NBA TRADE: Boston Lets Go of Holiday and Porzingis

By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña

In just a span of two days, the 2024 NBA champions Boston Celtics made headlines after dealing away their two core members via massive trade packages to two different franchises.

On June 24, 2025, the Kevin Durant trade to the Houston Rockets was followed by a surprising move by the Celtics, sending two-way defensive star Jrue Holiday to the Portland Trailblazers.

In exchange, the Western Conference squad will be shipping uprising guard Anfernee Simons and two future second-round draft picks.

Holiday could’ve been a member of the Trailblazers two years ago when he was traded by the Milwaukee Bucks in return for Damian Lillard’s services. However, Boston entered the picture and acquired the two-way stocky guard that proved to be their most valuable pick-up of the season when they won the championship title in 2024.

In their quest of a back-to-back NBA title this season, Holiday’s numbers took a huge dip, only averaging 9.5 points, 4.1 rebounds, 4.0 assists, and 0.9 steals per game from the first round to the Eastern Conference Semifinals.

During their title run last season, Holiday displayed impressive numbers and tallied 13.2 points, 6.1 rebounds, 4.4 assists, and 1.1 steals per playoff game.

On the other hand, Boston will be receiving a bonafide scorer in today’s modern NBA, as Simons is yet to reach his peak with averages of 19.3 points and 4.8 assists per game in the regular season.

According to several analysts, Boston acquiring Simons is one of their ways to cover the hole that Jayson Tatum left after rupturing his Achilles tendon in the playoffs.

Tatum will most likely be out for the entire regular season, and Simons’ offensive prowess together with Jaylen Brown and Derrick White will be badly needed by the team.

Meanwhile, the Celtics pressed another trade buzzer on June 25, 2025, when they shipped away Kristaps Porzingis as a part of a three-team deal.

According to ESPN’s senior NBA insider Shams Charania, Porzingis will head to the Atlanta Hawks, while the Celtics will be getting Georges Niang and a second-round draftee.

Porzingis only played 42 regular season games for the Celtics due to several injuries and had a lackluster playoff run when he only averaged 7.7 points.

During the series against the New York Knicks, Porzingis was surprisingly benched and only played 21 minutes per game in the six-game semifinal series.

After Holiday and Porzingis, who’s next for Boston? Is this a major upgrade or a downgrade? Thoughts folks?