Hayward’s departure during an appearance on Boston radio show Toucher & Rich on Tuesday, Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge said the team wanted to bring back Hayward, but that the forward preferred the Hornets due to an opportunity to take on more of a featured role — the fact that Charlotte made the largest contract offer probably didn’t hurt either.
Hayward’s exit did allow the Celtics to create a massive $28.5MM traded player exception that can be used during the season or in the 2021 offseason. As Darren Hartwell of NBC Sports Boston relays, Ainge said on Tuesday that he doesn’t expect to utilize that exception right away.
“We could use it to get three players or four players to strengthen our bench at different times,” Ainge said. “We’re not going to go do anything right now, just because it’s that time of year where people love their teams. Everybody has gotten better in the offseason.
“We’ll see how this season goes and see where we are. We’ll have the ability to improve our team at the trade deadline, and improve our team next offseason if not. It just gives us another vehicle to acquire players that we would not have had.”
Here’s more from around the Atlantic:
- Within a recap of the Knicks‘ offseason moves, Marc Berman of The New York Post suggests that Leon Rose‘s Plan A involved trading for Chris Paul and then signing Carmelo Anthony. When Paul, who reportedly wasn’t interested in joining the Knicks, was instead sent to Phoenix, Rose pivoted and completed a handful of minor signings and trades to fill out the roster.
- In a separate story for The New York Post, Berman examines how new head coach Tom Thibodeau plans to balance the Knicks‘ player development goals with a desire to be competitive in 2020/21.
- Raptors head coach Nick Nurse told reporters today that Toronto’s front office has liked DeAndre’ Bembry for a while and was happy to have the chance to sign him this offseason (Twitter link via Josh Lewenberg of TSN.ca). Nurse praised Bembry’s toughness, defense, and play-making, referring to him as a “high-IQ guy.”
- Having guaranteed Terence Davis‘ salary for 2020/21, the Raptors continue to wait for the NBA to complete its investigation into the allegations of domestic violence against the second-year guard, writes Doug Smith of The Toronto Star. “I think sometimes that may feel a bit unsatisfying but I think that we need to be respectful of that process as well,” general manager Bobby Webster said on Tuesday.
Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN tweets that the NBA has set its Christmas Day schedule for 2020/21.
Woj emphasizes that the currently starry five games scheduled are “tentative.” That’s likely due to the risk of COVID-19 cases preventing certain contests, rather than the league continuing to finalize the schedule.
ESPN reporters Andrew Lopez, Eric Woodyard, Nick Friedell, Dave McMenamin, and Ohm Youngmisuk have weighed in on the five scheduled games.
Here’s the full list of anticipated Christmas Day matchups, per Woj’s reporting:
- New Orleans Pelicans at Miami Heat, 12 p.m. EST
- Golden State Warriors at Milwaukee Bucks, 2:30 p.m. EST
- Brooklyn Nets at Boston Celtics, 5 pm. EST
- Dallas Mavericks at Los Angeles Lakers, 8 p.m. EST
- Los Angeles Clippers at Denver Nuggets, 10:30 p.m. EST
All four 2020 conference finalists will be present, though none will be facing each other. The champion Lakers, led by LeBron James and Anthony Davis and filled out by a revamped roster of role players, will host the Mavericks, looking to take a leap in the standings after rising superstar Luka Doncic‘s first All-Star season.
The Eastern Conference champion Heat, fronted by Jimmy Butler and newly-extended Bam Adebayo, will host another Western Conference club with a promising rep from the NBA’s next wave of superstars, the Pelicans and second-year forward Zion Williamson.
The Nuggets/Clippers matchup should feature plenty of fireworks, as Los Angeles faced ample scrutiny for letting go of the rope enough for Denver to climb all the way out of a 3-1 deficit to win their second-round matchup during the 2020 playoffs.
The Celtics will square off against the formidable Nets, piloted by a newly healthy Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving.
Reigning two-time MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo, meanwhile, will do battle with Durant’s old club, the Warriors, led by a former two-time MVP of their own in Stephen Curry. Antetokounmpo’s Bucks have recorded league-leading regular season records, only to fall short of the Finals in the playoffs during each of the last two seasons. Milwaukee is no doubt hopeful that its offseason makeover will amend that. The Warriors, meanwhile, saw their championship hopes jeopardized after All-Star shooting guard Klay Thompson incurred an Achilles tear that will sideline him for the entire season.
The Raptors, Rockets and Sixers, three perennial playoff clubs that (currently) have two All-Stars apiece, appear to be the biggest snubs this season, although the fate of Houston’s two All-Stars remains in flux.
Assuming every game happens as scheduled, which December 25 bout are you most excited for in 2020? Are there any teams or matchups you’re disappointed to see (or not see) listed? Let us know what you think in our comments section!
Celtics point guard Kemba Walker will be sidelined until at least early January as he continues to rehab a left knee injury, according to a team press release.
After consulting several medical specialists in early October, Walker received a stem cell injection in the knee and was put on a 12-week strengthening program. He is expected to return to on-court activities early this month but he won’t be ready to play when the season begins.
Walker was hampered by left knee soreness prior to the stoppage of play in March and it continued to affect him during the restart. GM Danny Ainge admitted that team’s prized free agent acquisition in 2019 was “definitely not himself” during the playoffs.
Walker tried to gut it out and continued to play heavy minutes — he averaged 36.9 MPG in 17 postseason outings. He posted solid averages of 19.6 PPG and 5.1 APG during that span but his perimeter shooting suffered (31.0% from long range).
If Walker’s knee issues continues to linger, it could have a major impact on the team’s bottom line. He is due to make approximately $34.4MM during the upcoming season and $36MM in 2021/22. He has a $37.7MM option for the 2022/23 season.
However, Ainge believes Walker’s won’t miss too much time, Chris Forsberg of NBC Sports Boston tweets. Ainge talked about Walker on the Toucher and Rich radio show.
“I’m not worried about Kemba. He’ll be back,” Ainge said. “It’s an opportunity for Marcus (Smart), Jeff Teague, Payton Pritchard.”
Ainge feels the team has plenty of depth at that spot and doesn’t plan to pursue former Boston All-Star and current free agent Isaiah Thomas.
The press release also revealed that center Tristan Thompson suffered a minor hamstring strain during an offseason workout prior to arriving in Boston, and his availability during the first week of camp will be limited. Boston officially signed the former Cleveland big man on Monday.
Guard Romeo Langford‘s rehab from right wrist is going according to plan, the release adds. He underwent surgery on September 22nd to repair a torn scapholunate ligament in the wrist and the projected recovery time remains 4-5 months.
After spending two years in Boston from 2014-16, Evan Turner will be returning to the Celtics for the 2020/21 season — but not as a player. According to Shams Charania of The Athletic (via Twitter), Turner is finalizing a deal to join the C’s as an assistant coach, with a focus on player development.
The second overall pick in the 2010 draft, Turner has spent 10 seasons in the NBA as a player for the Sixers, Pacers, Celtics, Trail Blazers, and Hawks. He has averaged 9.7 PPG, 4.6 RPG, and 3.5 APG in 705 career regular season games (26.9 MPG).
Although Turner had some productive seasons earlier in his career, he wasn’t an effective rotation player in 2019/20, averaging 3.3 PPG and 2.0 RPG in 19 games (13.2 MPG) for Atlanta. He was traded to Minnesota at the February deadline and never appeared in a game for the Timberwolves — the two sides explored a buyout, but didn’t end up reaching a deal.
It’s not clear if Turner is transitioning from playing to coaching for good, as he’s still just 32 years old and hasn’t technically announced his retirement. Still, for this season at least, it sounds like he’ll try his hand at player development in a role on Brad Stevens‘ staff.