The Boston Celtics were recently linked to a certain Detroit Pistons All-NBA center. While the sentiment of strengthening the center depth is reasonable, making a major trade is not.
Boston Celtics fans should not want Andre Drummond. Simply put, acquiring him would butcher the team’s depth and/or see the team trade one of their talented two-way forwards in Jaylen Brown, Gordon Hayward or Jayson Tatum.
The idea of trading for a center is not a bad one though. If it was, we here at the Houdini have been misplacing our energy. Acquiring a center is what this blog has been trying to do since the season started, no matter if the C’s won or lost their previous game.
Trading Hayward–with his $34 million player option for 2020-21–used to be a hobby of mine. I went through just about every conceivable team to find a deal, but if Danny Ainge doesn’t want to trade him, I am not going to continue occupying the trade Hayward space of the Boston Celtics blog-iverse.
Since the Celtics were linked to a Drummond deal, it is only reasonable to assume that the team does want to find a different solution at center. Enes Kanter has elevated his play recently, but Daniel Theis is a limited option as the starter. Robert Williams is returning soon, but why not acquire another promising big for some friendly competition.
The league is filled with promising bigs. Today, we are going to sift through the options that Ainge could pursue in a much smaller-scale trade than any Drummond blockbuster: