While the Celtics have had a busy offseason already between two significant trades and the 2025 NBA Draft, one of their biggest question marks is with a pair of their free agents. Al Horford and Luke Kornet are both unrestricted free agents as they were key parts of the team last season.
C’s president Brad Stevens stressed it was a “priority” to re-sign both Horford and Kornet. But that’s easy to say as their respective price tag could be expensive while the Celtics are looking to cut costs on their payroll.
On the Kornet front, it’s unclear what he’ll command on the open market. But per Heavy’s Steve Bulpett, sighting front-office sources, revealed roughly what Kornet could land in free agency.
“Kornet’s clearly in for a payday,” said the source to Bulpett. “Steven Adams got three years at $13 million per, and (Daniel) Gafford got $60 million over three years. The non-taxpayer mid-level exception is around 13 million; I’ll be surprised if Kornet doesn’t come in close to that.
“He scouts well. He’s still definitely a backup, but the question is what he’ll do when he gets more minutes than he did with the Celtics. He was playing for the minimum, and he’s going to do much better than that. I think he’s looking at $10 million per.”
Kornet put together a career season on the Celtics, becoming a legit playoff rotation big man. His chemistry with Jayson Tatum on the pick-and-roll was also a consistent weapon. While Kornet evolved his career uniquely away from 3-pointers, he was still an effective backup big man. He averaged 6.0 points, 5.3 rebounds, 1.6 assists and 1.0 blocks in 73 games (16 starts) last season.
Considering there are plenty of teams looking for backup big man production, what Kornet’s market looks like will be interesting. The C’s do own his Bird Rights, so they can sign him to whatever contract they’d like. However, for a franchise cutting costs, it’ll be a balance between the two. Regardless, Stevens made it clear they want to bring him and Horford back for another season in Boston.
“As you look at the rest of the team and what we’re trying to do, there is no question our priorities would be to bring Al and Luke back,” Stevens said. “Those guys are huge parts of this organization. They’re going to have, I’m sure, plenty of options all over the place, and that’s well-deserved. But I think that would be a priority. At the same time, I don’t want to put pressure on them. It’s their call ultimately. But, yeah, we would love to have those guys back.”