3 former Boston Celtics players team would love to have back

Former Boston Celtics player No. 3) Evan Fournier

When the Boston Celtics initially landed veteran wing Evan Fournier at last year’s trade deadline, it was stated that he was viewed as a player the franchise wished to hold on to ‘for a long time.’

If a long time means a little over three months then mission accomplished.

As we all know, the Cs opted not to re-sign Fournier in free agency over the summer and, instead, opted to take part in a sign-and-trade that would send him to New York in exchange for yet another Traded Player Exception, this time at a value of up to $17 million.

Now, from a financial standpoint, the decision made by Brad Stevens and co. made sense when it came to not re-upping with the 29-year-old for, even without him, they still find themselves over the luxury tax.

That said, from an on-court production standpoint, Boston could certainly use for a guy of the Frenchman’s playstyle right about now.

As stated already, the Cs struggle to find efficient and consistent offense from their players outside of the likes of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown (though, not even they have been all that consistent this year).

Fournier, on the other hand, is putting up 17.1 points per 75 possessions with the Knickerbockers on nearly 40 percent shooting from deep and has repeatedly been the team’s go-to scorer in crunch time.

Now, is Evan Fournier playing his all-time great basketball through 21 games this season? No, but he’s still doing exactly what the Boston Celtics could really use which is serving as a tertiary scoring option behind the team’s focal points in Julius Randle and RJ Barrett and is knocking down his catch-and-shoot attempts at a rather impressive rate (boasts a 57.6 percent effective field goal percentage and is converting on 40 percent of his catch-and-shoot treys).

So yes, while again we’re fully on board with the front office opting to bypass paying the aging wing, it’s undeniable that the team could use the, or someone of his skill set at this point in time.

Perhaps they’ll be able to land someone of this ilk with the TPE they received in return via the sign-and-trade.