Boston Celtics: 3 players who might not finish the season with Cs

Despite a rather underwhelming start to the 2021-22 season, the Boston Celtics look like a well-oiled machine as of late, rattling off six wins in their last nine games and, because of this, boast a 10-9 record.

As is expected, guys like Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown find themselves serving as the team’s best and most important commodities while others such as Robert Williams, Al Horford, and Dennis Schroder have all been tremendous complementary pieces within the rotation.

That said, while these players have all likely established themselves as full-season contributors (barring any blockbusters or simply unforeseen future events, that is) there are others who may not be so lucky, as there’s an argument to be made that at some point between now and year’s end we could see certain individuals parting from the team in one way or another.

Today, we at the Houdini discuss 3 players we believe could be in danger of not finishing the season as a member of the Boston Celtics:

Boston Celtics player No. 1) Juan Hernangomez

When the Boston Celtics traded for Juan Hernangomez this past offseason, we at HH were actually rather high on the move, even going as far as to state that he could serve as a quality starting option at the power forward position due to his previous excellence in such a role when with the Minnesota Timberwolves.

Unfortunately, through 18 games played, the 26-year-old has yet to inspire any hope that our expectations have a chance of actually becoming a reality as he’s received bare minimum playing time and, with it, has put forth less-than bare minimum production.

Seeing on-court action on just 10 occasions (has received eight separate DNP’s) the Madrid native finds himself putting up one point and less than a rebound per game in just 3.5 minutes.

Logging just 36 minutes in total this season thus far (lowest mark on the team of those who have full-time contracts) it’s quite apparent that head coach Ime Udoka is not all that eager to get Hernangomez onto the hardwood and, with how well the team has been playing of late, should they keep it up it only makes it less and less likely that we’ll be seeing him receive substantial playing time any time soon.

Because of this, we don’t find it all that far-fetched to believe that he may not finish the season as a member of the Cs and, should they not be able to package him into a deal involving, say, one of their TPE’s, Brad Stevens and co. could theoretically opt to just waive him considering the fact that his current salary is just $6.1 million and the final year in 2022 is non-guaranteed.

At the time of his arrival, it was viewed as a move well worth making for the power forward needy shamrocks.

However, to this point, he’s been a non-factor for the ball club and this doesn’t seem likely to change all that soon, if ever.