For the second time in three years, Celtics president of basketball operations Brad Stevens has been named the NBA’s Executive of the Year, the league announced today (Twitter link).
Stevens, who also earned the honor in 2024, is the 12th individual to win multiple Executive of the Year awards, according to the NBA.
The 2025/26 season was widely expected to be a “gap year” for the Celtics, who were determined to shed salary after operating above the second tax apron and lost star forward Jayson Tatum to an Achilles tear during the 2025 playoffs. Stevens made a series of cost-cutting moves last offseason, trading away Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis and allowing Luke Kornet and Al Horford to walk in free agency.
However, with Jaylen Brown, Derrick White, and Payton Pritchard leading the way and modestly paid contributors such as Neemias Queta, Sam Hauser, and Jordan Walsh playing key rotation roles, the Celtics remained competitive both before and after Tatum’s eventual return in March. The team won 56 regular season games despite the fact that Stevens completed another series of financially motivated transactions at the trade deadline to get Boston’s team salary below the luxury tax line.
Unlike most of the NBA’s major end-of-season awards, Executive of the Year is voted on by the league’s general managers rather than by media members.
Stevens received 11 of 28 possible first-place votes from his fellow executives and finished with 69 total points. That was enough to beat out runner-up Onsi Saleh — the Hawks general manager actually showed up on the same number of ballots as Stevens (17), but earned primarily second-place (10) and third-place (6) votes and finished with 41 points.
Trajan Langdon of the Pistons (six first-place votes, 40 points), Jeff Peterson of the Hornets (five first-place votes, 37 points), and Sam Presti of the Thunder (three first-place votes, 25 points) rounded out the top five finishers, while Brian Wright of the Spurs earned the remaining two first-place votes.
Six other executives showed up on at least one ballot. The full voting results can be viewed right here (via Twitter).
He owes this one to his coach and players. He did the opposite expecting to be a lottery pick team. He’s a good GM and has deserved the reward in the past, but this odds one I think Detroit should’ve taken.
Everyone in the planet thought the Celtics were gonna be a lottery team
So what exactly did Brad Stevens do that improved the roster from the previous season to justify the award? It appears that most of his moves were cost cutting/financial. Did he bring in players that actually made an impact game in and game out?
For what it’s worth, the votes for this award always seem to suggest that execs view it as if they’re evaluating “moves you made to get the roster to this place” rather than “moves you made in the past 12 months.” For instance, Queta was on the roster before 2025/26, but I imagine the Stevens voters are giving him credit for having Queta on such a team-friendly deal during his breakout year.
I get what you’re saying, but I think it says more about the voters than anything when no one really knows what the award shows proof of. I mean some say because of cost cutting moves, but they essentially kicked the can down the road and are finally paying the piper. Whereas you indicate that it’s potentially a cumulative 12-24 months of roster moves or contracts signed.
At least all the other awards to coaches and players are easy to define what they did to deserve the award.
Stevens work this year wasn’t getting Queta on his contract – it was identifying that he was suitable to be the starting center on it.
“So what exactly did Brad Stevens do that improved the roster from the previous season to justify the award? It appears that most of his moves were cost cutting/financial.”
Well, exactly. The best executive is voted on by other executives. And what they value is not who made the most decisive moves to improve the squad.
They love cost-cutting financial moves.
On record, they all talk about having the best squad; when they’re at work in their offices, they’re obsessing over the spreadsheets figuring out how to get under the tax.
Getting under the second apron isn’t just a
“cost-cutting financial move.” There are significant basketball-related penalties involved that significantly affect roster building. Stevens cutting costs set the Celtics up for the future while also keeping them one of the best teams in the league.
That’s why he won.
So who was the executive making those financial decisions in the past that put them in the position that required cuts cutting moves?
The one that got them a chip.
“Everyone on the planet thought the Celtics were gonna be a lottery team”
Well, no. Their over-under was 41.5 before the season, so they were expected to be a .500 team. That was the 8th over-under in the conference.
I, for one, expected them to win 50 games.
Their over/under was 41.5 and it took 43 wins for the 10th seed and 45 wins for a Top 8 seed.
If anybody got hurt in November they would have likely pulled the plug and gone the route of Utah etc. Everything broke right, so they are where they are.
No they didn’t lol, go back to Celtics posts on this website from last summer and you’ll see comments from people still expecting 45-50 wins from them this year.
All I read was that the Celtics were picked 10th in the East. Over & over.
Detroit is on the brink of elimination in the first round because the GM didn’t solve the team’s biggest weakness the entire season.
His coaches and players didn’t get them below the first and second apron.
And WHO hired the coaching staff and assembled the players?
No votes for Karnisovas ??
Well deserved. Dude is smarter than us all
Brad Stevens is fantastic, but I have no idea how this award does not go to Brian Wright. The Celtics core is unchanged, right built this team from scratch over the last three years and this year they went from 34 wins to 62. Mystifying!
Unchanged? Celts lost Horford, KP, Jrue, Luke and Tatum. 5 of their core gone.
SPURS IN THE LAST 365 DAYS
DRAFT
Dylan Harper (2nd) – jumped 6 spots in lottery
Carter Bryant (14th)
OFFSEASON
Sign Luke Kornet
EVERY OTHER MOVE
Nothing of consequence.
Kelly Olynyk, Jordan McLaughlin, Lindy Waters, Bismack Biyombo, Mason Plumlee.
“Mystifying”.
Overrated
Overrated by his peers?
You know more about hoops than all the GMs in the NBA?
Ok.
That depends. Did Karnisovas get a vote?
What about that dumb trade at the deadline
Or being stingy this year
This tweener team better win it all or this award was given to the wrong man.
Definitely a Adam favorite
What?
Executive of the century
This was a masterpiece on ALL accounts
I am a Celtics fan. Brad is a terrific GM, but not sure he should have won. I mean he did a good job of breaking up the team for salary cap purposes. The moves he made to do it that took savvy. Still, breaking apart your team well doesn’t seem like something that should receive an award.
What?
They’re right. Obviously it would’ve been much better for Stevens to let the Celtics be swallowed up by the 2nd apron where they would have no room to maneuver nor improve. That’s how a real man would do it, not a nerd who wastes time trying to figure out how to best operate under the current CBA.
Right, but they put themselves in the position to be over the apron. It was worth it to hang the banner, and he deservedly got GM of the year that season. Brad is without a doubt one of the best GM’s in the league. I’m just saying, if your team gets worse it doesn’t seem like you should get a trophy for that.
Getting worse I can understand, just disagreed with the breaking apart angle specifically. But I get what you’re saying.
It’s a relative award though, and relative to expectations the Celtics crushed them while now looking much better positioned for the future than they did before. That’s tough to beat, especially considering all the moves Stevens made.
I never put much stock in awards like this anyway. There’s so much context that is impossible to capture perfectly, and of course bias exists too. Personally I would do away with it, or at least expand it to 2-3 guys so you would not have any deserving names potentially miss out.
So he got this for drafting Hugo Gonzalez and dumping salary.
Dumping salary while maintaining team quality – which set the team up for another 5 years.
Stevens deserves credit. He made moves to help his team. To me Pistons made more moves. And had best record in the East. Pistons executive deserves it.
Wow! Can’t believe anyone says Brad Stevens doesn’t deserve this award.
Sixers going back to Philly ….. Can Celtics survive ??
Ha ha ha ha. Knicks will be waiting.
He needs to get back to coaching
I would give it to OKC or Detroit too but both teams made bad trades at the deadline. Plus OKC did Youngblood dirty. Dieng is better than Jaylin Williams, trade Jaylin out to save that 8M per year salary. Jalen Williams can have a normal Williams jersey. Jaylin Williams is horrible and doesn’t do anything.
Detroit not trading for a real C, Duren to PF, Micheal Porter Jr and Claxton I said but nope
Boston trading Simons for Nikola which was pointless but a expiring contract on this team. Instead trade Simons, Hugo and a pick for a all star PF and cap space but Vooch is perfect …. Just keep Simons he fits this team better
If Boston traded for John Collins or Tobias Harris it would have been a A+
Without giving up a pick I believe he shredded over 40 million in salary which would have been 100+m in taxes to become a non tax team.