Donovan Mitchell is heading east, but not to the team we thought. After talks between the Utah Jazz and New York Knicks, Mitchell’s assumed landing spot, broke down, Danny Ainge ended up moving the All-Star guard to the Cleveland Cavaliers.
That adds a lot of scoring punch to a team that hung its hat on defense last season, and for not a lot of player cost. Going out in the deal is Collin Sexton, who agreed to a four-year, $72 million sign-and-trade, Lauri Markkanen, and Ochai Agbaji. The real prize for the Jazz is three unprotected first round picks beginning in 2025 and two additional pick swaps.
In essence, the Jazz can take Cleveland’s draft spot for five straight seasons beginning in 2025.
Here’s what it means for the Celtics:
- They better hope Ainge’s gamble pays off.
Mitchell’s contract ends in 2026, so Ainge is banking on Mitchell wanting out by then and either getting traded or leaving the Cavs as a free agent. Cleveland is taking a big swing, hoping they can get good enough to convince Mitchell his best chance at a title is staying put, but Ainge is betting big on the draw of Mitchell’s hometown Knicks.
That doesn’t help the Celtics much in the short term, but the Cavs have gotten a lot better with this move, so anything that tears it apart would be good news for the Celtics.
Side note: Ainge is just a dealer. I wouldn’t want to trade with him. He’s not just trying to win trades, he wants it to be embarrassing. The Cavs come out winners right now as well, but this is a slow burn victory if Mitchell leaves and Ainge gets four years of primo picks.
- Another hurdle make seeding more important
A good team is going to fall into the play-in tournament. That means even the top seeds aren’t safe from a tough first round matchup.
The Celtics and Bucks are still the class of the Eastern Conference, but a best-case scenario for Brooklyn and Philadelphia could push them into the same upper echelon. Miami is knocking on that door as well, and now the Cavs are trying to push their way past Chicago into this conversation.
The Bulls have questions to be answered, but they were a pretty good team last year and they’ll also be a tough out if they stay healthy. That's seven teams right there and we haven't talked about the Toronto Raptors or New York Knicks. Both teams got better, and if they end up being the 8th and 9th seeds, then that just makes the road out of the East a bit tougher.
No, no one fears the Knicks per se, but they could still make life difficult. The Raptors always seem to do that to teams, and meeting them in the first round would be annoyingly difficult.
Either way, the lower down the standings a contender goes in the East, the degree of difficulty significantly increases. The top five teams could be five of the best teams in the NBA, and one of them will lose in the first round.
The Cavs muscling their way up the ladder just makes getting that top seed and home court advantage more important. That puts pressure on Boston’s main players to play more, which puts into question any plans for a slower ramp-up. It won’t be easy to make up ground in this conference now, so the pressure is on them to perform from the beginning of the season.
- Will they add depth (or try to raid the Jazz?)
Utah now has a lot of veterans available to be traded, though they can maybe bide their time and take them into the season and maybe raise the pressure on contenders to pay premium prices.
Boston can’t go after Jordan Clarkson, Bojan Bogdanovic, or Mike Conley because those guys don’t fit into any exceptions and the Celtics aren’t giving up what it takes to match those big salaries. Maybe there are more bit players down the roster that Boston can poach, but Ainge will certainly set the prices pretty high.
It does raise the question of Brad Stevens being a little quicker to pull the trigger on some help, especially down low. The frontcourt of Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen is a formidable one, and the Celtics might want a little extra help just in case.
The question there would be … who?
I doubt the Celtics will panic into a move right now, but the timetable on their experiment with Luke Kornett as the third big just shrunk a little. The Celtics may move more quickly or be more aggressive in adding to the roster now that yet another hurdle is in their way.
And it’s not so much about matching the Cavs. It’s more about making sure there are enough bodies on this roster to get through the season and the playoffs without running their stars into the ground.
The bottom line is that a good team got a whole lot better, and that always puts some pressure on the rest of the competition. Mitchell and Darius Garland are going to fill up the stat sheet and the Mobley/Allen combination will keep the rim safe. We obviously need to see it all in action to see how good it will be, but Boston’s road back to the Finals got a lot tougher today.
This was discussed on a new Locked On Celtics podcast. You can watch the show below or search for it on your favorite podcast app.