Welcome to Boston, Anfernee Simons!

[Larry_Russell]

It's also possible Simons resigns here on a team friendly deal.

I think Simons is a great scorer and I like the guy.
But I think having him and PP is just too much "smallness".

Trade PP and I'm 100% all in keeping Simons.

If you think about it, what happens when the Cs are in a Game 7 of a playoff series?
You're going to have JT, JB, White, a big man, and most likely Hugo or Mynot, right?

OKC learned their lesson in 2024 when Luka and the Mavs beat them because the Mavs had Gafford and Lively and OKC only had Chet and Dort as their best 5 players in crunch time.

It's really hard to win in the postseason without size.

OKC won the title because they were already the 1 seed and then they went added not 1 but 2 very good players (Caruso, Hartenstein)..1 of them just happened to be a big.

But the important thing is they were already an excellent team and then they added 2 more really good players. Plus a bunch of their guys were younger players so still on that upward trajectory (Jdub, chet, wiggins, etc.) along with good team chemistry, good coaching and voila, championship.

At the end of the day, what matters most for winning a championship is 2 main things:
a) having a superstar who's a top 4 (ideally top 5) player in the league
b) having talent

We had enough talent to win a championship in 2024. But then we lost Al, Luke, Jrue and KP.

If we trade Simons or Pritchard, we have even less talent - making our championship odds even lower.

And trading Pritchard isn't likely to happen..he only makes like $8mil a year so we wouldn't be able to get a very good player in exchange for him sincr whoever we get can't make more than Pritchard makes..

trading simons is addition by subtraction.

Simons single handedly can destroy a teams offensive flow and their defensive identity

[Hal14]

Maybe the best scorer on the team right now.

I might be in the minority, but I really hope we get to see how lethal this team could be offensively with Tatum, Brown, White and Simons. Not to mention Pritchard and Hauser.

Could be one of the most explosive offensive teams of all time.

ewww.

Simons and Brown battling for bad shots....and Simons not doing any passing or defense.

Gross.

He is not a winning player.

Did you not watch the game last night?

Good pass to Hauser - assist
Good pass to Hauser - misses an open 3
Good pass to Pritchard - missed an open 3

That was just in like a minute and a half long stretch of the game..

Plenty of solid passes..and his defense has been decent so far this season.

[Fierce1]

I might be in the minority, but I really hope we get to see how lethal this team could be offensively with Tatum, Brown, White and Simons. Not to mention Pritchard and Hauser.

Could be one of the most explosive offensive teams of all time.

ewww.

Simons and Brown battling for bad shots....and Simons not doing any passing or defense.

Gross.

He is not a winning player.

Did you not watch the game last night?

Good pass to Hauser - assist
Good pass to Hauser - misses an open 3
Good pass to Pritchard - missed an open 3

Plenty of solid passes..and his defense has been decent so far this season.

He won't change his mind about Simons, no matter what you say.

[Larry_Russell]

I might be in the minority, but I really hope we get to see how lethal this team could be offensively with Tatum, Brown, White and Simons. Not to mention Pritchard and Hauser.

Could be one of the most explosive offensive teams of all time.

ewww.

Simons and Brown battling for bad shots....and Simons not doing any passing or defense.

Gross.

He is not a winning player.

Did you not watch the game last night?

Good pass to Hauser - assist
Good pass to Hauser - misses an open 3
Good pass to Pritchard - missed an open 3

Plenty of solid passes..and his defense has been decent so far this season.

wow, three passes.

[ryan in Maine]

Looking forward to watching Simons play as much as i am anyone on the team.

[Celticlifer]

Anfernee Simons has the most valuable quality in the NBA, the ability to get off good shots one on one against any defense and to make stopping him a focal point of the opponent. You coach him up on defense (seems to be working) and keep him if you can. He seems to be a willing passer and has historically been more than adequate in that area. Saying he's not a winning player coming off of a Portland stint is meaningless. Charlie Scott wasn't a winning player with Phoenix, no defense, ball hog, etc. Came to Boston ( still not a good trade since we gave up Westphal) but was a great contributor to a championship team and nearly a repeat.

[Curmudgeon]

Anfernee Simons has the most valuable quality in the NBA, the ability to get off good shots one on one against any defense and to make stopping him a focal point of the opponent. You coach him up on defense (seems to be working) and keep him if you can. He seems to be a willing passer and has historically been more than adequate in that area. Saying he's not a winning player coming off of a Portland stint is meaningless. Charlie Scott wasn't a winning player with Phoenix, no defense, ball hog, etc. Came to Boston ( still not a good trade since we gave up Westphal) but was a great contributor to a championship team and nearly a repeat.

I'm not convinced. Forget about his lousy defense and ballhandling for the moment. Whenever he touches the ball, he slows it down and waits for the defense to set up. He never pushes it. The team can play fast when he's on the floor, but it's in spite of him, not because of him.

He shot well last night, but most of his points were meaningless and came after the game was already won. The guys who made game winning plays when it mattered were Minott, Pritchard and White.

[Celticlifer]

Ok, I hear you. I think he was pushing the tempo last night and the game was in doubt until he went off. We're not going to be very good this year so impacting winning may be hard to find, but put him on a team with tatum and company and he starts to look like Vinny Johnson. I think he'll make Hauser even more of a luxury and that gives us good options to get another big. Pritchard I'd still keep but you could make a case that he could be added to that package if Simons improves his d enough, although I just hate giving Pritchard up.

Quick question for you , Celtics ball 10 seconds to go down 1, who do you want with the ball in their hands: Brown, White, Pritchard or Simons? I think Simons is definitely in that conversation.

[Curmudgeon]

No, I want it in White's or Pritchard's hands because they won't turn it over and will find a good shot either for themselves or someone else. Simons will just tricky dribble for 8 seconds and then take a step back trey. Against good teams he'll be doubled and he'll never get it off. Brown will also try to score himself, but may be able to bull his way to the basket against bad teams. Against good teams he might get lucky and draw a foul.

[Hal14]

No, I want it in White's or Pritchard's hands because they won't turn it over and will find a good shot either for themselves or someone else. Simons will just tricky dribble for 8 seconds and then take a step back trey.

Or he'll do this:

Read on Twitter

Made it look effortless as hell.

And it'll be even easier with better spacing / less defensive attention on him if he's trying to do that with Pritchard, White, JB (maybe Tatum too) on the floor..

[Curmudgeon]

Yeah, that was one of Portland's 36 wins.

[Hal14]

Read on Twitter

[Parliament10]

Read on Twitter

[Curmudgeon]

Simons has a nice stroke. I wouldn't want to play horse against him. The rest of his game is below average, and I do not ascribe to the theory that the Celtics do not have enough scoring without him. If White and Pritchard start to shoot their career averages, there will be plenty of scoring, even with Brown on the bench.

[ryan in Maine]

Buy Simons stock.

Imo the Celtics are being ridiculous by swapping our 6th man and starting guard. We have the 6th man of the year, and we have a guy that started every game he played for 3 straight seasons. If you're going to experiment this is the year, sure, but if you want to get some wins on the board, start Simons and move Pritchard back to first man up. Pritchard looks like he has to do way too much work on offense. Luckily he's got a nice touch in the paint.

Some of you guys are talking about Simons kinda like normies used to talk about Pierce when his best teammate was Antoine Walker. Idk if Simons is in our future, but I'd be thrilled if he is.

[Celticlifer]

The point is that White and Pritchard will find it a lot harder this year to shoot their career averages because they went from 4th (actually probably tied for 4th )and maybe 6th option to 2 and 3. We will have trouble scoring because of this. You can already see it, White is taking tougher shots adn Pritchard is feeling pressure to be a leading scorer. Simons has been the go-to scorer on a bad team. He can at least be a good scorer on a better team and on a team with Tatum and Brown, he can be lethal. His handle is solid. His numbers last couple of years point to a guy who is willing to pass and is pretty good at it. Lots of great players were good on a losing team and showed more diverse games when they got on a winning team. Love, Bosh, Andrew Wiggins etc.

We will like what we see from Simons this year. Whether we can keep him next year is another question. If we trade him we will get back something very good.

[31to6]

How cool to see a Charlie Scott reference on this board! And a valid one, too.
Simons is auditioning right now -- can he be a potentially-useful long term piece for a winning team?
I'm skeptical, but we'll get evidence in the coming months.
I suspect if he were 6'6" it'd be easier to buy in -- but then he'd still be in POR, probably.

[meatball sub]

that stat is misleading bc i've seen a handful of plays where simons completely lost his man and the guy scored near another player. there's no way he's been one of the best wing defenders in the first 4 games

[Curmudgeon]

Read on Twitter

Until Hauser tonight LOL.

[31to6]

Simons +6 in 26 minutes tonight
he hit some shots (14 pts on 9 shots) and had a TO or two (just one in box score) is all I remember