Celtics finally, mercifully get under luxury tax with latest trade
The Celtics saved themselves a ton of money at the trade deadline. Now, hopefully they can get back to focusing on building a championship team.
Hopefully, this is the last we need to hear about the Boston Celtics and the stupid luxury tax.
According to Shams Charania Thursday afternoon, the Celtics managed to swing one more trade ahead of the deadline, which fell at 3 p.m. EST. As Shams reported at 4:08, the C's are sending big man Xavier Tillman to the Charlotte Hornets, and even sent another $3.5 million their way. With that deal, the Celtics officially have gotten under the luxury tax. So, congratulations to Bill Chisholm.
The first deal the C's made was promising. Because, while the main benefit of trading Anfernee Simons for Nikola Vucevic was swapping out a redundant, one-dimensional scorer for a big man that can provide offense himself, filling a legitimate need. The follow-up trades, the dumping of Chris Boucher, Josh Minott, and now Tillman's salaries, were entirely about saving money. Chisholm is fortunate to have Brad Stevens in charge, because he just demonstrated his ability to make him happy on the bottom line while simultaneously improving the team from a basketball standpoint.
That said, the Celtics essentially just paid the Hornets about a million bucks to help them get out of the luxury tax. Now, we can hope that saga is over, and the Celtics can focus on getting as close as they can to another championship. Just don't expect much out of the bench in the process.
