The reigning champion Boston Celtics have brought back all their most crucial core pieces for the 2024-25 season to chase a repeat. Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown are the headliners and get plenty of support from the other starters, but the team’s bench scoring is heavily dependent on one player. Payton Pritchard is having a career year off the pine and his instant offense has placed him atop this year’s Sixth Man of the Year race. His odds are -175 at BetMGM. Let’s go over what makes the sharpshooter’s case so compelling.
Pritchard was Boston’s sixth-leading scorer last season and averaged a then career-high 9.6 points per game while shooting 46.8% from the field and 38.5% from three. He followed up that run by posting a career-high 14.1 points this season. He’s shooting 46.6% from the field and a career-best 41.5% from deep in 2024-25. His ability to ramp up his scoring despite all five of the Celtics’ offensively capable starters returning has been impressive.
Pritchard leads all players this season with 664 bench points. He accounts for a large percentage of Boston’s subpar bench scoring. The Celtics rank 26th in bench points, as their reserves are posting 29.7 points per game. That means Pritchard is roughly half of the bench scoring for the league’s fifth-ranked offense.
De’Andre Hunter (+325) has the second-best odds and should probably be starting over rookie wing Zaccharie Risacher. He’s posting a career-high 19.2 points on exceptional shooting splits, but could realistically reclaim his old starting spot before the regular season is over. Then there’s Amen Thompson (+700), who’s averaged 18.3 points and 10.9 rebounds through 15 starts and could remain a starter even after Jabari Smith Jr. returns from a hand injury. Pritchard has a strong edge over Hunter right now and has a chance to go the distance, but there’s still room for others to improve their cases in the back half of the reason. A Pritchard win isn’t a foregone conclusion.
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