Celtics offseason Outlook: Jayson Tatum injury changes everything

When the Boston Celtics had dropped 2-1 at the New York Knicks when they got into game 4, it was a funny little story due to the unexpected nature. Most expected that the Celtics connect the series and frankly end the cheerfulness of the situation in six games.

Nobody laughed after game 4.

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Jayson Tatum, the best player in the team who tries to defend his title, broke his Achilles and not only ended his season, but also asked questions about how he will return from this injury, which will probably be for the 2026-27 season.

The Celtics will be destroyed in game 6 on Friday evening, which is not compared with the loss of Tatum, which could have had an impact for years.

Now everything is in the air. The Celtics are expensive and without Tatum they could be too expensive to stay intact for the next season. The assumption has been for some time that this iteration of the Celtics, even with a healthy Tatum, had an expiry date due to the mere volume of its continuous luxury tax.

Could the organization accelerate that the expiry date will be accelerated due to its new situation? It cannot be excluded.

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This was not as strong for the Celtics as many believed that this was the case. Jaylen Brown fought with his offensive for the pieces of the season, and while Boston set up a 3-point record after 3-point record, it could not fell secondary offensive options for the time of that.

This does not mean that their main strategy was wrong. The 3 is here to stay, and Boston starts 48.2 per night completely reasonable.

What was not appropriate was the amount of opportunities that they rendered throughout the season, since they essentially forgot the larger point of the outer shot: it opens the floor and enables cuts, drives and interior design options.

Only 17.9% of the attempts to shoot in Boston this season came from three feet from the edge, a brand that took 26th place in the NBA.

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This was also frustrating, since they took third place in the league in the conversion rate in these narrow attempts and ended 74.8% of these experiments.

Despite the win of 61 games, the Celtics are now outside and wonder how everything suddenly collapsed.

2024-25 finish

Record: 61-21, No. 2 Seed in the Eastern Conference. Lost in six games in the second round against the New York Knicks.

Highlight of the season

Payton Pritchhard's piece, who won the sixth man in the league. The 6-foot 1 combo guard has unlocked a new level to its game and was one of the most constant creators in the team. The Celtics would often trigger its evaluation competence if they needed a thrust, and Pritchhard was more than happy to commit himself. Indeed, he played so well that the argument could be presented that it will be difficult to keep out of the starting line -up, especially if he comes back next year after improving.

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The players signed for the next season

Jayson Tatum
Jaylen Brown
Jrue Holiday
Kristaps Porzi
Derrick White
Payton Pritchard
Baylor Scheierman
Xavier Tillman
Sam Hauser

Important freelance agents

Al Horford (UFA)
Luke Kornet (UFA)

Projected salary

$ 218,396.208

Draft picks

No. 28
No. 32

Design focus: Wift for the fences. When Tatum gets out all year round and the Celtics start to slowly remove key pieces from the squad to save money, it is the right idea to design high -ranking players. These are late selections, so the chances are low to find real differences, but that should not prevent the Celtics from trying to find the players left over on the board. The positions are damn.

If the Celtics attribute everything, they have very few ways to improve the squad because they go beyond the second apron. If you start selling pieces and positioning yourself to get a little under the second apron, you could have your tax at hand. But that seems to be a lot of trouble for very little return.

Needs and goals

This is difficult because the goal is the same as this year, but with Tatum this expectation is unrealistic. If the Celtics are honest with themselves, one year without Tatum there is the opportunity to find a young wing that they can give a lot of development minutes, and hope that the following year he will make a jump when Tatum returns and may provide them with another bang on a title.