What Celtics reportedly sought from groups in potential Derrick White commerce

Celtics

White was rumored to be a commerce candidate throughout the 2025 NBA Draft, however there reportedly wasn’t a deal near occurring involving him.

By Conor Roche

June 28, 2025 | 4:21 PM

2 minutes to learn

Celtics vp of basketball operations Mike Zarren wished to make it clear that the group by no means got here near buying and selling Derrick White throughout the 2025 NBA Draft on Thursday. Nevertheless, they had been apparently keen to inform groups what it will take to land the standout guard.

Boston informed a rival group that it sought a “Mikal Bridges-type” supply for White within the leadup to the 2025 NBA Draft, The Stein Line‘s Jake Fischer reported Saturday.

In case you want a refresher, the Knicks gave up 4 unprotected first-round picks, a top-four protected first-round decide, an unprotected first-round decide, a second-round decide, and three veteran gamers (Bojan Bogdanovic, Mamadi Diakite, Shake Milton) to accumulate Bridges from the Nets within the 2024 offseason.

Because the Celtics had a doubtlessly exorbitant asking value for White, commerce talks involving the two-time All-Defensive honoree by no means “obtained severe,” in line with Fischer.

“These two guys are actually, actually nice NBA gamers, and there hasn’t been something near severe about buying and selling them,” Zarren mentioned on Thursday, together with Celtics star Jaylen Brown in that assertion. “I’m unsure the place all this reporting got here from, however these guys are key components of our group, and we’re fortunate to have them right here.”

Within the lead-up to the primary spherical of the draft on Wednesday, rumors heated up that groups had been making sturdy affords to the Celtics for White and Brown. The truth is, groups that had a top-10 decide within the 2025 draft had been amongst these making affords to the Celtics for these two gamers, in line with ESPN’s Brian Windhorst.

The Raptors, who had the No. 9 decide within the 2025 draft, had been reportedly among the many identified groups pursuing White. Nevertheless, the Celtics weren’t occupied with their preliminary supply, in line with The Ringer’s Zach Lowe.

“There have been stories that the Raptors supplied the No. 9 decide for Derrick White,” Lowe mentioned on his podcast. “I’m informed that’s true, however that it occurred a month and a half in the past after Jayson Tatum obtained damage and Boston laughed at that supply and mentioned we want far more than No. 9 for Derrick White.”

Toronto is in possession of all of its first-round picks by way of 2032, so it might’ve made a Bridges-like supply for White. It clearly nonetheless can try this if it’d wish to, but it surely additionally parted methods with longtime group president Masai Ujiri on Friday. So, it won’t be keen to make an enormous commerce like that because it searches for its subsequent head of basketball operations.

White, who’ll flip 31 on Wednesday, has arguably been the Celtics’ third-best participant during the last two seasons. He averaged 16.4 factors, 4.8 assists, 4.5 rebounds, 1.1 blocks, and 0.9 steals per sport this previous season.

Although White has been important to the Celtics’ success since they traded for him in 2022, he’s been speculated as a commerce candidate this season as a result of Boston’s wage state of affairs. He’s coming into the primary 12 months of a four-year, $125.9 million extension, holding a $28.1 million wage for the 2025-26 season.

Nevertheless it’s fairly clear that it’s going to take rather a lot for the Celtics to half with White. The truth is, Celtics president of basketball operations Brad Stevens included him when he mentioned who the core of the group was when requested following the primary spherical of the draft on Wednesday.

“We’ll do our greatest to place the proper group collectively,” Stevens informed reporters on Wednesday. “We’ve obtained the inspiration, clearly, with Jaylen and Jayson [Tatum] and D-White and Payton [Pritchard] and all these guys that a variety of groups would like to have.”