Бостон Сэлтиксийн хамгаалагч Жордан Уолш 16 сая ам.долларын өртөг бүхий гурван жилийн гэрээг багтайгаа байгуулснаар 2029-2030 оны улирлыг дуустал тус багт хүчин зүтгэхээр боллоо.
22 настай тоглогч өнгөрсөн улиралд 68 тоглолтод оролцож, 25 удаа гарааны тавтд багтсан бөгөөд дунджаар 5.4 оноо, 4.0 самбараас бөмбөг авалт гүйцэтгэсэн байна. Тэрээр 7 фут 2 инчийн гарын урт, өндөр хурдны ачаар өрсөлдөгч багийн гол тоглогчдыг хамгаалах үүргийг амжилттай гүйцэтгэж, хамгаалалтын олон талт байдлаараа лигт дээгүүрт эрэмбэлэгдлээ.
Уолш өөрийгөө зөвхөн хамгаалалтаар хязгаарлахгүйгээр довтолгооны тал дээр ч сайжирч байгаагаа онцолсон бөгөөд өнгөрсөн улиралд шидэлтийн хувь нь будагтай талбайгаас 79%, гурван онооны шидэлтээр 38%-тай байв. Тэрээр багийнхаа төлөө самбараас бөмбөг авалт хийж, эв нэгдлийг хадгалан, чухал мөчид багтаа туслахыг зорьж буйгаа илэрхийлсэн юм.
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Jordan Walsh has agreed to a three-year, $16 million contract extension with the Boston Celtics, according to NBA TV’s Chris Haynes.
As part of the agreement, the Celtics will pick up Walsh’s $2.4 million team option for the 2026-27 NBA season before adding three more years onto the deal, which will run through 2029-30, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania. Boston will hold a team option for that ’29-30 season, according to Mike Scotto of HoopsHype.
Including the exercised team option, the deal locks in an estimated $12.7 million in guaranteed money over the next three years for the 22-year-old Walsh, whom the Celtics drafted out of Arkansas in the second round of the 2023 NBA Draft, and who has made just over $5.2 million across the first three seasons of his career.
For Boston, it also locks in a rising rotation-caliber wing at what will amount to about 3% of the salary cap through his age-25 season — a deal that, if Walsh continues to develop, could come to be seen as an absolute steal. The Celtics now have multiple young wings — Walsh, the also-just-extended Ron Harper Jr., recent first-round picks Baylor Scheierman and Hugo González — under team control on low-cost deals through at least the next two seasons.
With Jayson Tatum recovering from surgery to repair his ruptured Achilles tendon and veteran bigs Kristaps Porziņģis and Al Horford gone, the Celtics entered last season in search of forwards who could fill the frontcourt void. Walsh seized the opportunity, making 68 appearances, including 25 starts, and averaging a career-high 5.4 points and 4.0 rebounds in 17.8 minutes per game for head coach Joe Mazzulla last season.
The 6-foot-6, 205-pound Walsh primarily makes his bones on the defensive end, using his 7-foot-2 wingspan, athleticism and ever-revving motor to guard multiple positions and disrupt opponents’ offensive possessions. Throughout the regular season, Mazzulla entrusted Walsh with the defensive assignment against All-Stars like Jalen Brunson, Cade Cunningham, James Harden, Paolo Banchero and LaMelo Ball; in Boston’s disappointing first-round loss to the Philadelphia 76ers, he spent most of his floor time trying to harass All-NBA point guard Tyrese Maxey.
Walsh was one of only a dozen players who logged at least 1,000 minutes last season to rank in the 90th percentile or higher in defensive positional versatility, average matchup difficulty and perimeter isolation defense, according to The BBall Index — a list that included venerated stoppers like OG Anunoby, Scottie Barnes and Alex Caruso. He was one of just 24 guards and forwards last season to post a block rate and steal rate over 2%, according to Stathead, joining the likes of Anunoby, Barnes, Mikal Bridges, Ausar Thompson and Jalen Suggs; he also logged 3.5 deflections per 36 minutes of floor time, right in line with established chaos agents like Marcus Smart, Josh Hart, Jarred Vanderbilt and Tari Eason.
Walsh excels at extending possessions, too, consistently crashing the offensive glass to corral loose balls and give Boston’s shooters another bite at the apple. He rebounded a teammate’s miss on 7.9% of the Celtics’ offensive trips last season — a top-15 mark among wings 6-foot-8 or smaller — with Boston grabbing second chances and converting putbacks at top-three rates in his minutes.
That active, aggressive dirty-work game has made Walsh into the kind of player who can contribute without needing to dominate the ball. Advanced metrics like estimated plus-minus, DARKO daily plus-minus, regularized adjusted plus-minus and net points and value over replacement player all marked Walsh as a net positive last season despite barely scoring a handful of points per night and ranking 385th in touches per game out of 393 players who averaged 15 minutes per contest.
“I feel like there’s guys like [Jaylen Brown] who can go out there and get his, Payton [Pritchard] who can go out there and get his,” Walsh told reporters last season. “And within the chaos we have to have somebody picking up the pieces and trying to be the glue guy, keep everything together. […] I have to find those pockets to affect the game. When JB and Payton are shooting those shots, somebody needs to get the rebound. It’s either going to be [the other team] or it’s going to be us. Why not make it me?”
After improving as a finisher last season, shooting a career-best 79% at the rim and 38% from beyond the arc, Walsh knows that the next step in his evolution is developing the other parts of his offensive game — his dribbling, his passing, his ability to create a shot — to put himself in position to turn last season’s breakthrough into a full-tilt breakout next season.
“It means being a threat at all points in the game,” Walsh told Adam Himmelsbach of the Boston Globe at Las Vegas Summer League. “I feel like there were a lot of times last season where it’d be clutch moments where we needed a bucket and I’d have to get subbed out. When those moments come, I always want to be the best option. I want to be the best choice. So, for me it’s working on my shot, working on my handle, working on creating my own shot when I have those pockets.”
