Los Angeles Clippers: Ranking NBA teams based on who has the brightest future
1.) Boston Celtics
Wowee wow wow. The Celtics may have pulled off the best rebuild in NBA history, and they can thank one man for all of it: Billy King. Sure, Danny Ainge has done a bang up job managing the team in its current state, but if King hadn’t given up Brooklyn’s 2014, 2016, 2018, and the right to swap first round picks in 2017 to the Celtics for a package headlined by Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, and Jason Terry (who at the time combined to be 107 years old), we would be talking the Nets instead. But we aren’t, and the Celtics are currently a 55 win team whose best player played only 60 games and will miss all of the playoffs and whose second best player was only on the court for 6 minutes this season.
The 2014 BKN pick didn’t land, as James Young is hardly getting minutes on his current team, the Milwaukee Bucks.
In 2015, with their own pick, Boston snagged Terry Rozier who has been tremendous in this seasons playoffs and regular season as a backup to Kyrie Irving.
The 2016 BKN landed third overall and brought Jaylen Brown from UC Berkeley to Boston. His rookie season wasn’t anything to write home about, but he has made tremendous strides this season, being a very valuable core piece of this Celtics team that just won’t lose.
After trading down from the first to third overall pick in the 2017 draft, they still got their preferred player: Jayson Tatum from Duke. He has done wonders for the team. With an undying scoring ability, Tatum can provide spacing which is a necessity.
Next, in August in 2017 the Celtics acquired Kyrie Irving from the Cavaliers. The young core of Irving, Rozier, Tatum, and Brown will be very beneficial for the teams future.
Veterans and All-Stars, Al Horford and Gordon Hayward will also be huge for the team.
Horford has changed up his play style for the C’s and has become a great defender (also being mentioned as a Defensive Player of the Year candidate). Hayward only played six minutes this season before a devastating leg injury in the first game sidelined him for the season. However, in 2016-2017 he had a career season with the Utah Jazz. His pure offensive ability and above average defense put him high on the list of best small forwards in the NBA, and make him a great number two option for Kyrie Irving and the Boston Celtics going forward.
With all of this fire power, it would be to anyone’s surprise if the Celtics don’t hang at least one more banner in the rafters of TD Garden.