Who Will Make the Biggest Leap for the Boston Celtics This Season?

If the Boston Celtics are going to make some noise when spring rolls around, someone is going to have to over-perform their expectations. Or to put it more simply, someone is going to have to make a leap.

But who will that be?

To try to pin that down, we have to figure out what a “leap” really is, and who the candidates are.

First of all, just improving isn’t necessarily a leap. A leap is something noticeable, like if I were to lose 50 pounds over the summer instead of ten. There has to be a wow factor. Payton Pritchard averaging 20 instead of 17 is nice, but him averaging 25 is “wow.”

Also, to be a candidate for a leap, you have to have room to grow. Jayson Tatum coming back to average 30 points per game would have some amount of “wow” to it, but he’s done that before. So as happy as we’d all be to see him back to normal, it’s not really a leap in the classic sense.

Leaps tend to come from younger players, though every once in a while an older player gets a rare opportunity and cashes in on it. Neemias Queta is 27, but he was a late bloomer who took a big leap last season. He had all the room in the world to make a jump by getting more minutes in that one season than all his previous seasons combined.

Could Queta be a candidate for another leap? Sure, but his leap last year makes it tough to make the biggest on the team, so I don’t think it’ll be him.

I don’t think any of the players 28 years old or older are going to be in this mix. I think Pritchard can get better but I don’t see a massive jump that others might be hoping for. Sam Hauser pretty much is who he is. The same goes for Mitchell Robinson. Tatum can make some adjustments to his game but his leap would have to be to “best player in the NBA” and I don’t think that's happening. And excluding 30-somethings like Derrick White, Paul George, and Mike Conley goes without saying.

That leaves, from youngest to oldest, Hugo Gonzalez, Jordan Walsh, Amari Williams, Baylor Scheierman, Ron Harper Jr., and Luka Garza. Chris Cenac Jr. isn’t on the list because he’s a rookie and we have no baseline.

Garza took a leap last year because he was actually used on a regular basis. He also played more minutes last season than he did all four of his previous seasons combined. He did what he did well, but I also think he maxed out his capabilities. A lot of what he does well is because of his effort, and there's no trying any harder than Garza tried last season.

I don’t think Williams is going to get as much opportunity to supplant people ahead of him, which will hold him back even if he does make noticeable improvements. For him to really take the biggest leap on the team, he’ll have to supplant Queta, Robinson, or Garza. I think Williams has more talent than Garza, but I’ve yet to see the kind of consistent effort that Garza puts out there out of Williams. If I have one message for Williams, it’s that his default when he’s confused should be to try harder, like Garza, rather than slow down and get passive.

That leaves me with the wings, and that's really where the most opportunity lies. White, Tatum, and one of Robinson or Queta are guaranteed starters. George will start when he’s healthy, but that will only be about half the time. And the last starting spot is up for grabs.

Walsh, Gonzalez, Scheierman, and Harper Jr. will all have claims to those minutes, and I think they will all be important in their own way. What eliminates Harper Jr., to me, is that he doesn’t have a particularly elite skill that separates himself from the rest of the pack. He will be solid and have some very good games, but I’m looking for someone with something I can point to when I’m making my case. Harper Jr. is solid all the way around, and he can play some really tough defense, but he’s not better at any one thing than the other three.

Walsh is probably the best individual defender of the three, but his offense isn’t quite where it needs to be. That's both good for his argument and a strike against him. If he can add the offensive element he hopes to, then he’s a strong candidate for the biggest leap. What makes me skeptical is that we’d normally have seen a little more offensive growth by now if that kind of leap was coming, but we’ve seen enough that I can’t rule it out completely.

The biggest issue in picking between the three is the shooting, especially from the corners. Whoever fills this role will be getting plenty of corner three opportunities, and Walsh’s percentage (37.8%) was one of the worst among Celtics with more than a thousand minutes played. Gonzalez (40.7%) was okay, but Scheierman’s 49.4% was second only to Pritchard’s 52.4%.

Gonzalez has the most natural talent of the three. He’s the one who does things that make you wonder how he saw what he saw. That kind of gift makes a leap possible at any time, but it can also make you feel like you’re sitting at a slot machine waiting for it to pay off. It might feel like he’s ready, and whenever he hits, it feels like it will be for a big jackpot. But the shooting and mistake-prone basketball from his rookie year needs to vastly improve.

Scheierman, to me, feels like the best combination of everything we’re looking for, and therefore is the best candidate to make the biggest leap. He started last season with the same inconsistencies as the others, but he finished strong and with confidence. He had more assists and almost as many rebounds in 28 post-All-Star break games played as he did in 49 pre-All-Star break games. It’s the kind of late-season performance that lends itself to the kind of big leap we’re looking for. Over that same time, both Gonzalez and Walsh were watching their minutes dwindle.

It’s entirely possible that Scheierman can find himself in the starting lineup this upcoming season, which gives him a head start on everyone else. With George guaranteed to miss a lot of time and no clear competition in front of him, the runway is clear for Scheierman to take advantage of the situation and take off this season.

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