Celtics Front Office Member Reveals What Team Looks For In Late Draft Picks
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One downside of consistently being one of the NBA's premier teams is that the Boston Celtics are consistently picking in the bottom fourth of the NBA Draft.
Even after a down year and an uncharacteristic first-round exit in the NBA Playoffs, Boston had the 27th overall selection in this week's 2026 NBA Draft.
The Celtics used the 27th pick on Houston's Chris Cenac Jr., before selecting St. John's's Dillon Mitchell 15 picks later.
Before the draft began, Celtics Assistant General Manager Dave Lewin sat down with team coverage Manager Taylor Snow and revealed what the team looks for in its draft picks.
"A lot of the players that are the most talented have gone at the top of the draft, so those guys are no longer on board when you’re in the late 20s," Lewin told Celtics.com. "Late in the first and early in the second, those guys are still very talented, but mostly in the same ballpark of talent, so finding guys with the right mindset and competitive character is often the differential."
Lewin touched on recent draft hits like Baylor Scheierman, Payton Pritchard and Hugo Gonzalez during the lengthy interview. The overall message was consistent: the team prioritizes finding team-first contributors who are comfortable playing off-ball.
Those players are then heavily examined by Brad Stevens and the rest of the staff to ensure that they have the makeup of a Celtics draftee.
"We want to make sure that we have followed a player for a while," Lewin said. "We’ve seen him play in a variety of different settings. We’ve talked to people that have coached the player, worked with the player across a variety of settings, such that we know from every angle who this player has been as a basketball player, what his experiences have been, and how he’s handled and responded to a variety of different goals and circumstances throughout his career.
"We want to get a sense of who they are, what they’re about, what motivates them, what makes them tick."
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