Boston Celtics: 3 moves the Cs can make to improve their shooting
By Chris Conte
The 2020-21 Boston Celtics were among the most inconsistent offensive basketball teams due to their scheme, depth, roster construction, and injuries. They relied too heavily on Jaylen Brown, who contracted both tendinitis and a wrist injury, and Jayson Tatum, who caught COVID mid-season.
If both were fully healthy, maybe the Cs could have wound up looking slightly better, but being as reliant as they were on two players is unsustainable and not an excellent model to win a championship.
They need to support the two with complementary role players and a scheme that doesn’t drain all their energy by the time the playoffs come around.
Drafting Payton Pritchard and Aaron Nesmith, trading for Evan Fournier at the deadline & Al Horford after the season ended, and increasing Robert Williams & Marcus Smart’s roles are great ways to help the Jays succeed and lead the Boston Celtics to banner No. 18.
However, the Celtics can not stand pat or be stubborn; they need to keep patching the holes in their roster by making trades, using their TPEs, and signing free agents.
One of the most significant holes in the team’s roster is their lack of shooting.
There are a few ways the Boston Celtics can fix this shooting hole, and there are even more ways they can improve it in free agency and on the trade market.
This article will delve into what specifically Stevens and the Boston Celtics can do to give Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown the best-spaced floor they can ask for:
How to improve Boston Celtics shooting No. 1) Bring in more shooters
Adding more shooters to the roster should be priority number one for the Boston Celtics this summer. To give you an idea of why, let’s look at some numbers that depict just how foul the team’s shooting was without Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown this past season.
The Boston Celtics ranked 11th in 3-point makes, 10th in 3-point attempts, and 10th in 3-point percentage per game.
On the surface, that’s pretty good, but take Tatum and Brown’s 3-point shooting away and you get a more accurate number.
Without the Jays, the Boston Celtics ranked 30th in 3-point makes, 30th in 3-point attempts, and 18th in 3-point percentage. Those numbers should be taken with a grain of salt, but you get the point — the Celtics need shooters!
Brad Stevens and co. can pursue guys like Sviatoslav Mykhailiuk or Garrison Matthews, who are cheap and young and who can fulfill the C’s shooting needs in restricted free agency.
Or they could go hunting in free agency using their MLE.
Players like Patty Mills, Wayne Ellington, Danny Green, or Reggie Bullock would all be a great fit in Boston, and they would not break the bank in the process.
Brad Stevens’ last option is to exercise one of his many TPEs to acquire a shooter without giving up any hard assets. Players like Larry Nance, Justin Holiday, or Kyle Anderson all fit within the Gordon Hayward TPE and could provide the Celtics with some much-needed floor spacing.
In the end, Garrison Matthews, Patty Mills, and Kyle Anderson would be the best options from each method. All are relatively cheap, Anderson and Mills have experience with Udoka, and they all come with ancillary skill sets that can help the Celtics even more.
Depending on how the Celtics play their cards, they could net all three of these guys, but it’s more likely they only come out with one or two.