The Houston Rockets once built an entire offensive system around the idea that the three-pointer was basketball’s great mathematical edge. By 2019, they were launching 45 shots in a game. By 2025, the Boston Celtics had made that look modest, shattering the NBA’s all-time record with over 1,400 made threes in a single season. Now, as the franchise chases the game’s biggest remaining prize, Hall of Famer Reggie Miller raised a question that cuts right to the identity of the franchise: Does adding Giannis Antetokounmpo require Boston to finally rethink its religion?

That would represent a significant departure from the philosophy Mazzulla has spent years defending. “Our goal is to win the shot margin and win the three-point shot margin. If you shoot more threes and you make them at a reasonable percentage, you give yourself a mathematical advantage,” Mazzulla said while explaining Boston’s offensive approach. Which is exactly why Miller believes Antetokounmpo presents a unique challenge.

“I think if you’re Joe Mazzulla, you do have to change a little bit. They took way too many threes. I’m sorry.” When Dan Patrick challenged him on whether acquiring the two-time MVP would require giving up Jaylen Brown, Miller added: “That’s what it’s going to take.” He then used the Knicks-Spurs NBA Finals as a live case study, pointing to Game 4 as proof of concept: “Look at the Spurs in Game 4. They fell in love with the three in the first half, built a 29-point lead, and kept shooting them in the third, and that allowed the Knicks to get back in. A couple drives here and there, a couple mid-range shots, you win that game comfortably. You can’t fall in love with the threes.”

The numbers make Miller’s concern difficult to dismiss, even if they do not fully prove his case. The Celtics attempted 42.1 three-pointers per game during the 2025-26 regular season after setting NBA records the year prior with 48.2 attempts and 1,457 makes. The philosophy has worked more often than not. Boston owns a 50-15 record in regular-season games when attempting at least 50 threes. But the debate has always centered on the postseason, where variance becomes harder to survive and offensive alternatives become increasingly valuable.

This season, the Celtics blew a 3-1 series lead to the Philadelphia 76ers in the first round, eventually losing a 109-100 Game 7 in which their final possessions, while clinging to a one-point deficit, produced missed three-point attempts that sealed the collapse. 

Yet Boston’s own history offers evidence for the opposite view. In Game 1 of the 2024 Eastern Conference Finals against Indiana, the Celtics attempted 45 threes and survived largely because their spacing continued generating quality looks deep into the game, including Jaylen Brown’s game-tying three that forced overtime. The question is not whether the system works. The question is whether adding Antetokounmpo would make Boston better by preserving that identity or by evolving beyond it.

Which is precisely what makes the Giannis Antetokounmpo conversation interesting. According to NBA insider Marc Stein, a trade sending Giannis Antetokounmpo away from Milwaukee “is indeed drawing near,” with the Miami Heat holding momentum but the Boston Celtics still actively involved. Bill Simmons confirmed on his podcast that the Celtics made an offer within the past week, a development that surprised even him: “I thought they were sitting it out.”

Giannis as the Antidote to Mazzulla Ball, but at What Cost?

All season, Antetokounmpo’s future hovered over the league. When healthy last season, he averaged 27.6 points, 9.8 rebounds and 5.4 assists while shooting better than 62 percent from the field. But the numbers alone are not what make him fascinating in Boston’s context. Antetokounmpo generates offense almost opposite to the Celtics’ preferred method. He lives in the paint, consistently ranks among the league leaders in restricted-area scoring and free-throw attempts, and creates open perimeter looks by collapsing defenses toward the rim rather than stretching them beyond the arc.

The fit itself is easy to understand. Antetokounmpo has consistently emphasized the need to compete for championships, and Jayson Tatum remains the one player Boston is unlikely to move in any deal. On paper, the pairing solves a talent problem. The harder question is whether it creates a stylistic one.

Antetokounmpo has openly described his offensive philosophy in those terms.

“I know who I am. I can hit a jump shot here or there, but my job is to get to the paint, put pressure on the rim, and make things happen for my teammates,” he said during a playoff run. “When I attack the rim, it breaks the defense. I am not going to live and die on the perimeter.”

That mindset stands in stark contrast to a Celtics offense built around generating the highest possible volume of efficient perimeter shots.

He was also limited to just 36 games last season due to a knee hyperextension and bone bruise. A concern that cannot be detached from any evaluation of what he adds. Dismantling a championship-caliber core for a player coming off a significant injury, and requiring an overhaul of the offense, is a substantial gamble, even for a franchise with 18 banners. 

Reggie Miller’s argument ultimately is not that Giannis would make Boston worse. It is that Giannis would make Boston different.

The Celtics have spent three seasons building perhaps the NBA’s purest expression of modern five-out basketball. Antetokounmpo, meanwhile, remains one of the league’s most dominant forces of rim pressure and interior offense. Putting those two ideas together sounds simple on paper.

The challenge facing Brad Stevens and Joe Mazzulla is determining whether the best version of the Celtics is a more talented version of what already exists, or an entirely new team built around one of basketball’s most unique superstars.