When the Boston Celtics traded Jaylen Brow to the Philadelphia 76ers for Paul George and draft picks, everybody wondered what Boston was doing.
George is far from the All-Star player he used to be, and the Brown-Jayson Tatum duo is now over after just one trip to the NBA Finals.
While many suggested that the Celtics made the move for financial reasons, Celtics owner Bill Chisholm insisted that wasn’t the case.
“[This is] not about the money at all. This was trying to put together the right players and assets to win… I know people feel like there must be a smoking gun somewhere around the money. That is just not what this is about,” Chisholm said, via Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN.
Brad Stevens, however, spoke to the media on Monday and said the franchise was concerned with having two players taking up 70% of their salary.
“The path looked a little bit more challenging to me with 70 percent of our (salary cap) usage tied to two players. The reality of this era in this day and age in the NBA is that you have to do a great job and you have to have the optionality to do a great job of building out depth that can hopefully replace the irreplaceable individual,” Stevens said.
The Celtics acquired George, two first-round picks and two second-round picks in exchange for Brown. They had previously dangled him in talks centered around Giannis Antetokounmpo, but the Milwaukee Bucks ended up taking the offer from the Miami Heat.
At the end of the day, only time will tell if this move works out well for Boston or not.
