Let’s not beat around the bush: Jrue Holiday is still a good and useful player, but he’s having a challenging year. It’s hard to see how he has any hope of being worth the $100M+ left on his contract over the next three seasons. If he can’t turn things around, the Celtics’ difficult offseason might be easier (if no less sad) than expected.
Holiday is having his worst shooting season of this decade, hitting just 34% of his triples. Worryingly, he’s only at 33% of his catch-and-shoots since January 1st, which is a problem since defenses are increasingly treating him like he carries the plague. A shoulder injury has not helped, but he hasn’t shot well even when healthy.
Everyone remembers the loss to Memphis, in which Holiday went 4-for-17 from deep. We haven’t seen a team get that extreme since, but Holiday is often guarded by big men who ignore him to roam the paint instead.
Holiday has been able to take advantage of this defensive inattention at times with hard drives to the basket and clever cuts to the dunker spot — he’s actually hitting a career-high 69% of his attempts at the rim. He’s a good post player, and given a straight path to the hoop, he’s capable of some tricky finishes.
But the ripple effects of Holiday’s anti-gravity (repulsion?) are significant. The Celtics are nearly 11 points worse on offense when Holiday is on the floor. Some of that is due to how dang good Payton Pritchard has been in replacing Holiday, but a lot of it is that the rest of the team struggles to score when Holiday plays. The team as a whole shoots significantly worse at the rim, in the paint, and from deep when Holiday is on the floor. That’s not bad luck, either. Watch as Giannis Antetokounmpo ignores Holiday to come over and swat a Jaylen Brown attempt:
Although Holiday is still a good passer, that matters far less in his current role. Holiday is touching the ball less frequently this season (even adjusting for a slight minutes decline) and posting the lowest assist rate (and second-lowest assist-to-usage ratio) of his career. Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown’s respective playmaking leaps and continued improvement from Derrick White and Payton Pritchard mean there isn’t much room for Holiday to garner on-ball reps.
Holiday remains a very good defensive player overall, but he’s slipped even on that end. Despite the positionless nature of All-Defensive Teams, I still had him on my hypothetical First Team ballot last season; this year, he likely won’t merit more than an honorable mention. With Jaylen Brown taking the brunt of the difficult on-ball defensive assignments, Holiday’s best skill isn’t being maximized.
Advanced all-in-one metrics like D-EPM and D-DPM consistently rate Holiday’s defensive season as his worst since his early Pelicans tenure, and the eye test concurs. He’s been beaten off the bounce more than I can ever remember seeing:
Holiday’s struggles are magnified because Pritchard has been so electrifying. This play from earlier in the year lives rent-free in my brain. Watch the Raptors’ Davion Mitchell think about it and decide he’d rather give up a Holiday layup than an open Pritchard three:
That’s the kind of terror you’d love to have the Jays’ supporting pieces inflict upon opponents.
Holiday certainly has skills that Pritchard doesn’t, but as mentioned above, this isn’t a Celtics team built for his strengths anymore. That opens up some unsettling but important questions about Holiday’s future. With three years remaining on a deal that could age poorly, it seems very likely that Brad Stevens will shop Holiday around this summer.
Financially speaking, we know that something must give in the near future. Spotrac projects the Celtics will have a tax bill of $219 million dollars next season. $219 million! And that’s with only 11 players under contract! Even billionaires blink at the kind of luxury tax payments Boston would have to shell out to keep their current team together. Despite his diminished state and that contract, Holiday would hold some positive value to other teams that are in a better position to use him.
I’d love to say a lot depends on how the team performs in the playoffs, but I’m honestly not sure that’s true. Even if Boston wins another championship, tough decisions must be made. The fan in me can’t imagine breaking up a back-to-back title-winning core, but Boston’s uncertain ownership situation and the reality of nine-figure luxury payments will likely force a more business-oriented approach.
Do the Celtics want to make the same mistake Milwaukee did? Of course not. Do they have any other choice? Despite Boston’s run to the title mostly without him last season, Kristaps Porzingis feels more important to the Celtics’ future, given Al Horford’s own tenuous future. Brown is still the team’s second-best player and squarely in his prime. Pritchard, of course, is on arguably the league’s best contract. Tatum is going nowhere, and White shouldn’t, either. Given Holiday’s current level of play and the fact that Pritchard is waiting in the wings to take on a more significant role… it’s starting to feel inevitable that the team and Holiday will part ways.
I’ve depressed myself now. Let’s put talk of the future aside and figure out how to get Holiday right physically so he can return to being the two-way force we know he can be. There’s still another ring to win before this bridge needs to be crossed.
