Jared Sullinger is probably gone

Reds Army

This little nugget comes as a bit of surprise at this point of free agency.

For those who don’t know what this means… the Celtics made Jared Sullinger the qualifying offer last month, a mechanism for guys at the end of their rookie deals that makes them a restricted free agent. That move is what gives the Celtics a right to match any offer sheet he might get from another team. Rescinding that and his exception rights mean he’s now an unrestricted free agent, free to go and sign with any team.

Now… technically this means Boston can still sign him, but they’ve given up his Bird rights too with this move, so he’d have to be signed with available cap space. So while there is a technical possibility that could happen, there is little reason to believe the Celtics would do something like this just to sign him with cap space.

The reality of this is Sullinger is now free to go talk to teams and sign wherever. The Celtics, meanwhile, clear a $5.6 million dollar cap hold off their books and open up a roster spot. This could mean anything from Guerschon Yabusele making enough of an impact so far to be seen as the new Sully to keeping enough cap space open to absorb a contract in a trade. There are currently 12 players with guaranteed contracts, but this doesn’t include Jaylen Brown or any of the other first rounders or Tyler Zeller, the remaining restricted free agent.

People seem to be split on Jared Sullinger but, in reality, he was a good player for Boston. Yes, he took too many 3’s without really shooting it well enough to be a threat, and his conditioning has remained an issue, but he rebounded at a pretty high level and he was part of some of Boston’s best lineups this past season. There is definitely a spot for him in the NBA, but apparently not in Boston anymore.

We’ve definitely not heard the last of Sullinger. Maybe watching bigs get truckloads of money while he gets the scraps will be enough of a motivation to get him to that next level. If this is a wakeup call for him, then hopefully he can have a nice, long NBA career. On a personal level, I probably liked Sullinger more than most, but I get why this move had to be made. As Sully tweeted himself, and now we can probably deduce that he was talking about this, change is coming.

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I think his ( non) performance against Atlanta soured Ainge on him . It certainly did me. That said, he was our best rebounding big, and that`s not Horford`s forte.

Sully isn't really a good fit for this team. He can't shoot the 3 and can't really run the floor, either. It's a no-brainer, in my opinion.


KJ

jrleftfoot wrote:I think his ( non) performance against Atlanta soured Ainge on him . It certainly did me. That said, he was our best rebounding big, and that`s not Horford`s forte.

leftfoot,

Agreed.

I'm not a huge fan of Sully's, but I think he makes sense in the front-court with Horford for a short period. If we can acquire a 5 or a 4 who is strong on the boards, then we could comfortably let Sully depart. Looks like it's already done, however.

Regards

Adrian Wojnarowski: Free agent Jared Sullinger has agreed to a one-year deal with the Toronto Raptors, league sources tell @TheVertical. 13 mins ago – via Twitter WojVerticalNBA


bob


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Marc Stein – Verified account ‏@ESPNSteinLine

Jared Sullinger and the Toronto Raptors have struck a one-year deal believed to be in the $6 million range, according to league sources
11:56 AM - 11 Jul 2016
285 RETWEETS253 LIKES


bob


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This is a very smart signing by Toronto.
Sullinger will probably start for Toronto at PF, which allows Jakob Poeltl and Pat Patterson to come off the bench as the back up bigs.
Sullinger is a nice upgrade over Luis Scola.

Good landing spot for Sullinger.  If he can get himself into shape and stay healthy he'll be around for a while. I'm sure we'll continue looking for a rebounding forward/center.

great, now watch him get into the best shape of his life and kick our butts.

why couldn't;t he go to LA or something?

kdp59 wrote:great, now watch him get into the best shape of his life and kick our butts.

why couldn't;t he go to LA or something?

He knows how much $$$ is on the line for his next contract....

Two problems that face Sully that will not affect us one bit. If he looses the weight, he will be an ineffective in gaining position to rebound and weight loss has nothing to do with improving shooting....he cannot hit the 3 pter at a high percentage rate.

Second, he will not lose the weight because that is his DNA make - up. So he will be slow up and down the court as we have seen, not be able to jump against bigger more athletic players, and tire easily.

If he tries and does lose reasonable amount of weight, he will loose stamina and become weak.

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wpid-i_24_2c_fd_jared_sullinger.jpg
Ryan Wolstat: Raptors used the mid-level exception ($5.6M) to sign Sullinger, I’m told. 2 hours ago – via Twitter WolstatSun


bob


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