Unwrapping 12 Celtics stocking-stuffers on a rare quiet Christmas for Joe Mazzulla’s club:
1. Christmas Day is the marquee date on the NBA’s regular-season calendar, and for the first time since 2015, the Celtics are not among the 10 teams participating in the holiday quintuple-header.
The league’s decision not to give Boston a Christmas game was the clearest sign of how low external expectations were for the C’s this season. The risk of them being noncompetitive and/or uninteresting after losing Jayson Tatum to an Achilles injury and Kristaps Porzingis, Al Horford, Jrue Holiday and Luke Kornet to the second-apron buzzsaw was, it seemed, too high for the schedule-makers’ liking.
That proved to be a miscalculation. The new-look Celtics have, as Jaylen Brown put it after Monday’s win over the Indiana Pacers, “looked like one of the better teams in the league.” The NBA likely wishes it were tipping off its Christmas slate with Celtics-Knicks instead of Cavaliers-Knicks, considering Cleveland currently sits seventh in the East and has been one of the biggest disappointments thus far.
At 18-11, Boston trails only Detroit and New York in the Eastern Conference standings. League-wide, it ranks seventh or better in point differential, net rating, offensive rating, offensive rebounding rate, turnover rate, assist-to-turnover ratio, blocks per game and opponent effective field-goal percentage.
2. Any questions about how Brown would fare as Boston’s No. 1 option have been answered. He’s playing at an All-NBA level in Tatum’s absence, averaging 29.4 points (fifth-most in the NBA), 6.4 rebounds and 4.9 assists per game while shooting just shy of 50% from the field.
Brown has scored at least 30 points in 10 of his last 11 games, and the lone outlier was a 19-point, 12-rebound, 11-assist triple-double. He’s just the third Celtic ever to put up 30-plus in seven straight games, joining Larry Bird and Paul Pierce. Decent company.
3. The two most important developments of this Celtics season so far: Neemias Queta emerging as a legitimate starting-caliber center, and Jordan Walsh transforming from an end-of-the-bench afterthought into an everyday starter with elite defensive upside and a much-improved offensive game.
Unable to spend this past summer without compromising their luxury tax flexibility, the Celtics needed some of their young, cheap role players to hit if they hoped to be competitive. Check and check for Walsh and Queta, who have the lowest and third-lowest salaries on Boston’s 2025-26 payroll, respectively.
Queta ranks in the top 10 in the NBA in net rating, and the Celtics are 12-4 with Walsh in the starting lineup.
Boston, MA – December 15 – Boston Celtics center Neemias Queta (88) goes up for a dunk as Detroit Pistons guard Cade Cunningham (2) looks on during the second half of a NBA game. (Photo By Matt Stone/Boston Herald).
4. Honorable mentions: Josh Minott quickly becoming a versatile rotation player after signing for the veteran minimum, and Hugo Gonzalez looking like a long-term building block as a 19-year-old rookie.
Those four players’ combined salary is $9.7 million, less than the Celtics are paying Sam Hauser this season ($10 million).
5. Gonzalez’s playing time has fluctuated over the first two months of his NBA career, but the Celtics have trusted him with some massive workloads lately.
The first-round draft pick played the final 18:50 in last Friday’s win over Miami, the final 17:20 on Saturday in Toronto and all but 11 seconds of the second half Monday against Indiana. His stats over those three games: 26 points, 29 rebounds, five steals and four blocks, with Boston outscoring its opponents by 80 points (!!) with him on the floor.
He became just the third rookie in the play-by-play era (since 1996-97) to be a plus-80 over a three-game span, joining Donovan Mitchell and Ben Simmons.
After Gonzalez, who leads all rookies in total plus/minus this season, helped lead the Celtics back from a 20-point third-quarter deficit against the Pacers, Tatum called him a “bad mother—-.”
6. The Celtics have benefited from being one of the NBA’s healthiest teams to this point. Their starters have missed a total of just six games: two by Brown, two by Queta, one by Walsh and one by Derrick White.
That said, they’ve also shown resilience when they have been forced to play at less than full strength. The Celtics are 5-0 when at least one starter sits out.
7. Mazzulla, who this week became the third-fastest NBA head coach to reach 200 wins, deserves a lot of credit for Boston’s success thus far. This is easily the least talented roster of his tenure, and he has it on a 51-win pace.
8. The Celtics spent training camp hyping up their plan to play much faster this season. That … hasn’t really happened. Boston still ranks last in the NBA in pace, and only the Clippers and Rockets have longer possessions on average.
Despite that, the Celtics have attempted the ninth-most field goals per game, mainly because most of their possessions end in a shot. They commit the fewest turnovers per game and have the second-lowest turnover rate, trailing only Oklahoma City.
Boston Celtics guard Anfernee Simons (4) passes the ball past Miami Heat guard Dru Smith (12) during the second half of an NBA basketball game, Friday, Dec. 19, 2025, in Boston. (Mark Stockwell/Boston Herald)
9. Anfernee Simons will be the name to watch for the Celtics as the Feb. 5 trade deadline approaches. He’s on a $27.7 million expiring contract that Boston could look to offload for tax relief or use to acquire help at another position (frontcourt depth is one lingering concern).
Simons’ scoring has been streaky — over the last month, he has more games with fewer than 10 points (five) than ones with 15-plus (three) — but he’s been quietly effective as the quarterback of the Celtics’ second unit during the team’s current three-game win streak. Mazzulla gave him an unprompted shoutout after the Pacers game.
President of basketball operations Brad Stevens recently said Simons, a starter in Portland before his offseason trade to Boston, is “really trying” and has “made great strides” as a defender. “I’m a big fan,” Stevens said.
10. The Celtics recently launched an NBA All-Star campaign for Brown, White and Payton Pritchard. Brown is a no-brainer; he’ll be an All-Star for the fifth time. White has an interesting case, though the brutal shooting slump that consumed his first three weeks of the season likely sank his candidacy. The veteran guard has shot the ball much better of late and is one of just two NBA players with 35-plus blocks and steals this season (along with Toronto’s Scottie Barnes).
Two opposing head coaches recently called White the most underrated player in the NBA, with another, Indiana’s Rick Carlisle, saying he’s “certainly one of the most underrated players in recent years.”
11. Of the Celtics’ four offseason departures, Kornet has enjoyed by far the most success in his new home, fitting in well as Victor Wembanyama’s backup/sidekick in San Antonio. Boston will host the Spurs, owners of the NBA’s third-best record, on Jan. 10.
It’s been a rockier road for the other three ex-C’s. Porzingis (illness) hasn’t played since Dec. 5, Horford (sciatica) has been out since Dec. 4 and Holiday (calf) last took the floor on Nov. 14.
12. Tatum, by all accounts, is progressing well in his Achilles rehab. When will he return to game action? Unless the Celtics crash out of the playoff picture before then, our money is on the first week of March.