Can popular former first-round pick make Boston Celtics return?

There will be plenty of movement in the NBA over the next month as teams look to solidify their rotations for the start of the 2022-23 season. The Boston Celtics don’t have major roster questions like their opposite coast rivals the Los Angeles Lakers — who still have their biggest offseason move to make with Russell Westbrook on the trade block.

All Boston needs to do is find some end-of-the-bench depth to keep the Cs ready in case of injury or another COVID-19 variant with the same rate of spread as the Omicron virus back in November/December 2021. With Danilo Gallinari going down with an ACL tear, that may keep him shelved for the entire year given his injury history on that leg, the Celtics are likely to use training camp and the preseason to see if Sam Hauser can fill his role.

If Hauser isn’t deemed ready and the team still wants to add bodies to the mix, MassLive’s Brian Robb said in his latest Boston Celtics Mailbag that the Cs will be ‘looking to pluck some international talent on the cheap.’ Can that lead to the return of popular fan-favorite Guerschon Yabusele, who earlier this year signed an extension with Real Madrid until 2025?

Well, apparently no. Robb cautions Celtics fans to pump the brakes, advising that ‘Yabusele probably doesn’t make the cut for a contending squad,’ while adding that ‘that’s a story that might break Celtics Twitter if it came true.’

2016 Boston Celtics first-round pick Guerschon Yabusele will end up back in the NBA someday

In International competition, including the 2020 Olympics that took place in the summer of 2021, Guerschon Yabusele showed that he could go opposite NBA stars like Kevin Durant, Draymond Green, and even Jayson Tatum and not look out of place.

In fact, Yabusele’s French National Team took down Team USA in a shocking Olympics loss for a squad that was dominant from 2008-2016 but took a few losses under Gregg Popovich in Tokyo, Japan last summer.

Brian Robb says of Yabusele in the mailbag that ‘his numbers during Eurobasket (11.3 ppg, 55 percent shooting) show someone who could get another shot in the NBA at some point.’ Even if that shot doesn’t come with the reunion-happy Brad Stevens and co., it should happen at some point in the not-so-distant future.