Hoops Rumors is checking in on the 2026 offseason for all 30 NBA teams, recapping the summer’s free agent signings, trades, draft picks, departures, and more. We’ll take a look at each team’s offseason moves and consider what might still be coming before the regular season begins. Today, we’re focusing on the Boston Celtics.
Free agent signings
Mitchell Robinson: Three years, $47,388,600. Third-year player option. Signed using non-taxpayer mid-level exception.
Ron Harper Jr.: Four years, $13,704,229. Third year non-guaranteed. Fourth-year team option. Re-signed using Non-Bird rights.
Mike Conley Jr.: One year, minimum salary. Fully guaranteed. Signed using minimum salary exception.
Tucker DeVries: One year, minimum salary. Non-guaranteed (Exhibit 9/10). Signed using minimum salary exception.
Milos Uzan: One year, minimum salary. Non-guaranteed (Exhibit 9/10). Signed using minimum salary exception.
Trades
Acquired Paul George, a 2028 first-round pick or swap, the Sixers’ 2031 first-round pick, either the Warriors’, Thunder’s, or Bucks’ 2028 second-round pick (whichever is most favorable), and either the Wizards’, Trail Blazers’, or Suns’ 2030 second-round pick (whichever is most favorable) from the Sixers in exchange for Jaylen Brown.
Draft picks
1-27: Chris Cenac Jr.
Signed to rookie scale contract (four years, $15,343,630). First two years guaranteed. Third- and fourth-year team options.
2-40: Dillon Mitchell
Signed to two-way contract.
Two-way signings
Dillon Mitchell
One year, $91,000 partial guarantee (will increase to $339,441 at start of regular season).
Amari Williams
One year, $91,000 partial guarantee (will increase to $339,441 at start of regular season).
Departed/unsigned free agents
Max Shulga (Real Madrid – Spain)
John Tonje (Trail Blazers)
Nikola Vucevic (Magic)
Other roster moves
Signed Neemias Queta to a four-year, $56,000,000 veteran contract extension that begins in 2027/28. Fully guaranteed.
Signed Jordan Walsh to a three-year, $15,750,000 veteran contract extension that begins in 2027/28. Third-year team option.
Waived Dalano Banton (non-guaranteed contract).
Salary cap situation
Note: Figures are rounded to one decimal place.
Operating over the cap ($165MM) and below the first tax apron ($209MM).
Hard-capped at first apron.
Team salary: $198.7MM (tax/apron).
Below luxury tax line by $1.7MM; below hard cap by $10.3MM.
Full bi-annual exception ($5.1MM) available.
Five traded player exceptions available (largest worth $27.7MM).
The offseason so far
For nearly the entire 2025/26 season, the Celtics exceeded expectations. They more than held their own without Jayson Tatum available for most of the regular season, then got Tatum back in March following an accelerated recovery period from his 2025 Achilles tear. Boston posted a 56-26 record, claimed the No. 2 seed in the East, then took a 3-1 lead on the Sixers in the first round of the playoffs before losing its grip on that lead and falling in seven games to Philadelphia.
The Celtics’ front office could’ve chosen to focus on that regular season success, assuming (reasonably) that the team would be better equipped to make a deeper playoff run in 2027, with Tatum another year removed from that torn Achilles and its younger players more comfortable in their respective roles. In other words, running it back with modest upgrades around the edges was a viable offseason plan for president of basketball operations Brad Stevens.
In fact, it briefly looked like that was the path Boston might take. On the morning of July 1, the club reached a three-year, $47MM+ agreement with free agent center Mitchell Robinson, luring a key contributor away from the defending champion Knicks. Besides weakening a conference rival, the move strengthened a frontcourt that lost Kristaps Porzingis, Al Horford, and Luke Kornet in 2025 and relied mostly on unproven contributors in ’25/26.
Thrust into a starting center role last season, Neemias Queta was a revelation, setting new career highs in most statistical categories while averaging 25.3 minutes per game in 76 outings (75 starts). Queta’s breakout season earned him a four-year, $56MM extension with the Celtics this offseason after the club exercised his minimum-salary option for ’26/27. But as good as he was, the club didn’t want to have to lean so heavily on him going forward and made it a priority to add another reliable rotation big man.
In Robinson, the C’s were able to add one of the NBA’s premier rebounders and rim protectors, as well as a player who should give them a different look in the middle. As long as he’s healthy – ankle problems have been an issue in the past – he should give his new team a productive 20 or 25 minutes per game.
Having already agreed to re-sign forward Ron Harper Jr. to a team-friendly four-year, $13.7MM contract, and with a modest three-year, $15.8MM extension on tap for forward Jordan Walsh later in the summer, the Celtics didn’t have to make any drastic roster changes. However, there had been a sense since the team’s first-round elimination that Stevens would be open to them.
While they weren’t among the teams said to be pushing for Giannis Antetokounmpo at February’s trade deadline, the Celtics got very involved in those sweepstakes after the season ended, battling Miami down to the wire for the right to trade for the two-time MVP. The Bucks ultimately chose a Heat package featuring a wider variety of young players and draft picks over a Celtics offer that was headlined by five-time All-Star Jaylen Brown.
But the trade chatter surrounding Brown kept percolating with Antetokounmpo off the board. Stevens continued to explore trade scenarios involving the All-NBA second-teamer until he found a deal he liked with the Sixers, who sent Paul George, a pair of first-round picks, and two second-round picks to the Celtics in a shocking blockbuster. Word of the deal broke late in the afternoon on July 1, less than seven hours after Boston had come to terms with Robinson.
There are a number of reasons why the Celtics might have been motivated to move Brown. Analytical models have never been high on his game, and he wasn’t a perfect fit on a team that loves to fire away from beyond the three-point line. He’s on one of the NBA’s most expensive contracts, with three years and $185MM left on his super-max deal, and swapping him for George moved Boston below the luxury tax line.
Additionally, Brown’s comments about 2025/26 being his “favorite” season – despite the first-round playoff exit – raised eyebrows, since it implied he liked being the Celtics’ go-to scorer and play-maker more than winning a championship (in 2024) as a No. 2 option. And perhaps most importantly, he didn’t seem particularly thrilled about hearing his name come up in the Antetokounmpo trade rumors, so the team may have been worried that the relationship wasn’t salvageable.
Whatever the thinking was, the deal has shone a bright spotlight on Stevens and the Celtics’ front office entering the 2026/27 season. The return of George and a few draft assets was widely panned as being too light for a player of Brown’s caliber, and multiple reports have suggested that the Sixers’ addition of Brown helped convince LeBron James to sign with Philadelphia, meaning Stevens and the C’s may have inadvertently created an Eastern Conference powerhouse.
For what it’s worth, I do think George is being somewhat undervalued by critics of the Brown trade. He’s no longer the two-way dynamo he was in his prime, but he averaged 17.3 PPG with a .392 3PT% last season and was even better in the playoffs. He can be a nice fit in Boston if he stays healthy, but that’s admittedly a big “if” as he enters his age-36 season.
Up next
It looks like Boston’s major offseason business is complete. The Celtics do still have one open spot on their projected regular season roster, but signing a veteran free agent as a 15th man would push their team salary into tax territory, so I expect there will be no rush to fill that opening until a little later in the regular season.
After re-signing Amari Williams to a two-way contract and inking this year’s second-round pick, Dillon Mitchell, to a two-way deal, the Celtics also have one two-way slot still open.
John Tonje and Max Shulga, who were on two-way contracts for much of last season, have signed elsewhere this summer, so the club figures to bring in a newcomer alongside Williams and Mitchell. It remains to be seen whether the Celtics have anyone specific in mind or if they might allow their camp invitees to compete for that spot while keeping an eye out on two-way and Exhibit 10 players around the league who will be waived before opening night.
It’s also worth noting that two notable Celtics players – George and Payton Pritchard – are eligible for contract extensions. I think it’s pretty safe to assume George won’t be signing a new deal in the next couple months, but it’s certainly worth having a conversation with Pritchard, despite his assertion that he’s in no rush to get anything done.
Pritchard’s maximum extension at this point would be worth just shy of $69MM over three years. Given that he has continued to improve in each of the last few seasons and figures to play a major role again in 2026/27, that might not be a strong enough offer to lock him up, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if the two sides postpone talks until next offseason.