Rating Boston’s rookies: how a top analyst sees the Celtics’ new players

Boston Celtics rookies Payton Pritchard and Aaron Nesmith have enough run to say at least a little about where they stand in their cohort.

The Boston Celtics have a pair of solid rookies on their roster from the 2020 NBA draft class, even if it took a bit for one of them to get up to the speed of the league’s play.

And The Athletic’s John Hollinger rates rookie guard Payton Pritchard and sharpshooting wing Aaron Nesmith into his subjective tiers about where we think they belong, if perhaps a hair lower given where we would with our increased exposure and admittedly Celtics-centric bias. The Athletic analyst is surprisingly bullish as we are on what many tended to portray as an underwhelming draft class — and while there may be fewer top-tier talents, there’s plenty of hidden gems awaiting polish.

And hopefully two of them on Boston’s roster — so where did they land in Hollinger’s estimation?