NBA Trade Rumors: Heat, Celtics, Hornets in hot pursuit of Nikola Vucevic
NBA Trade Rumors: Miami Heat, Boston Celtics, and others in hot pursuit of Nikola Vucevic.
Weeks away from the 2021 NBA Trade Deadline, there are plenty of teams that will be trying to add to its roster ahead of the playoff push and the second half of the season. Two of those teams in the Eastern Conference are the Miami Heat and Boston Celtics.
Both the Heat and Celtics need help in the frontcourt and are reportedly targeting the same big man ahead of the deadline. According to The Ringer, the Heat and Celtics – along with the Charlotte Hornets and San Antonio Spurs – are in hot pursuit of Orlando Magic big man Nikola Vucevic.
"“The Heat, [San Antonio] Spurs, [Boston] Celtics, and [Charlotte] Hornets have all expressed significant interest in acquiring All-Star center Nikola Vucevic, league sources say."
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It’s hardly a surprise that semi-contenders such as the Heat and Celtics are interested in Vucevic. He’s on pace to have the best season of his career thus far and would fill bit holes in both team’s rosters.
For Miami, Vucevic would give the Heat the answer to a frontcourt starter to place next to Bam Adebayo. Vucevic’s versatile skill-set on the offensive end wouldn’t clog the paint and would continue to let Bam be Bam on that end of the floor. Defensively, Bam’s versatility on that end of the floor would help hide Vucevic’s challenges as a defender.
Boston simply hasn’t gotten the boost that they believed they were going to get with Tristan Thompson and Vucevic is an offensive force that would help take some of the scoring pressure off Kemba Walker, Jayson Tatum, and Jaylen Brown.
He’d be a huge upgrade to either of those teams and would help them take a step up the conference hierarchy.
The two big questions, of course, is whether Orlando even wants to trade Vucevic – who has two years remaining on his contract after this season – and if either of those teams or any others vying for Vucecivc, would be able to meet Orlando’s demands.
Next. NBA Trade Rumors: 10 bold predictions for the trade deadline. dark
Any team looking for help along the frontcourt shouldn’t think twice about the possibility of adding Nikola Vucevic. Over the next few weeks, we should find out whether Orlando would entertain the thought of trading their best player on the roster.