The Boston Celtics dedicated time to develop Grant Williams into the player they needed him to be in order to better support their core group of players.

Over the course of his four-year career with the Celtics, Grant has arguably been one of the most improved players on the team and in his own draft class from 2019.

Grant is the ultimate two-way player for Boston, or at least he can be. He’s a top 3-point shooter in the NBA while also defending at an elite level on the other end.

For a player who’s averaged over 20 minutes per game in the regular season and close to 30 in the playoffs for his career, Grant continues to receive garbage minutes on the nights he’s not a DNPCD. It just doesn’t make sense.

Head coach Joe Mazzulla has made it clear all throughout the season that Grant isn’t playing based on matchups. However, I’d argue that Grant is one of the better players on the team to matchup against anybody, especially on the Heat.

This is what Mazzulla said about Grant not playing in Game 1.

“We have a plan to use the depth that we need in order to give us the lineups that we think can really help us. I thought Payton gave us an opportunity with his shooting, with his playmaking, his pick and roll defense. Grant is always going to be ready. And we’ve built a lot of versatility and depth in our lineup where we can go a lot of different ways. We trust that anybody that we call in will be ready.”

Mazzulla elected to play Payton Pritchard very early in the first quarter, as he was the 8th man for Boston in Game 1. I didn’t hate the decision, but I was definitely surprised and even more surprised that Grant didn’t play at all.

Mazzulla’s running out of excuses for why he’s not playing Grant and it’s going to come back to bite him in this series.

Game 2 of the ECF is tonight in Boston.

Follow us on Twitter @CelticsFiles

Photo Credit: Winslow Townson, USA TODAY Sports