The Celtics have signed Ron Harper Jr. to a three-year, $9 million contract, ESPN’s Shams Charania reported on Saturday afternoon. It’s a win for each side: Harper Jr. will get his first long-term NBA contract at 26 years outdated, recent off the most effective season of his profession.
And the Celtics get a hard-playing function participant with loads of upside on a financially savvy deal, somebody who can stretch the ground, defend, and rebound at a excessive stage.
It’s been a protracted journey for Ron Harper Jr. to get right here
Ron Harper Jr. went undrafted in 2022 after a standout profession at Rutgers. Since then, he’s bounced across the league, spending a while with the Toronto Raptors and Detroit Pistons.
Final yr, he started the season with Boston on an Exhibit-1o, coaching camp contract, and in the end secured one of many staff’s three two-way contracts. Then, after excelling with the Maine Celtics, he started to spend extra time with the mother or father membership and in the end signed an ordinary, rest-of-season contract with the Celtics in April.
However Harper’s tenure with Boston started earlier than final yr. He was on the Celtics Summer season League staff in 2024 and was on a coaching camp deal that fall. At that Summer season League, he was coming off a season-ending shoulder damage however informed reporters he was able to play with toughness and grit.
“I’m a participant that’s going to play exhausting, play the fitting method, play inside himself,” he mentioned then.
In flip, started the 2024-2025 season with the Maine Celtics, earlier than signing a two-way contract with the Detroit Pistons. After that contract expired, he returned to Boston. This yr, he’ll start his third consecutive coaching camp in Boston – although for the very first time, he’ll have assured cash.
The previous Rutgers standout averaged 11 minutes in 29 NBA video games final yr, getting three begins. He scored a career-high 27 factors to associate with 7 rebounds, 4 assists, and three steals in a win over the Orlando Magic in mid-April. However his breakthrough second got here earlier than that, when he began his first-ever NBA recreation in Houston, guarded Rockets ahead Kevin Durant, and scored a then-career-high 11 factors.
“I really feel like I do know the system; the coverages are just like the again of my hand,” Harper Jr. mentioned after the sport. “That was an enormous a part of the method and the choice to be coming again in the summertime — I simply knew the staff, I knew the coaches, I knew the system.”
The choice clearly paid off. Harper Jr. averaged 4.2 factors and 1.7 rebounds, capturing 41.8% from the sector and 35% from three final yr.
Now, he will get his first-ever assured contract.
Ron Harper Jr. may very well be the primary of a number of Celtics extensions
The Celtics will even have the flexibility to increase Jordan Walsh and Neemias Queta this offseason, and Payton Pritchard in October. Jaylen Brown can also be eligible for a two-year, $140 million extension in July, although his future in Boston stays unsure after he was reportedly provided in a commerce for Giannis Antetokounmpo.
