BOSTON – Before the season began, Jayson Tatum scoffed at the notion that the Celtics were going to tank the season.
“It’s the way our organization is ran,” Tatum told ESPN’s Malika Andrews. “It’s the culture that we set, it’s the standard that we have — regardless of who is on our team.”
Six months later, and Tatum’s comments seem awfully prescient. The Celtics are fresh off a 56-win season and have a 3-1 lead over the Philadelphia 76ers in the first round of the playoffs.
And on Tuesday, Brad Stevens was (unsurprisingly) named the league’s Executive of the Year, earning 11 first-place votes (and 69 total points), beating out Atlanta Hawks general manager Onsi Saleh, who came in second place.
It’s Stevens’ second such honor in three seasons, his first coming in 2024, after the championship season.
I talked to a front office executive earlier this month who told me he continues to be baffled about why teams are willing to even pick up the phone when Stevens calls, considering how many trades he’s won in recent years. (He said the same of Oklahoma City Thunder general manager Sam Presti).
But what actually makes Brad Stevens so good at the job?
Few can answer that question better than Rich Gotham, the Celtics’ longtime team president. Gotham joined the Celtics as a marketing executive in 2003 and replaced Red Auerbach as team president in 2007.
So, when I got the chance to sit down with him a few weeks ago, the first thing I wanted to discuss was this elusive notion of “Celtics culture.”
It hasn’t always really been there during Gotham’s tenure, but it’s been on full display for years now. And the Brad Stevens era — which began 13 years ago — has embodied it.
“Early on, we were, candidly, bringing players through the organization so quickly, so many moving parts to build the team that became the ‘07, ‘08 champs,” Gotham said. “Culture? It wasn’t the same. You had pride in being part of the Celtics and what that means. But when you’ve got players coming in and out, you don’t really have a chance to cement it.”
Things began to change in 2007; that was the year the Celtics traded for Kevin Garnett.
“He was a culture-maker,” Gotham said. “Suddenly, you got a player who’s a superstar, who’s coachable, who outworks everyone, who holds everyone to the highest standard, and people just sort of like – if he’s in the layup line, I’m on point. If he’s not, if he’s hurt, if he’s out, it’s a little looser.”
Garnett served as a model for younger players like Kendrick Perkins and Leon Powe, and also influenced his co-stars, like Paul Pierce. The result was the franchise’s first championship in 22 years. And Garnett’s tenure in Boston served as a cultural reset.
“When he came here, we as an organization got our swag back,” Gotham said.
Then came Brad Stevens
The next most critical part of that culture-building was Brad Stevens, who took over as head coach of the Celtics in 2013.
Stevens had already emerged as one of the best young coaches in the game; few could draw up an ATO quite like the Indiana native. But Stevens’ defining characteristic may have been his ability to cultivate culture.
“Brad is a believer in culture, and he brought a good, strong sense of what he felt constituted being a good teammate,” Gotham said. “And when Brad got here, we were in transition. His years as a coach helped build culture, and then when he moved into the position where he’s the one acquiring the talent, that sort of played over there.”
Stevens has served as the Celtics’ general manager since 2021, meaning that he wasn’t the man responsible for bringing in Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown (shoutout Danny Ainge).
But, he was the driver behind the trades that brought players like Jrue Holiday, Derrick White, and Al Horford to Boston – players who epitimized the team-first, Celtics mindset the organization wanted to embody.
“Brad really looks at [talent acquisition] from a team standpoint,” Gotham said. “And, a lot of it is sort of the unselfishness that you really need to make it work for an NBA team. If you look for that in players, the rest of it kind of follows.”
For Joe Mazzulla, Stevens’ talent acquisition philosophy has made life a whole lot easier. Countless times this season, he’s deflected questions about his own coaching and deferred to the players in the locker room.
“The greatest gift you can have as a coach is to have players that have a high, competitive character, care about winning, and want to get better,” Mazzulla said a few weeks ago.
Who signs those players?
Brad Stevens, whom Mazzulla coached under from 2019 to 2021. That synergy has made the whole operation run a lot more seamlessly.
“We have a unique relationship because I worked for him, and there aren’t many of those former coaches in the GM role, who can see from a GM perspective and a coach perspective,” Mazzulla said. “And I know how he thinks and the language that he speaks and how he sees the game because I worked for him, and he knows how I look at it — because we had that.”
Craig Luschenat, the Celtics’ head of player development, told me that the front office is a major reason for the program’s success. Neemias Queta, Sam Hauser, Jordan Walsh, and Baylor Scheierman all got their start with the Maine Celtics — and all four are now hugely important to the Celtics’ success.
“They only bring in guys that are, first of all, great people and hard workers,” Luschenat said. “And so, we’re very fortunate that we don’t have to deal with guys who are lazy or don’t love basketball. We don’t have to deal with any of the off-court stuff, so when they get to the building, they’re ready to work. And that’s a huge advantage.”
And, it goes beyond just being a hard worker: basketball IQ is something that Stevens and the front office prioritize.
“You could look at a lot of players that have been here previously, that now aren’t with us, or just guys around the league that are super athletic… if you just watch them in a workout, one-on-one, you’d be like, ‘Oh my gosh, this guy’s a freak, right?’” Luschenat said. “But as soon as you put 9 other players on the floor, they can’t think the game, or they can’t make high-level decisions, and aren’t competitive. And so, our front office does an amazing job of bringing guys that can think, compete at a high level, and work hard, and if you have that as a foundation, it makes our jobs as coaches so much easier.”
Luka Garza epitomizes what’s made Brad Stevens so effective
I’ve talked to many people around the league this season, and they all affirmed one thing: Luka Garza is widely considered to be one of the best locker room guys in the NBA.
So, when he was set to become a free agent, he was one of Stevens’ first calls.
“There are no secrets in the NBA,” Gotham said. “You generally have a good understanding of players who are really good culture contributors. And Brad definitely puts an emphasis on that aspect of the whole player.”
The backup center’s play became key to the Celtics’ on-court success this season; he’s averaged 8.1 points in 16.2 minutes per game, while shooting a team-best 43.3% from three.
But, equally pivotal to the Celtics’ success has been his mindset.
Some nights, Garza has eclipsed 25 minutes of action, and other nights he’s ridden the bench. Garza fell out of the rotation for two distinct stretches – in December and in February. Still, his attitude never wavered.
“Luka Garza is such a great example of a player who’s got that – no matter what role he’s playing,” Gotham said. “If he plays two minutes, or if he plays 20 minutes, if he’s not playing for a couple of games, he’s the same person coming to work every day, giving you everything he has. He has just a great attitude, just a great positive vibe to him. And that really does contribute to the team. And when players get a chance, who’ve put in the work, and then they start to thrive – I just think the team feeds off it.”
That culture is why Hugo Gonzalez goes berserk when Baylor Scheierman draws a charge, or why Ron Harper Jr. jumps up and down on the sidelines when it’s Gonzalez’s turn and he gets a defensive stop.
“You’ve seen this team this year – how happy they are for each other on the bench, how happy everyone’s been to see Jordan have success, Hugo have success, Baylor have success, Neemi have success, Ron Harper have success,” Gotham said. “It feeds itself.”
Getting below the luxury tax
Stevens didn’t win the award exclusively because he knows how to cultivate culture — he, alongside a team of assistants that includes Mike Zarren, Dave Lewin, and Buddy Scott, also managed to get the team under the luxury tax line ahead of the trade deadline.
Payton Pritchard, the NBA’s third-most efficient isolation scorer in the NBA and the Celtics’ third-leading scorer, is making less than $8 million this season.
Neemias Queta, a 2021 second-round pick who was waived by the Sacramento Kings three years ago, established himself as the team’s front-court anchor while playing on a minimum contract.
Jordan Walsh has been locking up Tyrese Maxey on a second-round rookie deal. Sam Hauser, who went undrafted, was a perennial starter this season. Hugo Gonzalez quickly established himself as one of the most impactful rookies despite being picked No. 28 overall. And Baylor Scheierman turned into a legit rotation player in just his second year in the league.
Walsh, Gonzalez, Scheierman, Queta, and Garza are each making less than $3 million.
The result?
While shedding hundreds of millions of dollars in payroll, the Celtics survived Jayson Tatum’s 62-game sidelining en route to a 56-win season, good for second-best in the East.
And, after many expected them to head toward the lottery, the Celtics are back in familiar territory: eyeing an NBA title.
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