Sometimes, even very well-run ball clubs like the Boston Celtics make mistakes big enough that they hang around to haunt a team for seasons after the mistake was made. Most often, this comes in the form of signing a player to a contract they cannot possibly live up to the value of due to any of many unforeseen circumstances.
When that happens, a franchise will usually cut and stretch a player’s salary over multiple seasons to preserve as much of their cap space as possible for the duration of the contract remaining stretched between three and five seasons to ease the cap hit to the team. More often, however, a team will eat the deal at once, especially when it’s a smaller contract or just a season or two left on it, with what remains on the books still owed known as “dead money” in league parlance.
And in a recent HoopsHype analysis, it seems several Celtics alumni made the top 30 contracts of dead money in the league for these sorts of deals; let’s look at which deals they are on and where they are ranked.
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30. Demetrius Jackson (Free Agent)
Makes $92,857 from Boston this season
29. Neemias Queta (Boston)
Makes $250,000 from Sacramento this season
26. Lamar Stevens (Boston)
Makes $400,000 from San Antonio this season
25. Malik Fitts (Free Agent)
Makes $555,217 from Indiana this season
24. Juwan Morgan (Runa Basket Moscow)
Makes $576,230 from Indiana this season
22. Nik Stauskas (Free Agent)
Makes $702,311 from Indiana this season
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