Basketball Reference has a section of its website that calculates the probability for current players to make the Hall of Fame. and there numbers on various Celtics legends are all over the map. The one-time Celtic with the highest odds of making the Hall is none other than the polarizing Kyrie Irving at 97.55%.
That makes sense, as Kyrie has made nine All-Star games, three All-NBA teams, and hit one of the biggest shots in NBA Finals history back in 2016 for the Cavaliers. But after that, things get a little bit wonky.
The player with the next highest odds of Celtics is Jayson Tatum, at 59.61%. That seems way too low for a guy who has already made five All-NBA teams, including four first-team nods, six All-Star games, was the best player on a title team, and isn’t even 30 years old yet.
Next up is Al Horford, and this is even crazier as he’s listed with just a 26.45% chance. That’s way too low for a guy who has put together a 19-year NBA career with six All-Star appearances, an All-NBA berth, a Finals win, and an All-Defense nod. Add the two NCAA National Championships, and I’d say Horford is close to a lock.
Horford, Brown, and Holiday have much better odds than this
Jaylen Brown is even lower down the list at just 8.5%, which seems patently absurd. Brown won ECF and Finals MVP in 2024; he has made two All-NBA teams and six All-Star teams, and he’s just 29 years old. If JB retired today, he’d have a decent case, and he’s still squarely in his prime.
To think that he has less than a 10% chance to crack into the Hall is pretty nuts and seems way off to me. He’s closer to 50/50, and with a few good years is probably close to a lock himself.
The only other Celtic with better than 1% odds is Jrue Holiday, with just a 1.67% chance. Jrue may be facing an uphill battle, but that still seems way too low to me. He has made two All-Star teams, six All-Defense teams, and has won two titles with two different teams. He’s 36 years old, but if he can put a few more good seasons together, I think he has a real case.
I know these metrics aren’t perfect, and at the end of the day it comes down to humans voting. But based on some of the names that have been enshrined in Springfield already, I think all of these numbers should be boosted considerably to represent accurate odds.
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