The Celtics have been busy making moves since Wyc Grousbeck announced plans to sell his family’s ownership stake in the team earlier this month. Brad Stevens addressed the team’s sale for the first time on Wednesday in Las Vegas, acknowledging that the decision was as much news to him as it was to everyone else.
“Well, I mean, I learned not long before everybody else did that was going to happen,” Stevens told reporters in Las Vegas. “I obviously am very thankful for Wyc and his family and everything that they’ve done. I’m looking forward to seeing what happens from here.”
Stevens has been busy bringing back all the major parts of a team that is a favorite to repeat entering the 2024-25 season, inking extensions with Jayson Tatum and Derrick White while re-signing three of Boston’s own free agents in Luke Kornet, Neemias Queta and Xavier Tillman. The new deals for White and Tatum will be costly contracts that last long beyond the Grousbeck sale but the change in ownership doesn’t appear to be impacting Stevens mapping out the future.
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“I don’t want to get too far into the weeds of it all but how does it affect us? It doesn’t really right now,” Stevens said. “From the standpoint of the corporate side or basketball operations we’re just head down, doing what we think is best for the now of the Celtics and the future of the Celtics. We’re lucky we have a good team.”
The tougher questions will come when new ownership is in place and how they handle a skyrocketing Celtics payroll that will be facing historic luxury tax payments as soon as the 2025-26 season. If Boston’s new owners are willing to foot that bill, the Celtics will be set to contend for the remainder of the decade. If not, tougher decisions will be coming for Stevens in his front office about what players the team can afford to keep around.
in the meantime, Stevens has positioned this group well to take at least one more swing with this core fully intact. Even as other Eastern Conference teams load up with talent, the Celtics’ continuity puts them ahead of the pack in their quest to become the NBA’s first repeat champion this decade.
