The buzz surrounding a potential trade of Giannis Antetokounmpo to the Celtics keeps heating up, and even the most reluctant of fans need to start accepting this reality. It’s gone way beyond the point of fans, social media, and speculation at this point, and even if you don’t view Bill Simmons as a credible source, how about Marc Stein?
For the second time in as many weeks, Stein has confirmed Bill’s intel, saying that he has spoken to teams and inside sources around the league who believe “Boston is increasingly projected to be the other landing spot that Giannis prefers to be steered to”.
Then, on the All-NBA Podcast on Sunday, Stein reiterated, “The Boston talk, it has gotten louder and louder and louder… since the end of May, this has been out there. And my old friend Bill Simmons beat me to it… the two teams that keep coming up are Miami and Boston.”
Stein talked about how all signs still point to Giannis being dealt ahead of the NBA Draft, which starts on June 23rd, and discussed how badly Antetokounmpo wants to win, and how the Celtics would offer him a much better chance to do so.
We have been hearing about a Giannis trade to Miami for ages by now, and everyone knows exactly what that deal would include. If the Bucks like it, and Giannis was happy with it, you’d think a trade would be done by now. But the Heat offer simply isn’t very appealing to either of those parties.
Trade to Heat not good for Bucks or Giannis
For the Bucks, they’d be getting a questionable contract in Tyler Herro, some solid young role players but no real star potential, and draft picks that don’t figure to land high in the lottery any time soon. If you’re going to trade away the greatest Buck in franchise history, you need to be able to point to a little more than Herro, Ke’lel Ware, Jaime Jacquez Jr., the 13th overall pick, and some other assets.
And for Giannis, why would you want to go to a team that’s nowhere near contending, and will be gutting its roster to add you? They’d be left with Giannis and Bam Adebayo, which is already a bit of an awkward fit; then they’d be left with basically no picks and a bunch of role players. That has to be a tough sell for a 31-year-old two-time MVP who wants to win more rings in his prime.
The Celtics, on the other hand, make sense for everyone involved. Whatever Boston could get for Jaylen Brown would go to Milwaukee, and that alone would be an upgrade on anything Miami can offer. For Giannis, he’d basically be slotting into Brown’s slot in the lineup, joining a team that won 56 games with Jayson Tatum barely playing a quarter of the season (and at less than full strength).
So, that leads us to the Celtics. Now, we know that they are interested and that they’ve made an offer. If we’ve already gotten to that point and they’ve reached the point of being willing to part with Brown and take on Giannis, it feels like it’s just a matter of time and ironing out the details.
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