With the Boston Celtics facing harsh penalties imposed for being above the so-called “second apron” payroll limit, president of basketball operations Brad Stevens was left with no choice but to break up the team that had won the 2024 NBA championship, and put together a 61-win regular season the following year.
The Celtics’s championship was the 19th in franchise history. Winning 64 regular season games in 2023-2024 and 61 the next season gave Boston 15 seasons of at least 60 wins. Both are NBA records.
And yet, Stevens was forced to gut that record-setting squad, trading away center Kristaps Porzingis and 16-year-veteran guard Jrue Holiday, as well as allowing backup center Luke Kornet leave as a free agent. As if that all wasn’t enough, center and power forward Al Horford, also a free agent, appears unlikely to stay in Boston who may be unable to meet his salary demands while staying under the second apron.
Celtics Not Done Shedding Payroll For Next Season
The Celtics will be missing four-time All-NBA first teamer Jayson Tatum next season as he heals a torn Achilles tendon, but his $54.1 million salary will still count against the salary cap.
As a result, Stevens may not be done unloading payroll to prevent the Celtics from losing the roster-building flexibility caused by exceeding the second apron â and one longtime Boston sports columnist presented his idea of what Stevens should do next.
As the writer, Christopher Gasper of the Boston Globe, acknowledges, Celtics fans are not going to like it.
In a piece titled “A Case for Trading Derrick White,” Gasper writes, “before you grab the pitchforks and picket outside the Globe offices at this mere suggestion, hear me out. This offseason dictates uncomfortable choices. No one wants to part with White. However, the Celtics still need to slough off more salary, and Whiteâs value is likely never to be higher coming off the best season of his career.”
Stevens traded for White midway through the 2021-2022 season, taking the Colorado native from the San Antonio Spurs, the team that drafted him in the first round in 2017. White has gone on to play an essential role for the Celtics as they have made it to the NBA Finals twice and the Eastern Conference Finals three times in his four Boston seasons. The 6-foot-4 guard became a fan favorite along the way.
But White will enter the first season of a four-year, $118 million contract in the upcoming season, pulling in a salary for 2025-2026 of $28.1 million.
White’s First Celtics Coach May Want Him Back
The Houston Rockets finished with the second seed in the Western Conference last season, and appear to be making an all-out push for the top in the next one.
“Rockets coach Ime Udoka was one of the driving forces behind the Celtics trading for White in 2022, when Udoka guided them to the NBA Finals,” Gasper noted. “The two overlapped when Udoka was an assistant in San Antonio, and ESPNâs Brian Windhorst reported the Rockets were ready to pounce on White if he didnât re-sign with the Celtics last summer.”
According to reports, the Celtics have already made it clear to teams inquiring about White that to get his would take “a package similar to what the Brooklyn Nets got for trading Mikal Bridges to the New York Knicks.”
That package included “our unprotected first-round picks, a pick swap in 2028 and a first and second-round pick in the 2025 draft,” according to a CBS Sports report.
Houston, Gasper points out, “is armed with draft capital, slated to have multiple first-round picks in 2027 (including the Phoenixâ unprotected first-rounder) and 2029 (the most favorable of their own, Dallas, and Phoenix).”
Udoka and the Rockets already made a huge bet on their championship chances, trading for future Hall-of-Famer Kevin Durant, giving up two players and the No. 10 pick in the 2025 draft, as well as five second-round picks in return.
Durant will be 37 years old to start the upcoming season, meaning Houston will be feeling pressure to maximize their chances right away. Trading away a substantial piece of the Rockets future for White could persuade the Celtics to part with White, giving up another piece of their championship team.
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