Forsberg: Could these trends alter Celtics' trade deadline strategy?

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It’s trade season so everything around the Boston Celtics -- and much of the NBA -- is shrouded by the smoke of trade rumors, the majority of which won’t come to fruition.

Hey, we get it. Trades are fun. More fun than the Celtics have been for most of the past two seasons. But the majority of deals that get to the finish line over the next two weeks are unlikely to be anything that danced in internet rumors.

Celtics trade targets: 10 players worth considering as deadline nears

Here’s something a bit more definitive to ponder: The Celtics are about to wrap up a quietly encouraging January, a month in which they rank second in the NBA in net rating at plus-9.6, trailing only the Phoenix Suns, who have posted a league-best 11-1 record with a net rating of plus-11.8 net rating.

The Celtics are a less sexy 8-5 in that span. Improbable collapses against the Knicks and Trail Blazers have tempered much of the progress made. And two lopsided wins this week have certainly juiced Boston’s numbers.

As usual, it’s impossible to make any firm declarations about this team.

But as Brad Stevens ponders potential roster tweaks in advance of the February 10 trade deadline, he’ll do it while digesting his team’s recent progress. Boston plays three of its next four games against Eastern Conference squads ahead of them in the standings, which might help steer Stevens in the crawl to the trade buzzer.

If he ultimately elects to keep this team largely intact -- maybe making minor tweaks to add shooting, another reliable big man, and/or simply clear a pathway to court time for Boston’s younger players -- then the following trends will have given him the confidence to cross his fingers on this year’s core and wait for the summer for bigger changes.

Tatum throwing fire

Jayson Tatum snapped out of an 0-for-20 3-point shooting funk Sunday with a 51-point game against the Wizards. Tatum has now scored 50-plus points five times in his career. The first of four such instances last season came in Game 47. This year? It came in Game 48.

Why is that notable? Because Tatum is notorious for saving his best basketball for the second half of the season. After his first 50-point game last April, he averaged 30 points per game to the finish line of the season, tied Larry Bird’s franchise record with 60 points in a game, won a couple Eastern Conference Player of the Week honors, and went for 50 twice after the regular season (once versus the Wizards in the play-in game, then against the Nets in the playoffs).

So much of Boston’s first-half woes can be distilled down to Tatum’s shooting struggles. His 3-point shot has been improbably off. But he’s made 16 of 28 3-pointers over the last two games. His shooting slump encouraged him to find other ways to impact the game and he’s been a more consistent rebounder and playmaker in recent weeks.

The Tatum we’ve seen this week is the sort of player who gives the Celtics a puncher’s chance in most playoff series. It might not be enough given Boston’s other warts, but Tatum playing at a high level is by far the most important aspect of any second-half charge.

Starters have been elite

Boston’s preferred starting five of Tatum, Jaylen Brown, Marcus Smart, Al Horford, and Robert Williams owns a plus-21.9 net rating over 174 minutes in 14 games together. Among all lineups with at least that much floor time, that five-man group has the second-best net rating in the league behind only a Minnesota quintet (plus-30.7, 204 minutes).

More impressive, Boston’s starters are limiting opponents to 91.3 points per 100 possessions, an utterly absurd number that has masked that group’s lackluster offensive numbers.

Forsberg: It's decision time for the Celtics and Marcus Smart

We’ve lobbied for coach Ime Udoka to slide some extra shooting onto that first unit to help it truly launch. But it’s understandable why he’s stuck with that group given the glitzy overall numbers. And the fact the Celtics have figured out to stagger the Horford and Williams minutes for most of the game is encouraging progress.

Water finding its level?

The Celtics are shooting 49.1 percent on all non-corner 3s the last two games. That number is clearly unmaintainable but, since the start of January, the Celtics are up to 36.2 percent on above-the-break 3s, which ranks 11th best in the NBA in that span.

That’s encouraging progress considering Boston was shooting 31.4 percent on all above-the-break 3s and ranked 27th in the NBA through December 31.

Clinging to the numbers

Boston’s point differential for the season has spiked to plus-3.0. That’s the ninth best mark in the league. Boston’s expected win total over 82 games at that mark is 48.7, per Cleaning the Glass data.

Boston’s expected wins to this point would be 29, which is four wins below its current mark. At 29-20, we’d likely feel a lot different about this team than we do at 25-24. Boston would be lumped in a pack with the Nets, 76ers, and Bucks and just two games back of the conference-leading Heat.

The reality, of course, is that this team hasn’t played consistently enough to deserve to be viewed as a legit contender. And it’s dangerous for this team to get lulled into any sense of false hope from a solid January. 

Stevens needs to keep his focus on making the moves that best position this team to launch further down the road. If he can do that while cleaning up some of the current roster flaws, then that’s simply a bonus.

If Boston does leans into its January progress, what might its deadline activity look like?

It could be as simple as shipping out Bruno Fernando, cash, and/or recently acquired players like Bol Bol and P.J. Dozier, to ensure a dip below the luxury tax. Boston could benefit from adding more bench shooting and a big who can limit the time the team needs to lean on Enes Freedom (and limit the amount of minutes Horford needs to play overall).

If the Celtics elect to keep Schroder and other veterans, then they ought to gauge the value of some of their recent draftees and sell as high as possible if they’re not going to get playing time to aid their dwindling trade value.

If the core is preserved, there is likely no move that can be made that will radically alter the trajectory of the season. Boston’s ability to compete will ultimately come down to how well Tatum and Brown are playing in mid-April and whether Stevens found the best pieces to put around them.

A quiet deadline means the team will have some heavy lifting to do this summer, especially if this team reverts to its familiar roller coaster ways after the deadline. But there might not be a better alternative at the moment. Boston is too talented to tank, even if an awful lot has to go right to emerge as a legitimate threat.

Being in the middle isn’t particularly sexy. But nothing about this season has been for the Celtics. Stevens does not have an easy task in front of him and his team’s January progress might only make those decisions a bit tougher.

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