2026 NBA Draft (Part I)

[Celts17Pride]

It’s tough to gauge for me…good thing I am not a better.

White, Brown, Pritchard, Simons, Hauser, Queta is a solid group that might surprise.
Younger guys could step up…also any injury or missed time to Brown or White could lead to lots of Ls.
I think it’s pretty high variance on the win total….like 32-48….

Pritchard, Simons, Hauser, Niang, Queta, Garza, Tillman defensely? Ouch!!

Offense (minus Tatum, Holiday, Porzingis, Horford and Kornet) won't be able to keep up with how bad the defense is going to be next year. Celtics are an easy 35-38 win team, very similiar to the Chicago Bulls last year.

I would t be surprised to see a win total in that range, however lumping Queta in as a bad defender seems wrong. White is a stellar defender and Brown can be solid.
I don’t disagree with you but I think, for me, I wouldn’t be too surprised to see this Celtics roster surprise us.

The Celtics will be the 2005-2006 Celtics with (Brown, White, Simons, Pritchard, Hauser, Queta) playing the roles of (Pierce, R Davis, Szczerbiak, D West, Gomes, Jefferson). That team won 33 games.

[Hal14]

Wrote an article on Australian wing Jacob Furphy..a potential draft target next year..

Read on Twitter

[brackdan70]

Wrote an article on Australian wing Jacob Furphy..a potential draft target next year..

Read on Twitter

Thanks for sharing. Lotto seems like a big reach, especially in a loaded draft.
He is really SG sized. 6’5.5 in shoes and small wingspan. Looks like a baller though.
To me he seems more like a guy that might stay in school a few years….2028 or 29 late first rounder.

[Hal14]

Wrote an article on Australian wing Jacob Furphy..a potential draft target next year..

Read on Twitter

Thanks for sharing. Lotto seems like a big reach, especially in a loaded draft.
He is really SG sized. 6’5.5 in shoes and small wingspan. Looks like a baller though.
To me he seems more like a guy that might stay in school a few years….2028 or 29 late first rounder.

Maybe.

Some of these guys who are lacking in physical traits but are very skilled, high IQ players are ones who stay in school longer - such as Jaime Jaquez, Pritchard, Austin Reaves, Duncan Robinson, Hauser, Nembhard, TJ McConnell, Alex Caruso, Fred Vanvleet, Cam Spencer, etc.

So it's certainly possible Furphy will be a 3 or 4 year college guy.

With that being said, he is about same height/weight/wingspan as Kon Knueppel who was just the 4th pick after his freshman year. And Jared McCain is an unathletic 6'3" SG who was a top 20 pick and the ROY favorite before season ending injury. Guess maybe Furphy should've gone to Duke? lol

[Hal14]

Read on Twitter

Hopefully we get 1 of these 9 guys.

Especially considering our need at C..Boozer is the dream, Quaintance is a nice consolation price..

[Hal14]

Read on Twitter

[phincsfan]

If the C's navigate the tank this season it'll be interesting to see how Stevens does with what looks to be a revamped scouting department. The Ainge dynasty has left that room.

2nd round picks have been pretty abysmal over the last dozen years.

Lots of that on DA, even with Stevens as HC.

[Larry_Russell]

Brads target if team gets a top 10 pick in 2026 will be Tahaad Pettiford

[Hal14]

Our center of the future could be this guy.

Watch on YouTube

6'11". Can hit 3's, set screens, catch lobs, make solid passes on offense. Can block shots and switch a little bit on D. Runs the floor. Only 19 yrs old.

Playing this season at Virginia..same school as Hauser and Malcolm Brogdon (and Trey Murphy, Jay Huff, Ryan Dunn, etc.).

From Germany - we've had success with another German center - Theis. German bigs seem to do pretty well in the league. Theis, Hartenstein, Mo Wagner, etc.

Long way to go till the draft, so hard to tell for sure but as of now, seems like he'll be there in the mid to late 1st round.

We probably won't be bad enough to get a pick too high. Maybe we pick in like the 15-20 range..I'd gladly take Gruenloh with that pick.

[165bows]

Watch Koa Peat absolutely body this rich man's Kenneth Lofton at the 2:00 minute mark.

https://www.tankathon.com/players/koa-peat (video at bottom of the page).

[redslastlaugh]

The Celtics will be the 2005-2006 Celtics with (Brown, White, Simons, Pritchard, Hauser, Queta) playing the roles of (Pierce, R Davis, Szczerbiak, D West, Gomes, Jefferson). That team won 33 games.

2005-06 Celtics was a fun team to watch because new ownership had fully digested the purchase and started the asset accumulation phase and we just had some fun young guys to root for. And, lets be honest, I was a more fun, more young guy myself in 2006, lol

The difference is it was easy for fans to sell themselves on the upside of "under 25 yrs" old guys on that team: Perkins, Al Jeff, Tony Allen, Delonte, Gomes, Gerald Green were all drafted by the team and all looked at least promising. RIght now, the young guys on the '25-26 Celtics (under 25 yrs) are Jordan Walsh, Hugo Gonzalez and Josh Minott which is not as promising a group of prospects.

Plus Danny had all his future firsts, had just added a first acquiring Wally for Davis and Blount and had the big Theo Ratliff expiring so our asset pile was pretty strong. So while that team looked like it was going sideways, in retrospect, we were in a stronger spot than it looked

[redslastlaugh]

I haven't given the 2026 draft any attention yet. I went over to Tankathon and they have a preliminary first rnd mock and only two Centers are projected in the first round (Chris Cenac & Patrick Ngongba) so it seems like the early word is 2026 is looking thin on bigs.

Last yr, we had 12 centers (or C/PF) taken in the first 46 picks: Maluach, Queen, Sorber, Yang, Beringer, Wolf, Konan-Niederhauser, Kalkbrenner, Broome, Raynaud, Zikarsky, & Amari Williams.

Last year looks like an extremely deep center class. We got an interesting guy on the list but also 12 centers were taken and we got the 12th one so kind of hard to get that excited about an interesting, oddball type of prospect that eleven centers got picked ahead of ... we'll see. I think I like Amari Williams the most of the 3 guys we picked because he's so interesting... but point is, last year was the year to swing on centers.

2026 is not looking that way, at least this far out in advance

[165bows]

I haven't given the 2026 draft any attention yet. I went over to Tankathon and they have a preliminary first rnd mock and only two Centers are projected in the first round (Chris Cenac & Patrick Ngongba) so it seems like the early word is 2026 is looking thin on bigs.

Last yr, we had 12 centers (or C/PF) taken in the first 46 picks: Maluach, Queen, Sorber, Yang, Beringer, Wolf, Konan-Niederhauser, Kalkbrenner, Broome, Raynaud, Zikarsky, & Amari Williams.

Last year looks like an extremely deep center class. We got an interesting guy on the list but also 12 centers were taken and we got the 12th one so kind of hard to get that excited about an interesting, oddball type of prospect that eleven centers got picked ahead of ... we'll see. I think I like Amari Williams the most of the 3 guys we picked because he's so interesting... but point is, last year was the year to swing on centers.

2026 is not looking that way, at least this far out in advance

Quaintance is a bit short for a C but has some two way potential - I haven't gotten into it a ton yet but he's the best big imo in terms of pro potential and a great fit. Just super young even tho he's a Soph to be relied on by this team he'd be a young ~20 year old to start the following season. Ersin Demir comped him to a Tyson Chandler with some offensive potential I'll take that all day of the week for the modern NBA.

[redslastlaugh]

Ersin Demir had him as a first rounder on his substack mock before Grunloh withdrew. He looked pretty interesting, maybe a little bit thin and clunky as an athlete but interesting. Would have been an interesting bet if Brad Stevens couldve promised to take him at 28 or 32 if Johann wouldve stayed in the draft.

Once a big comes to college seems he's either gonna lock up top 20 draft stock or he'll play poorly and get exposed and his draft stock will fade and maybe the player just stays in school.

It's not a Brad move to promise a guy, but it'd have been an interesting dice roll because Brad really values bigs who can shoot and protect the rim..

Our center of the future could be this guy.

6'11". Can hit 3's, set screens, catch lobs, make solid passes on offense. Can block shots and switch a little bit on D. Runs the floor. Only 19 yrs old.

Playing this season at Virginia..same school as Hauser and Malcolm Brogdon (and Trey Murphy, Jay Huff, Ryan Dunn, etc.).

From Germany - we've had success with another German center - Theis. German bigs seem to do pretty well in the league. Theis, Hartenstein, Mo Wagner, etc.

Long way to go till the draft, so hard to tell for sure but as of now, seems like he'll be there in the mid to late 1st round.

We probably won't be bad enough to get a pick too high. Maybe we pick in like the 15-20 range..I'd gladly take Gruenloh with that pick.

[Hal14]

Watch Koa Peat absolutely body this rich man's Kenneth Lofton at the 2:00 minute mark.

https://www.tankathon.com/players/koa-peat (video at bottom of the page).

I like Peat. He's very good. Got him 8th on my big board right now. I see him more as a SF/PF type in the NBA though with a chance he could maybe play some small ball 5.

I wouldn't hate it if we took him, if we weren't able to land a big..

If he ends up developing into a small ball 5 though, you could put him at the 5, Tatum at the 4 and JB at the 3..could be really good..

Will be interesting to see how he does this season at Arizona but I am thinking he will be more of a combo forward..

[165bows]

Watch Koa Peat absolutely body this rich man's Kenneth Lofton at the 2:00 minute mark.

https://www.tankathon.com/players/koa-peat (video at bottom of the page).

I like Peat. He's very good. Got him 8th on my big board right now. I see him more as a SF/PF type in the NBA though with a chance he could maybe play some small ball 5.

I wouldn't hate it if we took him, if we weren't able to land a big..

If he ends up developing into a small ball 5 though, you could put him at the 5, Tatum at the 4 and JB at the 3..could be really good..

Will be interesting to see how he does this season at Arizona but I am thinking he will be more of a combo forward..

Yeah fit-wise I think he's a forward, but a solid ball handler.

For GB fans, he could be the true Michael Jordan of Tobias Harris-es.

[Hal14]

Future Celtic.

Watch on YouTube

"With the 15th pick in the 2026 NBA Draft..."

[brackdan70]

I haven't given the 2026 draft any attention yet. I went over to Tankathon and they have a preliminary first rnd mock and only two Centers are projected in the first round (Chris Cenac & Patrick Ngongba) so it seems like the early word is 2026 is looking thin on bigs.

Last yr, we had 12 centers (or C/PF) taken in the first 46 picks: Maluach, Queen, Sorber, Yang, Beringer, Wolf, Konan-Niederhauser, Kalkbrenner, Broome, Raynaud, Zikarsky, & Amari Williams.

Last year looks like an extremely deep center class. We got an interesting guy on the list but also 12 centers were taken and we got the 12th one so kind of hard to get that excited about an interesting, oddball type of prospect that eleven centers got picked ahead of ... we'll see. I think I like Amari Williams the most of the 3 guys we picked because he's so interesting... but point is, last year was the year to swing on centers.

2026 is not looking that way, at least this far out in advance

Quaintance is a bit short for a C but has some two way potential - I haven't gotten into it a ton yet but he's the best big imo in terms of pro potential and a great fit. Just super young even tho he's a Soph to be relied on by this team he'd be a young ~20 year old to start the following season. Ersin Demir comped him to a Tyson Chandler with some offensive potential I'll take that all day of the week for the modern NBA.

Yep Quaintace looks like a C or very long PF.
There are 8 or 9 true Centers and several long PFs in the top 50. I do t think it’s short on bigs at all. Maybe in the lotto.

[165bows]

Future Celtic.

Watch on YouTube

"With the 15th pick in the 2026 NBA Draft..."

Pretty nice stroke.

Looks like my boy Viktor Lakhin.

[Hal14]

Future Celtic.

Watch on YouTube

"With the 15th pick in the 2026 NBA Draft..."

Pretty nice stroke.

Looks like my boy Viktor Lakhin.

Yeah, like 4 years younger though..