Boston has a talented and deep veteran-laden roster, but going forward, the kids need to play more.
In less than a month the Boston Celtics will make the first pick in the NBA draft. With that pick, they’ll be adding yet another young star to an already deep team. All indications are that University of Washington guard Markelle Fultz is going to be donning green and white to start the 2017-18 season. Players like Fultz fit right in on any team.
He’s going to be drafted number one for a reason. Fultz isn’t just good, he’s damn good. One of my colleagues gave him a comparison range of a Russell Westbrook/James Harden hybrid to D’Angelo Russell 2.0. I’m leaning much more to the superstar hybrid side of that comparison. Consider me very much onboard the Fultz hype train. I might even be the conductor.
Getting this amped up for a player who was still in high school at this time last year can lead to some let down, but it’s not every day you get to draft a player of this caliber. He could step right in, score over 20 PPG right away, and make the all-star team as a rookie. It wouldn’t shock me one bit.
Mark it down now; this kid will win the rookie of the year award next season. Fultz is the type of player that is going to make several all-star appearances in his career at the very least.
Fultz is a point guard but has the size and ability to play shooting guard as well. The problem is that both of those spots are filled, and then some, on the Celtics roster. Boston’s backcourt currently consists of starters Isaiah Thomas and Avery Bradley, along with Marcus Smart, Terry Rozier, and others off the bench. That doesn’t leave much playing time to spare.
Granted, the contracts of Thomas, Bradley, and Smart all end after next season. However, Boston needs to find significant minutes for Fultz immediately. Below are the last five 1st overall picks. Ben Simmons didn’t play in his first year due to injuries and Anthony Bennett was an atrocious pick, but the other three players all player near or above 30 minutes per game in their debut NBA seasons.
2016: Ben Simmons DNP
2015: Karl-Anthony Towns 32.0
2014: Andrew Wiggins 36.2
2013: Anthony Bennett 12.8
2012: Anthony Davis 28.8
Those minutes are what Fultz needs to be playing for Boston next year. With the current roster construction, it will be difficult to give him those minutes, but it needs to happen, no matter what it takes. For it to happen, it might take a move that is not universally popular amongst Boston Celtics fans. One or both of Bradley or Smart might have to be dealt to make room for Fultz.
The same scenario might have to happen at small forward as well. In his rookie year, Jaylen Brown played a modest 17.2 minutes per game. That’s a fair number for a 19-year-old rookie with how much talent was on this team this season. Next season that number needs to go up. In his limited minutes, Brown flashed star potential and looks ready to take on a bigger role for this team. The kid even guarded the best player on the planet for stretches of the conference finals against the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Brown’s natural position of small forward is currently occupied by veteran Jae Crowder. Even though he’s been an important part of this team the last couple of years, Crowder isn’t a player you build around. Brown is.
It’s possible that Crowder gets dealt this offseason in a package for a big man. Heck, it’s possible anyone on this team outside of Thomas and Al Horford could get traded before next season. The most ideal situation, however, would be transition Crowder to a bench role and unleash Brown in the starting lineup.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been a big fan of both Bradley and Crowder during their time in Boston. I’d love to keep these guys around but in today’s NBA you need star players to win. This year’s NBA finals matchup is a perfect example of that. Boston had a very good team but didn’t stand a chance against the star power of Cleveland. Fultz and Brown aren’t going to be superstars in 2017 but they have the potential to be superstars in the very near future.
These aren’t back end of the 1st round picks that are likely to be bench pieces or borderline starters in their careers. You draft these guys with the plan that they will cornerstones for your franchise. You draft them to build a championship caliber team around. For that to happen, they need to play significant minutes.
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All of this could be derailed by a trade or big free agent signing, but if Brown and Fultz are on this team next season they need to play significant minutes. If Boston envisions these two as future stars and organizational building blocks, then the training wheels need to be ripped off.