Jeff Green Officially Signs

The team formally announced the Jeff Green signing tonight. This is significant for a couple of reasons. First, that mean's he's not being signed-and-traded. Second, an ESPN source indicates that he signed for more than the qualifying offer.

ESPN Boston:

The Boston Celtics officially announced Saturday that they have re-signed forward Jeff Green. Terms were not disclosed, but a source close to the situation told ESPN.com's Chris Broussard that it's a one-year, $9 million pact.

That is interesting to me in that we obviously paid him more that what he could have agreed to in order to keep him from seeking offers elsewhere and to make sure we maintain cap flexibility for next summer.

And it isn't just about being able to let him walk either. We have the option of signing and trading him next summer as well. That $9M slot affords us the option to give him a pretty big paycheck via Bird Rights if he plays well enough to earn it. Finally, if all goes south quickly, we have a $9M expiring contact to dangle at the trade deadline in March.

So, we've got options. Considering what Ainge has been able to do with relatively few options this summer, it will be very interesting to see how creative he'll be next year.