The next iteration of the Celtics with Jayson Tatum back healthy is going to take some time to put together for Brad Stevens over the next month. However, one small part of that puzzle will begin to become apparent later this week as the Celtics have until Friday to decide on Baylor Scheierman’s third-year option for the 2026-27 season.
“I haven’t had any conversations about that (with the team),” Scheierman told MassLive Wednesday night after beating the Cavaliers.
On the surface, the 2024 No. 30 overall pick looks like a likely bet to have his option picked up, strictly based on cost. Scheierman’s salary option ($2.7 million) is only a bit more over the veteran’s minimum and those low-cost deals are the types of contracts the Celtics will need to fill out their roster after having a couple of supermax contracts taking up a large chunk of the cap.
Regardless, Scheierman is not bothered about the uncertainty about his future lasting down to the wire.
“I’m just focused on what we got tomorrow and that’s about it,” Scheierman said. “I’m not too focused on that. I feel very confident about what’s to come.”
The question for the Celtics with Scheierman is whether he’s shown enough to earn that guaranteed money at this time. It’s tough to make an accurate judgment on a guy just a year and a week into his NBA career when they have played as little as Scheierman. Through 417 NBA minutes, Scheierman’s averages are far from impressive particularly from a shooting standpoint (35 percent from the field).
Still, he had a very promising string of games in March last season that showed the kind of promise that made him the No. 30 overall pick. He’s played in four straight games now since being a DNP-CD in the opener, coming out ahead of Jordan Walsh in the wing depth hierarchy for now. Joe Mazzulla even gave Scheierman a shoutout postgame after the team’s blowout win over the Cavaliers.
“There was a lot of minutes over the last two, three games where we’ve had like, this is who we have to be,” Mazzulla said. “Like you’re saying, the depth, the ability, I thought even Baylor’s five or six possessions on Donovan Mitchell, he executed the game plan. So just getting 11, 12 guys that can play the way we need to play on both ends of the floor, we’ll continue to grow as a team. So like you said, it’s a credit to them doing that, and we’ve just got to get better at it.”
The Celtics will have 10 players under guaranteed contract for next season if the Scheierman option is picked up but likely enough breathing room to stay out of the luxury tax, if that ends up being a priority for ownership with the repeater tax looming. The team will obviously be looking to rework the roster around a healthy Jayson Tatum to some degree but a 25-year-old Scheierman with a couple years in Mazzulla’s system looks like he could useful deep bench depth for the team at the least.
Whether or not Scheierman develops enough to be a bench factor on a contending team remains to be seen. For the low cost, he’s likely earned himself at least one more season in green.
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