It’s no secret that the Boston Celtics are poised to run into some problems with the luxury tax. They have now been a second-apron team for two years in a row, and Wyc Grousbeck himself stated that no team is likely to hold that status for any longer than that. "You can't stay in the second apron," Grousbeck said on The Greg Hill Show. "Nobody will. I predict for the next 40 years of the CBA no one's gonna stay in the second apron more than two years."
If the Celtics want to avoid being a second-apron team for the third straight season next year, they’ll have to make a huge move—they will have to trade one of their top five stars.
Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, Jrue Holiday, Kristaps Porzingis, or Derrick White.
One of Kristaps Porzingis or Jrue Holiday will almost definitely be traded by Celtics
And according to Jake Fischer of The Stein Line, two of those guys are in serious danger of being traded.
“The question is what happens if these Celtics fall short of a repeat,” Fischer wrote. “It seems you can safely save a spot for Boston on the list of teams this offseason whose potential business will be determined in large part by how it fares in the postseason. Maybe not to the same degree as a Phoenix, Sacramento or Milwaukee, but the Celtics are clearly going to be confronted with some tough decisions about key rotation players.
"They're going to have to trade some guys at some point," one team capologist told The Stein Line.
“The two major salaries that league figures are monitoring in possible future trades: Kristaps Porziņģis and Jrue Holiday.”
Before this information, it was pretty easy to whittle down the list of which player the Celtics would look to trade. Tatum is untouchable. Brown is crucial to what the Celtics do on both ends of the floor. White is younger than Holiday, healthier than Porzingis, and one of the best two-way guards in the NBA.
But hearing Fischer report that league figures are officially looking at Holiday and Porzingis as trade chips to monitor this summer, rumors have become reality.
The Celtics’ financial situation is going to force them into making a huge trade this summer, and barring an insane turn of events, at least one of Holiday or Porzingis will be gone.
What will the Celtics get back in return? That much is to be determined. But the reality that Boston will have to part ways with one of their top guys, regardless of the outcome of this season, just became even more apparent.