Boston Celtics star skyrockets up re-draft leaderboard

Over the past decade, the Boston Celtics have gotten a bad rap when it comes to their draft endeavors outside of the first 10 selections.

For many, the main talking point has been that aside from the highly-touted prospects such as Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, and Marcus Smart that they nabbed in the early lottery, the C’s front office has struggled to find any substantial talents in the latter stages of the NBA Draft.

However, this isn’t an entirely true statement.

In fact, residing on the team’s current roster are several late first-round talents that, slowly but surely, have established themselves as high-end contributors for this championship-aspiring club.

From Grant Williams (selected 22nd in 2019) to Payton Pritchard (selected 26th overall in 2020), the Boston Celtics roster several prominent players who wound up falling late in their drafts, but perhaps the most noteworthy youngster taken outside of the lottery in recent memory is 24-year-old big man Robert Williams III, who was the 27th overall pick back in 2018.

Looking back on that fateful night, though there were several sensational talents and stars in the making selected before him, there were many other busts and, ultimately, lower-potential players who were taken off the board as well and, according to the folks at Bleacher Report, if there were to be a do-over of the event, writer Andy Bailey believes the man known as Time Lord would be a sure-fire lottery snag.

In fact, to him, he’d go sixth overall.

"For one thing, Williams is a trustworthy passer. You might not want him initiating sets or running the break, but he’s adept at finding the open man out of a short roll or connecting the dots with another big inside.The 2.0 assists he averaged last season might not sound like much, but his passing ability is truly unique when viewed in context. No one in league history matches or exceeds both of his career marks for block percentage (8.0) and assist percentage (10.5).Williams also distinguishes himself from most other bigs with the way he can defend the perimeter.With the way he jumps and plays around the rim, it’s easy to see Williams as a center, but his listed height (6’8″) is shorter than that of some wings. Wing-like agility seems to have come with that frame. The way he moves his feet and scrambles on the rare occasions he’s beat off the dribble were a huge part of the Boston Celtics’ dominant 2021-22 defense."

2021-22 finally served as that breakout campaign that Boston Celtics fans had been hoping for seemingly from the moment the franchise snagged the center four years back, as he posted sensational per-game averages of 10 points, 9.6 rebounds, two assists, and 2.2 blocks per game on an insanely efficient 73.6 percent shooting from the floor all while serving as the security blanket down low for the league’s top-ranked defensive unit.

Though he may have to do some fine-tuning with a few aspects of his game, considering he was a mere four picks away from being selected in the second round of his respective draft, even with his imperfections, Robert Williams III was an absolute steal of an add for this ball club.