More than an hour after the trade deadline passed, word of another deal has trickled in. According to Shams Charania of ESPN (Twitter link), the Celtics reached an agreement to send center Xavier Tillman Sr. and $3.5MM in cash to the Hornets.
It’s a minor move relative to its on-court impact. Tillman, 27, has played an extremely limited role in Boston this season, appearing in just 14 games and averaging 2.2 points and 1.8 rebounds on 7.9 minutes per night. It’s possible the Hornets won’t keep him on the roster after finalizing their trade.
However, it was a crucial move for the Celtics from a financial perspective. After opening the 2025/26 league year operating above the second tax apron, Boston has now moved all the way below the luxury tax line.
The team made cost-cutting moves involving Jrue Holiday, Kristaps Porzingis, and Georges Niang last summer, then moved Tillman, Anfernee Simons, Josh Minott, and Chris Boucher in deals this week to duck slightly out of tax territory. That’s a first step toward the team avoiding repeater penalties in future seasons.
Boston’s margins are very small — after its deadline deals and its promotion of Amari Williams to a standard contract are all official, the team will have 12 players on standard contracts and will be below the tax line by roughly $842K, tweets Yossi Gozlan of The Third Apron.
The Celtics will likely take full advantage of the rule that permits teams to carry fewer than 14 players for up to two weeks at a time and up to 28 days in total. It also seems likely that Max Shulga, another two-way player, will be promoted sooner or later — he would only count for the rookie minimum for tax purposes since he was drafted by Boston, whereas any free agent signing would count as a two-year veteran’s minimum.
The $3.5MM Charlotte will receive in the deal will more than cover Tillman’s remaining salary, so it’s essentially free money for the Hornets, who remain comfortably below the tax line themselves and won’t have a problem taking on the big man’s $2.55MM expiring contract.
Go get Mike Conley please.
I agree, Nrg.
Harper will get the next standard deal when it is time. Shu is not ready yet.
It’s a money thing. If he were to sign a rest-of-season minimum deal in two weeks, Harper would count as $699,440 toward the tax. Shulga would count as $387,713.
How do they get a 14th player then with less than 500k ?
Sure there’s a way but idk how
Looks like they would have about 470 k w 13 players
They wait for prorated minimum to get lower
I have to double-check the math, but my guess:
– They go 14 days with 12 players.
– At the 14-day mark, they sign Shulga to a rest-of-season contract and promote John Tonje to a 10-day deal (he should count for rookie min. since he was a 2025 draft pick who hasn’t been waived since then).
– When Tonje’s 10-day expires, they go 14 more days with 13 players.
– At that point, they do a rest-of-season contract with a vet.
Alternatively:
– They go 14 days with 12 players.
– At the 14-day mark, they sign two vets to 10-day contracts.
– When those 10-days expire, they go 14 more days with 12 players.
– At that point, they promote both Shulga and Tonje.
– Later in the season, they can add a vet as a 15th man.
The second path seems more likely to me, but I’m actually very curious to see how they play it, since the margins are really slim.
Awesome clarification !
TY
Under the tax, kept Hauser.
Who knew?
Ghost – Probably not even Brad till after breakfast this morning
Bigger point – Brad did it and I don’t think you understand how big of a feat that is considering where they sat 6 months ago
Just be happily unaware Ghost, this was a masterpiece
He locked Luka tf up during the finals. Will never forget it.
And Tatum before he landed on the Celtics. Maybe a bigger role in Charlotte hopefully
One year out of the tax makes no difference for repeater tax stuff I thought?
Yeah I didn’t word that great — they’ll need to spend another season out of the tax to fully reset the repeater clock.
Start the clock , they will probably be under next year as well w no big exts looming