The thinking is that Simmons has never been part of a winning culture and thus has little to offer the development of such players besides soaking up a portion of the minutes in a best-case scenario.

The Boston Celtics cut an NBA champion, a former Celtics player signs in Israel, and Ben Simmons is linked to Boston.

Then, Simmons made his third All-Star team, his second All-NBA team, his second All-Defense team, and he even got votes for both Most Valuable Player and Defensive Player of the Y

The Celtics released reserve point guard JD Davison on Thursday, the team announced. The move brings Boston down to 14 players on their 15-man roster. Boston picked up a $2.3 million team option on the point guard on June 29 but the contract was non-guaranteed. By releasing Boston now, the team absorbs no cap hit for next season.

Davison, last year’s G League MVP, played on two-way contracts in each of his first three seasons with the Celtics, but that is the maximum allowed with one team.