FanPost

Looking Into My Crystal Ball: The Future of the Celtics For Next Year and Beyond

Start of the year:

PG:

We are set here don't really need to do anything major this year (we need to take a hard look next off season).

SG:

Lee: Try to showcase him at the beginning of the year to move him at the deadline

Crawford: Trade him for a future second round pick

SF:

Here again similar stay the status quo and take a look where you are next off season

PF:

Bass: like Lee showcase him at the beginning of the year to build up value

Humphris: Try to find a team looking for an expiring deal and deal him for a 2nd round pick plus generate a trade exception (very important)

C:

We need to look hard here and get a young big (Maybe Horford/Drummond/Asik/Vucevic/ or Cousins)

Trade deadline:

Package Bass and Lee if they have a good beginning of the year showcase for something of value (See young big). Maybe if a team like Houston is in the mix they would be willing to trade Asik as they are in win now mode.

Send Hump out for the Trade exception and pair with the one we generated with the Nets deal and have a really huge trade chip for the offseason.

My Rotation after the trade deadline:

PG: Rondo/Pressy

SG: AB/Brooks/Bogans

SF: Green/Wallace

PF: Sully/Olynyk

C: Asik/Shav/Fav

Next Offseason:

So first off hopefully with showcasing Bass and Lee, and the beginning of the year we lose enough games to get a top 5 pick next year. In this scenario we are not in full tank mode putting all our hopes and dreams into the ping pong balls (which never works) but hopefully come out with a great starter and maybe future star. If we don't happen to have a top 5 pick it will most certainly be a top 10 where we can get good player.

This next part is the hard part, I see this as kind of an Al Jefferson type of move. We will need to move a young guy/guys who we all like (AB, Sully, or Olynik depending on how he does) to move for a complementary star, I am thinking a power forward as next year's draft seems weak on them. Looking at the 2014 Free Agent list I would say a sign and trade with the Pistons and get Greg Monroe. I am going to say its going to take AB/Sully as they have more experience out of this group. and the Pistons probably wont want to pay him after this year to clear the way for Drummond.

Now, for the important trade exception. There are a ton of great free agents next year 1st Tier (Lebron, Melo) 2nd Tier (Gay, Wade) 3rd Tier (Granger, Z. Randolph) and I am probably missing some. Now some of you may think I'm crazy for listing some of these players, but if we build it right and depending on how teams do this year we might be able to get a Melo.

We know the Knicks experiment is going to fail, and they are going to go into rebuilding mode once again. We could use that trade exception and one of our many future picks (Nets 2016 makes most sense) and maybe get Melo which I think is the path of least resistance. I also think you can sell him on the youth if we make all these other moves that we would be a legit contender and make him want to come to Boston. so that's what I will go with in this particular post even though as you can see above is not our only course of action as there are other players we can get.

We also need to find a way to get a legit backup PG next year, either through the draft (our other pick) or next year's mid-level exception. For sake of the post I will go the midlevel route and say get (Stucky/Sessions/Colliston/ or Lowery). Any one of those guys is a starts PG on a bad team and a great option for a backup on a great team and could be had for midlevel type money so id be happy with any of them.

2015 Season rotation after all these moves:

PG: Rondo/ Mid Level Money PG (See Above)/ Pressy

SG: 2014 Draft Pick/Brooks

SF: Melo/Green/Wallace

PF: Monroe/Olynik

C: Asik/Shav/Fav

Final Thoughts:

I just want to let you guys let this sink in a minute... A year removed from the big three era we could have a legit top tier team to compete for banners NOW. The team I built above, I don't think by any means is doing anything crazy that can't happen, and if it is I listed viable alternatives to some players so were not putting all our eggs in one basket. I just think that would best case scenario and made the most sense to me.

This team would be young enough to compete for a title many years to come and have enough assists for the future to keep it rolling (Clips 2015 Pick, Swapping 2017 Pick with Nets, Nets 2018 Pick). Have an OKC type of team, which is sustainable for the long run. Especially with a great GM like Danny who always seems to find the gems in the draft.

I applaud Danny for what he has done as I can see him painting a picture for the future.

I hope you all can appreciate what I have written as I took a good couple of hours researching all this information and putting together something. Something which I feel is 100% in the realm of possibility versus a very far stretched post which could never happen in a million years.

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