Payton

Pritchard

Pritchard can put together some impressive offensive performances but remains behind Jrue Holiday and Derrick White on the depth chart. Holiday, White, Jayson Tatum, and Jaylen Brown were all shut down at the half of Boston’s preseason opener, giving Pritchard more room to operate as an offensive focal point. While worthy of late-round consideration in deep leagues, he’s likely to be nothing more than a streamer in standard leagues.

Brad Stevens mentioned Wednesday that Porzingis was likely to miss the start of the season, and this latest report from Bontemps confirms that assertion. The 5-6 month timeline puts a potential return in the late November to late December range, which means he could potentially miss up to two months to start the 2024-25 campaign. That should mean plenty of run for Al Horford, with guys like Sam Hauser, Payton Pritchard and Luke Kornet in the mix for more run off the bench.

Kristaps Porzingis has already been ruled out, so if Holiday is absent for Game 3, the Celtics will be down two starters. Boston holds a 2-0 series lead, but Indiana is undefeated at home in this season’s playoffs. Holiday has been big through the first two games of the Eastern Conference Finals, sporting averages of 21.5 points and 9.0 assists. Derrick White would presumably start at PG in Holiday’s place, while one of Payton Pritchard or Sam Hauser would join the starting five alongside Al Horford, Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.

Pritchard played a decent-sized role off the bench in the first round, but he didn’t make a significant impact like he did in this game. However, he kicked off this series with a solid performance as a reserve, and he wasn’t the only one. Luke Kornet, who has filled in as the backup center behind Al Horford, collected 10 rebounds and two blocks. Pritchard and Kornet should both continue to play important roles off the bench, but it is unlikely that either contributes in the box score to the level that they did in this game.

Pritchard came into this one riding high off of a 31-point performance and a new career-high in the scoring department set on Friday. He topped that performance with a new career-best in points and led all scorers in this lopsided affair. For the second straight season finale, Pritchard dropped at least 30 points and broke his own personal scoring record. To make this performance even sweeter, Pritchard posted a second straight double-double thanks to his work as Boston’s primary facilitator. The Oregon product has shined throughout his career when given the opportunity, but he typically doesn’t see enough minutes to make a significant impact in the box score. He balled out over the final month of the season while Boston built an insurmountable lead in the East and rested starters periodically. Pritchard appeared in all 82 games in 2023-24, and he finishes his fourth season with averages of 9.4 points, 3.2 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 1.8 triples across 22.3 minutes. He is an elite backup guard who usually fills in admirably when called upon.

Pritchard is rostered in just 27% of Yahoo leagues but put together his best fantasy performance of the season as a starter ahead of the weekend. The Celtics are comfortably atop the Eastern Conference and could give the backup point guard another chance to stuff the stat sheet in the team’s regular-season finale against the Wizards on Sunday.

With two games left in the regular season, Boston is finally deciding to fully rest their core six stars. It will be a completely new starting unit, with everyone available playing big minutes.

Boston’s top six players are out for Friday’s game. While Mazzulla refused to reveal his complete starting five, he said Pritchard, Hauser, and Kornet would start. And those are the three names fantasy managers (and DFS players) needed to focus on as soon as it was revealed that none of Boston’s top six players would be available.

The Celtics have lost two in a row, and with only two games left in the season, there’s no reason to keep playing the starters. Boston wrapped up the Eastern Conference weeks ago, so it makes sense to give the first unit a breather ahead of an anticipated deep playoff run. Guys like Payton Pritchard, Sam Hauser and Neemias Queta could be big winners from a fantasy standpoint to close out the 2023-24 regular season.

Boston locked up the top seed in the East a while ago, and they have had players rotating in and out of the rotation recently. There are six questionable players on Thursday, with Derrick White being the only starter that isn’t on the injury report. Payton Pritchard and Sam Hauser will be intriguing streaming options if Brown and Holiday sit out.