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Phil Pressey Will Try To Convince Celtics He's A Keeper During Summer League

BOSTON (CBS) – It's not easy to be a young guard on the Celtics roster this summer. The competition is fierce with new draftees Terry Rozier and R.J. Hunter entering the fold, as well as highly touted 2014 picks Marcus Smart and James Young looking to improve. Once you throw in seasoned veterans such as Avery Bradley and Isaiah Thomas into the mix, there doesn't seem to be much room for an end-of-the-bench guard like Phil Pressey on the 15-man roster.

The 24-year-old took note of this reality in the past week and is determined to do something about it. To start, he has elected to suit up for Boston's summer league team in Salt Lake City and Las Vegas in the next two weeks.

The original plan for summer league had Pressey watching from the sidelines while Smart and Rozier got additional reps running the Celtics' offense. However, with a roster decision looming on the 5-foot-11 former Missouri star on July 15th, the circumstances changed for the third-year reserve. The Celtics must decide whether to guarantee his $947,276 salary for 2015-16, or waive him, on that date.

With 14 guaranteed contracts already on the books for next season once the July free agent moratorium ends, Pressey knows his time in Boston may be coming to an end. Instead of looking toward what's next, he convinced Danny Ainge and Brad Stevens he wanted to get back on the court and remind the team what he can do, so on Friday, the team announced he would officially be joining the summer league roster.

"I've been working on my game. My minutes last year were kind of up and down," Pressey said at practice Friday. "It's just an opportunity to play. Guys play in [summer league] all the time in their third year. It's just a good opportunity for me to showcase what I can do again and continue to play."

While the team's major moves in the free agency period are likely done, there is an opportunity that trades will clear out some additional roster space for Pressey to stick around. However, that's not a scenario he can count on at this point. In his mind, his summer league play will be an audition, for the Celtics, and any other team that might want him if he's waived.

"It doesn't matter who you are," Pressey noted when asked about for whom he's auditioning for. "Whether you're the first guy or 12th guy, you can be playing on the Celtics one year, and you can get traded midseason. It's just a good opportunity for me to continue to play. Like I said, I love playing. So whether it's right now, summer league, preseason, or regular season, it doesn't matter to me."

One person that isn't particularly concerned with how Pressey performs in summer league is head coach Brad Stevens. With a glut of guards in place looking for reps, Pressey won't see full-time duty, just periodic stints in games over the next two weeks. Stevens isn't the one making the decision on speedy point guard's roster fate, but he wasn't shy about going to bat for him last week.

"I think we all feel this way, we love Phil," Stevens declared. "We all appreciate the way he works. We like what he does. We've watched him for two years. And to evaluate him on a five-day basis [in Salt Lake City and Las Vegas] doesn't make sense after the two years we've been together. We know everything about him. We'll see how the next 10 days or whatever it is play themselves out, and we'll go from there. You have to be able to manage your roster appropriately, obviously, in all these decisions, but he is the kind of guy you want to have around here. So we'll see how it all plays out, but I'm a big Phil Pressey guy."

In the next 10 days it's up to Pressey to ensure the Celtics' front office remain in his corner as well. Otherwise, his days in green may be coming to a premature end.

Brian Robb covers the Celtics for CBS Boston and contributes to NBA.com, among other media outlets. You can follow him on Twitter @CelticsHub.

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