Boston Celtics Rumors: 3 potential Terry Rozier trades that work

With rumors swirling, where could Boston Celtics guard Terry Rozier wind up in a trade?

Terry Rozier was an integral part of the Boston Celtics when they made their run to Game 7 of the Conference Finals last season. He played 36.6 minutes per game and averaged 16.5 points per game, and developed a reputation as a clutch shot-maker.

This season doesn’t resemble those playoffs at all for Rozier, who’s averaging just 22.5 minutes per game and 8.5 points per game with an abysmal 37.4 field goal percentage. His usage rate has fallen from 21.2 percent to 18.5 percent, per Cleaning the Glass.

Rozier thrives when he starts. It’s a small sample size, but he’s shooting 6.6 percent better from the field this season when he starts than when he comes off the bench, and he averages more than twice the assists. Unfortunately for Rozier, he’s unlikely to get consistent starting opportunities with this squad. And while the rest of the team has largely come around on offense, he’s still forcing tough shots and struggling to find his place in the attack.

And so now the Boston Celtics, with the trade deadline looming, have decisions to make. They’d surely love to see what the 2015 16th overall pick will become, but there’s opportunity cost here. The Celtics have a 10.3 net rating when Rozier is on the bench, and just a 1.2 net rating when he’s on the floor. You always have to be careful with those kinds of stats, but the eye test backs it up in this case. Rozier is not fitting in with the Boston Celtics, and is playing pretty ugly basketball.

More important, perhaps, is the luxury tax situation. The Celtics are in the luxury tax right now, and would need to shed $3,827,382 to get under it. They’re barely over, so the bill wouldn’t even be that large, but for a team poised to be a contender for years, ownership might not want to start the clock on the repeater tax.

Rozier is making only $3,050,390, so they’d need to trade away more than Rozier to dodge the tax. That might prove too tall an order (none of the trades I came up with address it), and for all we know, ownership isn’t worried about how much they’re spending. But this is worth remembering as we toss around trade ideas.

Let’s get into some trade possibilities for Rozier. (All ideas were checked for viability in the ESPN Trade Machine).