Brad Stevens Had Himself A Masterclass Trade Deadline By Both Improving The Celtics For This Season While Also Helping Their Ability To Build The Roster This Summer

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Now that the NBA Trade Deadline has officially passed, everyone has put their pencils down and we've had enough time for the tail end of the deal announcements to happen, we can finally take a step back and take a look at what Brad Stevens and the Celtics were able to accomplish.

Heading into the final day, I think most expected there to be some sort of activity. What that activity would be was anyone's guess, and honestly all options were on the table. Get under the luxury tax? Expand the Vuc trade into something bigger? Move an additional rotation piece if the value was right? I don't think you could rule out anything, which is what made for a pretty stressful time. It's always a relief to remember that Brad Stevens is the one making these decisions, but you're lying if you say your heart didn't skip a beat every time there was a Shams trade notification. That's just how things are on a day like today.

Let me first just say it's annoying as fuck that Shams rushes to put out tweets just so he can be first, but doesn't give the full details of the trade. I know he's not alone in this practice, but he's the one that kept tweeting incomplete Celts trades so that's why I'm picking on him. I don't care who is first, I care about the information being complete! OK, rant over.

Now, let's look at what happened today.

Our first vague Shams report of the day really wasn't all that surprising. We knew Boucher was going to be moved, it was more of a question as to whether or not the Celts were going to have to give an asset to do it or what. To me, this was more about opening up the roster spot while also lowering the tax bill (for the moment), and in the end, it cost the Celtics the 2nd round pick they got in the Vuc trade. You knew Ainge wasn't going to do this for free, so that cost wasn't all that surprising.

Boucher never played, so there's no reason for him to take up a roster spot. Welcome to the new CBA world folks. If you aren't playing, you're probably getting traded.

That move is also what was holding up the Vuc announcement, since it included that pick. Once that happened, things became official.

Again, Shams with the infuriating bullshit. Did the Celts get a pick? Give a pick? What was the deal?

At it turned out, neither. This was a salary dump where the Celts got some cash back and again, lowered their tax bill. The initial shock you may have felt is probably because of how Minott started the season, but the reality is he's another guy that simply wasn't in the rotation. All year the wing group was a competition, and I think its fair to say that Walsh/Hugo/Baylor were able tos how more. I'm sure Minott's ankle injury didn't help, but even after he was cleared to return, he still never played. Even in blowouts, he was getting 1-2 minutes. In hindsight, that was a pretty obvious tell.

I also don't think you should rule out how Minott was used. He was mostly played during the stretch of the season where the Celts played him at the 5 as a small ball center. Given they just traded for Vuc and Garza/Queta have taken a leap, we haven't really seen the small ball lineups anymore. So in a way, there really wasn't a roster need for a small ball 5, especially factoring in Tatum's pending return.

Clearly, the Celts felt that his roster spot was more important for a potential buy out guy (something that opened up for them being under the 1st apron), and you could argue they did Minott a favor since he wasn't playing at all.

But much like the Boucher deal, the real benefit here was continuing to lower the tax bill (which is fine).

This was probably the best news of the day. Amari has been dominant in Maine and showed real flashes in his spot minutes with the main club, and for that cost, this is a no-brainer. It would not shock me if we look back at this deal in a similar way we look at Queta/Garza's deal. I have no doubt that should he get reps, he'll outplay that contract.

It's also a win for the Draft history of Brad Stevens, something that was a fair question heading into the season. Taking a player 46th who proves he's worth a standard deal? That's a gigantic win for a guy that really needed to start hitting on his picks. Now knowing that Walsh/Baylor/Hugo/Amari all appear to be hits or at the very least players who look like legit NBA talents is exactly what a team with an expensive roster needed. 

Next step? Please utilize Amari's passing more when he plays. If you're going to invest in him, let's maximize his talents. 

For a while, it seemed like the Celts were pretty much done after the Minott deal. That was a little confusing because they were still over the luxury tax, but it took a little while for the final move to drop

Again, Shams, what the hell man. The deadline was over for an hour. Where were you on this?

Anyway, first and foremost, shoutout Xavier Tillman for his corner 3 and defense on Luka in the NBA Finals. You will forever be a Celtics legend for those moments.

But much like Minott/Boucher, Tillman was not playing. I'm talking about not even a single second. Given what we saw earlier in the day, I think we were all waiting for this move to drop, and then when it didn't initially, that was kind of odd.

Now that it's happened, for the moment the Celts are completely under the luxury tax. 

The thing is, they now have 3 open roster spots, and per NBA rules, they need to add some players. Is it possible to add players in the buyout market while still being under the luxury tax? Apparently, yes

Will this be converting Ron Harper Jr? After last nigt, I wouldn't hate that. But we also have to wait to see who gets bought out. 

There's this idea that getting under the luxury tax is "bad" or a sign that the new owners are stripping money and aren't willing to spend. I just can't really follow that logic when you see what the moves ended up being to get to this point. 

- Flipped Simons who they probably couldn't re-sign for a positional need

- Didn't trade Hauser or Pritchard

- Didn't move any rotational piece

- Only moved players who were DNP-CDs.

- Opened up WAY more flexibility to build the team this summer, which is good (for the moment, also get the non-taxpayer MLE)

- Opened up the ability to sign an expensive buyout, should that opportunity present itself

All of these are good things. They could go back over, maybe they thread the needle, we'll have to wait and see. But if it was truly this doom and gloom that some want you to believe, they would have moved off bigger salaried players, which did not happen.

Losing guys who never played while improving your ability to build a roster should be the EXACT things fans should want Brad to do. Now it is important to remember, you need multiple years to avoid the repeater tax, which I have a hard time believing the Celts will do this upcoming summer now that they just opened up all these avenues to build out the roster. If you can save some money and gain roster flexibility while not losing anything of substance and still make your team better, why wouldn't you?

All in all, I think if you were to tell me the Celts addressed a position of need, cleaned up their books to arm Brad Stevens with all the ammo in the world to build the roster, while also not subtracting any key pieces, I'd call that a pretty successful deadline. There's still more to figure out in terms of the final roster spots, but overall? I can't really see being all that upset with the business the Celtics did this deadline. Seems to me like they checked off every box they needed to (buyouts pending), and I would say that any rational person would agree.

Of course there will be some who scream about being cheap and all that nonsense, but in most of those cases those people aren't even aware of all the CBA restrictions/penalties/etc. I could understand that angle had someone like Hauser been moved, but that didn't happen. We're talking about end of bench players who were DNP-CDs. 

We'll see who ends up hitting the buyout market, but my bigger takeaway from this week is Brad positioned the Celts to be better in the immediate short term (this season) as well as helping their positioning to build moving forward. That's what I want my GM to do in this situation, and that's exactly what Brad Stevens did.