Is Detroit’s No. 7 pick and Boston’s 3 firsts an ideal swap?

Are the Boston Celtics and Detroit Pistons ideal draft night trade partners? At least one Detroit analyst thinks so.

If the Boston Celtics could trade up into the top eight selections of the draft with a deal to consolidate their three first-round picks of the draft, should they?

This is exactly the question poised by Detroit Bad Boys’ Steven Hinson, who thinks the Pistons and the Celtics are natural trade partners — more on why shortly.

On one hand, this draft is largely bereft of projected star power outside of the prospects expected to go in the first three or four picks of the draft — and even then none of them are especially highly-regarded compared to other drafts.

Conversely, while this draft is seen by analysts as lacking in top-level talent, it’s also considered to be broadly-populated with high floor prospects, meaning the odds of finding starters and rotation players is better than usual well into the second round.

Add in that almost all top-50 players come from the first eight picks of the draft, and you’ve got a lot of conflicting directives to consider.

But then, the most important one of them all is whether you can actually use the draft picks you’ve amassed — you need a roster slot for them or a team they’d be willing to play for overseas until you have one if you don’t.

And even if you can ‘stash’ a player, such ‘stashed’ players have a very checkered record of working out, too.

So, the Celtics — who took on seven rookies this season — fall squarely in that ‘don’t have roster spots’ camp, and aren’t even a season removed from cutting the last player (Guerschon Yabusele).

Enter the Detroit Pistons.

As Hinson points out, with Boston’s roster crunch and seven rookies already on board a team with title designs this season never mind next, trading up is probably something the Celtics want to do.

And with the Pistons not competing for anything next season barring a miracle and holding only nine player’s rights next season, they should be looking to cast a wide net.

There’s probably only a few players it would be worth going this route to draft, such as if French point guard Killian Hayes or USC big man Onyeka Okongwu were still on the board.

Or, if wings like Florida State’s Devin Vassell or Vanderbilt’s James Nesmith could only be drafted for sure by making such an aggressive move.

The latter pair may be too much of a stretch unless the front office was as sure about their floor as they were about getting Jayson Tatum while trading back, and there’s a very good chance Okongwu and Hayes will be long gone by the time the No. 7 pick is on the clock.

But, it’s absolutely worth making the calls to find out if such a deal is possible.

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