The Boston Celtics and the Portland Trail Blazers confirmed on Sunday that point guard Jrue Holiday had been dealt.

 

Holiday was traded to Portland for guard Malcolm Brogdon, center Rob Williams, a 2029 unprotected first-round selection from Boston, and a 2024 first-round pick from the Golden State Warriors.

Four days prior, Holiday traveled to Portland as part of a three-team transaction that brought Milwaukee Bucks star Damian Lillard to the Blazers

. The Bucks’ 2029 first-round pick, Holiday, Deandre Ayton, Toumani Camara, and draft picks from 2028 and 2030 were all acquired by the Trail Blazers in the deal.

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Cavaliers Guard Set To Miss Multiple Weeks After Injury Vs. Celtics

It’s not looking good in Cleveland

Cleveland’s 116-107 defeat to the Celtics was one of just several losses the Cavaliers suffered on Thursday night on their way out of Boston.

While trailing the Celtics by double figures in the third quarter, Cavaliers All-Star guard Darius Garland underwent a costly injury.

The 23-year-old, who stands at 6-foot-1, collided with Boston’s 7-foot-3 Kristaps Porzingis during a drive to the basket, prompting a trip to Cleveland’s locker room for a medical evaluation before returning.

Yet, despite finishing the night with 19 points, two rebounds and three assists, Garland still suffered a fractured jaw.

After undergoing a CT scan early Friday morning, the Cavaliers announced that Garland will undergo surgery requiring a four-week absence from the team — piling on to Cleveland’s disappointing 13-12 start during a three-game losing streak.

Cleveland is now left undermanned moving forward, also losing center Evan Mobley with a knee injury which will also require surgery.

Averaging a double-double (16 points, 10.5 rebounds) thus far, Mobley could miss an even much more extended period from the floor than Garland amid recovery.

That’ll pose a massive challenge for Cavaliers head coach J.B Bickerstaff who doesn’t feel Cleveland is that far off from making its presence felt in the Eastern Conference.

“We’re still waiting to be complete, but I think we’ve shown what we’re capable and the level we can play at,” Bickerstaff told reporters postgame on Thursday night.

“… I think we’re not far, but it’s just gonna take the commitment from one another to get there.”

Seated as the ninth seed in the East, the Cavaliers have split their last 10 games at 5-5, including two losses to the Celtics.

When a Celtic puts up a three, I feel lots of different ways. So I decided to rank those feelings for the sake of academic study.

I have a theory that different Celtics players shooting the basketball can elicit a wide range of emotions and physical reactions, and I think this is worthy of academic study.

Getting this study funded has proved more difficult than I thought, but I can anecdotally confirm that how I feel when certain Celtics take a shot varies massively from player to player.

It goes beyond if I think the shot is going in or not, but that certainly factors into the experience.

Since the World Health Organization and the Center for Disease Control don’t want a piece of this groundbreaking research, I’ve decided to produce a first draft here at CelticsBlog. Call it an ad-hoc peer reviewing process.

I’ve decided to situate this study on the three-pointer, as the Celtics rely more and more on winning the three-point variance battle.

They attempt 43 entire threes per game, the most of any team in the league. Everyone in the rotation can shoot, so the Celtics’ analytics-based staff wants to exploit that advantage to its fullest.

Since this is a first draft, we’re only ranking the five Celtics who attempt the most threes per game.

You can imagine Jrue Holiday, Payton Pritchard, and Al Horford come in somewhere behind these guys, though Big Al might claw his way into the top five if he keeps it up.

These guys are ranked from most to least confidence-inducing-when-they-shoot-a-three.

Maybe one day with more funding we can extend this to the entire roster, or perhaps—with a lot more funding—the entire league.

Without further ado, I present the first draft of the Shooter Freak-Out Index: how I feel when each Celtic shoots a three pointer.

(For maximum objectivity, I’m going to give an example of each guy’s shot with a clip of them missing a three from the December 12th win over the Cleveland Cavaliers. Misses tell us more than makes sometimes.)