Celtics Summer League Standout Could Leave NBA This Year

A critical Summer League Boston Celtics standout may be abandoning the NBA at large for greener pastures this offseason.

Boston has enjoyed an active summer, offloading two starters from its 2024 championship team in in a pair of cost-cutting transactions. The Celtics did select three young players far beyond the lottery in last month's 2025 NBA Draft, and have taken fliers on signing some intriguing talent with room for development.

Now, it's possible one such player will slip through their fingers.

Free agent Summer League Celtics center Charles Bassey is reportedly being circled by Italian EuroLEague squad Virtus Bologna, reports Iacopo De Santis of PianetaBasket.com. Bassey had an intriguing Summer League stint with Boston, notching averages of 15.3 points on 70.4 percent field goal shooting and 11.0 rebounds.

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“I don’t want to speak for him, what his goals might be,” team president Brad Stevens remarked on Bassey, per Souchi Terada of MassLive. “He’s a guy that’s probably playing for what’s next. I just think he’s a guy we’ve paid attention to from afar for a long time. We’re watching all these guys all the time and I thought he did a really good job (against the Grizzlies). He probably was the biggest reason we won the game I thought.”

As Terada writes, Bassey has a reasonable shot at potentially cracking Boston's center rotation this season. Bassey will be competing with new free agency signing Luka Garza, former fourth-string center Neemias Queta, and power forward/center Xavier Tillman for minutes. Terada notes that Queta and Bassey have a lot of stylistic overlap, making Bassey somewhat superfluous — in theory.

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Earlier this summer, the Celtics traded away former starting center Kristaps Porzingis to the Atlanta Hawks as part of a three-team exchange with the Brooklyn Nets, in a deal that landed forward Georges Niang and a future second round draft pick in Boston. Former third-string Celtics center Luke Kornet agreed to a three-year, $41 million free agent contract with the San Antonio Spurs.

Porzingis' nominal backup, Al Horford — who proved far more valuable to the Celtics during both their two playoff runs together — remains an unsigned free agent. Along with free agent combo guard De'Anthony Melton, Horford is "widely expected" to sign a deal with the Golden State Warriors, per Brett Siegel of ClutchPoints.

Al Horford and De'Anthony Melton are widely expected to sign with the Warriors, sources said.

A handful of teams at NBA Summer League stated Horford and Melton already have verbal agreements in place with Golden State.

Jonathan Kuminga's situation is holding these deals up. https://t.co/kN3jZ7HgdH
— Brett Siegel (@BrettSiegelNBA) July 21, 2025

The 24-year-old has logged four pro seasons in the NBA with the Philadelphia 76ers and San Antonio Spurs, including each of the last three with San Antonio. All told, the 24-year-old has logged averages of 4.3 points on 63.1 percent shooting from the floor and 64.8 percent shooting from the charity stripe, 4.3 rebounds, 0.9 blocks and 0.8 assists per bout.

Still just 24, Bassey may yet possess some untapped upside.

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