During a question for Brad Stevens to open up the Celtics’ 2026-27 media day, the Boston Globe’s Gary Washburn was searching for a specific word.
It’s a term Stevens used often during the first press conference following the Jaylen Brown-Paul George trade, quickly becoming a buzzword moving forward that you may or may not be sick of hearing.
Optionality.
Washburn called it a “Brad Word.”
“That’s a Brad word. Sweet,” Stevens said with a smile and a hint of sarcasm.
Now, it’s a word to describe the Celtics entering the new season, who have spent the summer creating financial flexibility while adding piece after piece to build a team that can both sustain success through an entire regular season and win at the highest levels of the postseason.
For the 2026-27 Celtics, depth is king.
“The balance right now is that you do have to have that depth piece to be good,” Stevens said. “The way that the game is played, how much ground you have to cover, how versatile you have to be up and down your roster is really important.”
Stevens related the need for a deep team to his days coaching at Butler, where a roster’s talent at the top could make up for a lack of depth on the back end.
“I think most coaches would tell you, especially when I was in college, it’d be like, I’m good with seven or eight guys, and we can figure out how to navigate it with the rest, but that’s just not the way you can win in this league, so I’m really interested to see how the depth is utilized as an advantage,” Stevens said.
The 82-game endurance test underscores a need for playable talent outside of the core rotation. Just 18 of 582 players contributed in all 82 games last season, making iron men, especially star-caliber iron men, a rarity.
The teams that can adjust on the fly and put together a productive rotation regardless of that night’s injury report are the ones that’ll see the most positive results in the conference standings. The Celtics, who last year had 10 five-man regular season lineups generate 50+ minutes, are well accustomed to molding into a new look on a night-to-night basis.
“The one thing I know about Joe, and one thing I know about our players, is that they all know that their opportunities will be plentiful, and if they’re not coming today, they’re coming down the road just because that’s the way this works,” Stevens said.
Throughout the 2025-26 season, Joe Mazzulla showed no fear changing up his starting five, right down to the last game of the season, when he inserted Ron Harper Jr., Baylor Scheierman and Luka Garza into their Game 7 lineup against the 76ers after Jayson Tatum was announced as inactive.
Speaking on the changes to the team’s philosophy since their roster shakeup, Mazzulla doesn’t have an answer yet as to how things will look. It’s a constantly evolving answer that will take time to figure out.
“How can we take advantage of the strengths and the talent that we have? How can we take advantage of the offseason and the work that the guys have put in to become better players, and turn that into an offensive and defensive philosophy? I don’t know that I have that answer on day one. I think your team naturally grows, and you’re always learning about your team,” Mazzulla said.
One question posed to Jayson Tatum asked if he considered it “his team” this year. It’s not a simple question to answer, according to Tatum, who will undoubtedly be the central figure on the floor tasked with handling the acclaim and scrutiny that comes with a six-month regular season.
“We don’t have the same roles, we all bring something different on a daily basis to make the group better,” Tatum said. “It’s not just saying it’s my team, I’ve got 14 other teammates that I’m going to lean on, and we all need each other to be better every single day.”
Whether it’s a new face from the draft or free agency, a player working on a two-way contract, or a Boston mainstay you’ve seen countless times before, the Celtics will have up to 18 players in green on opening night. It’s best to be prepared for any one of them to check in with a chance to make a difference.
