Boston Celtics: How Dennis Schroder impacts rotation after joining BOS

It’s no secret that the Boston Celtics benefit from acquiring a point guard at any point during the offseason. In fact, it’s quite obvious that the Celtics didn’t have a viable backup plan for their point guard position after parting ways with Kemba Walker and his large contract. However, the Boston Celtics have signed free agent point guard Dennis Schroder to a one-year contract using the taxpayer mid-level exception worth $5.9 million.

It’s worth mentioning that Schroder was available because he turned down a four-year $84 million contract extension to remain with the Los Angeles Lakers, which was the most amount of money and years the team could offer him. Schroder turned down the offer with the expectations of having a large market for his services, thus, attempting to use his efforts to force a larger contract to go his way. Which ultimately backfired as he did not have as many potential landing spots as he thought.

Bringing in free-agent point guard Dennis Schroder on the taxpayer mid-level exception is a low-risk, high-reward acquisition for the Boston Celtics.

The Boston Celtics signed Shroder using the taxpayer mid-level exception. By doing so, the Celtics evade getting into the hard cap. The signing truly benefits both sides here – Boston gets their much-needed point guard and Shroder gets to showcase himself on a talented team to the rest of the NBA for a more hopeful (and lucrative) free-agent market next offseason. But for this season, he is very much excited for the opportunity to play for the Boston Celtics.

If Schroder can replicate his performance from last season, he’ll be successful playing in Boston while sharing the court with the All-Star duo of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown. Shroder averaged 15.4 points, 3.5 rebounds, and 5.8 assists per game last season while posting 44-34-88 shooting splits with the Lakers. He also took 12.5 shots per game, while his likely counterpart, Marcus Smart, took 10.6.

Once the point guard and shooting guard positions are clearly defined, the overall team will run much smoother. For Schroder and Smart to coexist on the court together, they’re going to have to compromise and define their roles. Similar to how Kyrie Irving and James Harden made it work together in Brooklyn, Smart and Shroder will have to do the same.

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With adding Schroder to the roster, Brad Stevens finally has depth to the point guard position, which is something that Boston has lacked for most of his tenure as the head coach. With that, the Celtics have Schroder, Smart, Josh Richardson, Payton Pritchard, Kris Dunn, and Carsen Edwards to widen out the position.

There’s also a variety of lineups and rotations that the Celtics will be able to take advantage of. For example, Schroder and Smart could be the starting one and two guards, while Richardson and Pritchard are established enough to run the second unit without sacrificing points in times where Tatum and Brown are off the court.

Another lineup scenario could be to have Schroder as the point guard on the floor with Richardson and have Smart come off the bench. Or if the Celtics wanted to go with a bigger lineup, Schroder can be the only guard option on the court with Brown, Tatum, and two big men.

What I’m curious to see is how Boston Celtics head coach Ime Udoka plans to use Schroder. Udoka is passionate about having Smart become the facilitator around Tatum and Brown. The first-year head coach wants the ball in Smart’s hands more often than not this season.

"“Put the ball in Marcus’ hands a lot more, he’s kind of asked for that. I think he’ll be a great facilitator as well.” – Ime Udoka, via Brian Robb of MassLive"

Using this logic from Udoka, Smart could possibly be the better option at point guard this season rather than Shroder. Smart is the longest-tenured player on the Celtics. He understands how to run the floor and has years of built-up chemistry with Tatum and Brown. With Smart running the point, the starters would essentially slide down one positional spot: Smart (PG), Schroder (SG), Brown (SF), Tatum (PF), Williams(C).

With this lineup, the same five players are on the court, but with Smart being the better facilitator and Schroder being the better shooter. The nice thing with Smart and Schroder is that they can be somewhat interchangeable on offense. However, based on what we’ve heard from Udoka, he intends to have Smart being more of a facilitator this season. The thing with this is that Smart truly needs to buy into being a facilitator and not a scorer.

The overall signing of Shroder is another masterful acquisition for Stevens in his first season as president of basketball operations. There aren’t too many people in Stevens’ position who would have been patient enough to hold off as long as he did. It shows that Boston truly was – and still is – content with Smart being the team’s starting point guard, regardless of Shroder joining the team.

It’s worth noting that with Schroder now being in Boston, it becomes more challenging for Yam Madar to find a spot for himself on the Celtics this season. He will most likely be sent back to Israel for another year. Luckily for Boston, they’ll still own his draft rights, which will allow him to develop and grow for one more year before signing him to the 15-man roster.