According to The Boston Globe’s Adam Himmelsbach, the Boston Celtics never offered a contract to All-Star center DeMarcus Cousins despite a report from ESPN’s Chris Haynes stating that Cousins had narrowed his options down to the Celtics and the Golden State Warriors before deciding to join to reigning NBA champions.
Chris Mannix of Yahoo Sports would confirm the report.
Himmelsbach and Mannix also report that by the time the Celtics were aware that Cousins wanted to join the Celtics and started to look into it, he was already committed to signing with the Warriors.
The report is intriguing in that Cousins says he had no significant contract offers before signing with the Warriors and called Golden State’s general manager Bob Myers up himself.
Considering that Cousins signed a one-year deal with the Warriors for a bargain-bin price of $5.3 million, that would seem to be true.
The Celtics hold a non-taxpayers mid-level exception worth $8.6 million. Various other teams do as well.
Furthermore, while the Celtics say that weren’t initially aware that Cousins was interested in joining their team, it shows that they weren’t significantly invested in targeting Cousins at the start of free agency. Nearly 24 hours had passed from the start of free agency before Cousins’ signing was announced.
With Cousins coming off a late-season Achilles injury and in-line for a maximum contract prior to the injury, perhaps the big man’s health and potential contract demands kept the Celtics at arm’s length.
Nonetheless, it looks bad in retrospect, with the talented Cousins signing with another team for far less than what the Celtics could offer.
Even if Cousins is limited in what he can provide on the court and the amount of games he’ll be healthy to play, the chance that he could have a surprisingly stellar season made him a low-risk, high-reward signing. Especially at that price.
—
Cousins, a 27-year-old four-time All-Star, averaged 25.2 points, 12.9 rebounds, 5.4 assists, 1.6 steals and 1.6 blocks per game last season on 47.0 percent shooting from the field and 35.4 percent shooting from three-point range.
