Boston Celtics: 2 Damian Lillard alternatives to pursue mid-season

Given the Boston Celtics’ signing of Dennis Schroder to a one-year deal worth just the taxpayer’s MLE, it’s safe to say that the point guard question mark has not been replaced by a long-term option.

That is, assuming Marcus Smart doesn’t just take the full-time floor general mantle and end all thoughts about pursuing someone else for the position.

This Hardwood Houdini writer believes Smart’s best spot is the 2, though, where he thrived in 2019-20 on a Cs team that was on the doorstep of the NBA Finals and arguably overperformed relative to their talent because of how well the group gelled.

Bleacher Report opened up the proverbial pandora’s box yesterday with a piece pushing the idea of a Damian Lillard trade bringing a superstar floor general to Beantown by Christmas. Greg Swartz peddled a package focused on Jaylen Brown:

"With Jayson Tatum off limits, the Celtics can offer Portland a package based around Jaylen Brown, with other young talent (Aaron Nesmith, Romeo Langford, Grant Williams, Payton Pritchard) available to sweeten a deal as well. Boston owns all of its future first-round picks in the likely event the Blazers seek draft compensation. If newly-signed point guard Dennis Schroder is included in the deal, it would have to occur after Nov. 11 (three months from his signing with Boston). A core of Lillard, Tatum, Marcus Smart, Al Horford and whoever is left over from the trade should once again be one of the top teams in the East, while Portland begins its rebuild around Brown."

And you know what? We don’t want to trade Brown.

So instead, we figured we’d focus on these 2 Lillard alternatives that can be had for much cheaper: