Taking Stock of Celtics' 2015 Draft Picks
BOSTON – The Celtics have amassed a treasure chest of assets during the past two years of wheeling and dealing during the team's rebuild. The vast majority of the capital Danny Ainge has acquired in that timespan arrived in the form of draft picks, but many of those selections come with asterisks attached.
In the NBA these days, several draft picks that change hands in trades are conditional selections. Depending on where a team finishes in the standings, a team may or may not owe their trade partner a pick.
View: Boston's Stockpile Of Future Draft Picks
Two of the four draft picks the Celtics currently own for the 2015 NBA Draft serve as examples of these kinds of picks with stipulations attached. With the draft workouts already beginning to take shape for the C's, let's take stock of the team's inventory and explore why the Celtics receive certain picks from teams, while others are destined to be gone forever.
Picks Celtics own for 2015 NBA Draft:
2015 own first-round pick (16th overall)
2015 own second-round pick (45th overall)
2015 unprotected Clippers first-round pick (28th overall, acquired from Doc Rivers trade in summer of 2013)
2015 Sixers second-round pick (33rd overall)
Picks Celtics will not own due to protections in 2015 NBA Draft
2015 Sixers top-14 protected first-round pick (via Miami) – The Celtics acquired this pick via the Jordan Crawford/Joel Anthony three-way trade with the Heat and Golden State Warriors last December. The Sixers tanked so the Celtics will not be seeing this selection. Instead, Boston will get two second-round picks from the Sixers for 2015 and 2016. With Philadelphia finishing with the third worst record in the league, that second-round pick is set to be the No. 33 selection in the draft and should be valuable for Boston if they elect to move up.
2015 Timberwolves top-12 protected first round pick (via Phoenix) – The Celtics nabbed this pick via the Brandan Wright trade with the Suns back in January. (Phoenix had acquired it from Minnesota for a separate deal). The Wolves had the worst record in the NBA this year and nabbed the top pick in the lottery. However, the top-12 protection carries over for next year as well, so if Minnesota makes some dramatic improvements this offseason, Boston could have another pick at its disposable next year. The fact that the Wolves will have a No. 1 overall draft pick on their roster for the third straight season could help accelerate their rebuild.
2015 Mavericks first-round pick (protected 1-3, 15-30) – This future selection was the key piece of the Rajon Rondo trade, along with Jae Crowder and Wright. Boston put in the pick protections in hopes they would get a lottery selection for future seasons (when the odds are in favor of Dallas being a worse team). With the Mavericks making the postseason this year, it is highly probably the Celtics will see this pick next year when it's only top-7 protected. With Rajon Rondo heading out-of-town and several key Mavs coming up as free agents, this could be a real asset for Celtics moving forward.
2015 Wizards second-round pick (protected top-49) – Ainge sneakily picked up this pick from the Wizards by sending power forward Kris Humphries to Washington in a sign-and-trade deal last summer. Unfortunately, the Wizards were the 12th best team by record in the NBA, which means they would pick 49th in the second round of the draft, barely allowing them to keep their pick. Still, this pick is the perfect example of the Celtics getting something in trades for nothing (i.e. signing-and-trading Humphries, who they weren't going to bring back anyway).
Brian Robb covers the Celtics for CBS Boston and contributes to NBA.com, among other media outlets. You can follow him on Twitter @CelticsHub.
