The Boston Celtics have had great success since they acquired Kevin Garnett in July 2007. Only missing the playoffs once, while advancing to 6 Eastern Conference Finals, 2 NBA Finals, and winning 1 championship. However, last year was not just a down year for Boston, it was a disastrous year for the Celtics. They finished .500 at 36-36 finishing 7th in the East. After a 50 point performance from Jayson Tatum in the play-in win vs the Wizards. The Celtics were walloped in the first round vs the Nets but they did win one game thanks to yet another 50 point game from Tatum. They are getting Jaylen Brown back from an injury that held him out of the postseason. Let’s go over what the Celtics did in the offseason and why they should improve for this upcoming season.
The day after their season ended Boston got to work. Danny Ainge resigned as President of Basketball Operations so the Celtics promoted Brad Stevens to the job, so they needed a new coach. In steps Ime Udoka, the former assistant for a bunch of teams including the Nets last season, for his first head coaching job. It is a new voice, something that many people believed the team needed last season. They also were not deep enough to survive a regular season last year. So they acquired Al Horford, Josh Richardson, Dennis Schroder, Enes Kanter, and Juancho Hernangomez. They still have the young talent of Robert Williams (whom they recently extended), Payton Pritchard, Romeo Langford, and Aaron Nesmith. It is a much deeper roster that will need their young players to ascend but they should be much more competitive in the Eastern Conference in 2022.
When you have 2 young stars, the way the Celtics do, they can be very competitive in the Eastern Conference. They are not favored to win the East, they should not be picked to win the East, and they are not going to beat the Bucks and Nets to win the East. However, the idea that they are lesser than the Heat, Hawks, and 76ers is silly to me. They have the front line talent and the depth to compete in a good Eastern Conference. They still have Marcus Smart and his needed toughness, they also brought in good bench players in Schroder and Richardson. Yes losing Kemba Walker and Evan Fournier hurts but they can survive through they way they have rebuilt the depth of this team. However, they do need a jump from their young players most importantly Nesmith and Langford, both had a good summer league and will need to take a leap this season while also complementing the stars of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown (which I think Nesmith will do very nicely). Tatum has a chance to become a MVP level player, Brown has become an elite player who can carry a really good team, Al Horford is a very good veteran who knows the guys after spending 3 seasons in Boston previously, and Robert Williams has a chance to become a top flight NBA center. They have a chance to become a very good team this season and a championship contender in the seasons that follow.
The Celtics had a rough 2020-21 season, after coming off a short offseason due to the bubble, a lot of COVID issues, and injury issues, I’d expect Boston to bounce back in 2022. They have talent up and down the roster, a new coach who seems like he can be a solid NBA head coach, and a new opportunity to prove a lot of people wrong. This is a really good team that had a bad season that led to sweeping changes. I expect a much better Boston Celtics team in 2022.
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