The Vertical's Mannix: Boston could be "dark horse" in Durant free agency

The Celtics may not have given the hometown fans much to cheer about at the start of this playoff campaign, but Boston's faithful can still dream about Kevin Durant coming to Boston in the warmer, sunnier days ahead.

On the heels of the announcement that Scott Brooks would join the Washington Wizards as their next head coach, The Vertical's Chris Mannix wrote today that Wizards fans should not invest in the idea that Brooks would be a factor in recruiting Durant to Washington. Towards the end of that piece, Mannix included Boston in the list of teams that would be big players in courting Durant.

The Summer of Durant will be wild, with Durant eager to be courted, to see how other teams operate. Golden State will be in the mix, San Antonio too, while Boston lurks as a dark horse, the Eastern Conference alternative if Durant chooses to extract himself from the bruising Western Conference playoffs.

Despite the labeling of Boston as a "dark horse" candidate behind the likes of Golden State and San Antonio, Celtics fans can take solace in the fact that another league insider considers Boston to be a real (if perhaps secondary) option for the summer's premier free agent. While nothing about Durant's free agency will be concrete until July, we can at least enjoy his current playoff efforts from afar, fantasizing about a day next year when Durant storms through the postseason in Celtics green rather than Thunder blue.