In an offseason largely devoid of personnel changes for the NBA champion Boston Celtics, here’s one:

My name is Zack Cox, and I’m officially joining the Boston Herald as its new Celtics beat writer.

Those of you who are familiar with my work likely know me from the Patriots beat, which I covered for NESN for the last eight years — from the 28-3 Super Bowl season in 2016 up to Bill Belichick’s departure this past January. And you’ll continue to see my byline in the Herald’s Patriots coverage alongside Andrew Callahan and Doug Kyed, who cover the team better than anyone in New England.

But my primary responsibility will be bringing you day-to-day, up-close, behind-the-scenes coverage of the team that’s supplanted the Pats as Boston’s most consistently successful franchise.

It’s a professional pivot, surely, but also a return to my roots in a sense. In the early days of my sportswriting career, the first pro team I covered as a beat reporter was the 2014-15 Celtics. That was Brad Stevens’ second season as head coach, Marcus Smart’s rookie year. It was a transitionary period for the C’s, not too dissimilar from the one their Foxboro counterparts are navigating now.

Twenty-two different players appeared in at least five games that season, including sips of coffee from guys like Jameer Nelson and Tayshaun Prince. The three who played in all 82 were Brandon Bass, Tyler Zeller and Evan Turner — who, a decade later, remains the best quote of any player I’ve ever covered.

The ’14-15 Celtics were not a good team, but they were, by season’s end, an unexpectedly entertaining one. After swinging a deadline trade for future fan favorite Isaiah Thomas, they went 20-9 down the stretch, surging from 13 games below .500 to a surprise playoff berth. LeBron James’ Cavaliers quickly vanquished them in four games, but even that tidy sweep was competitive, portending brighter days ahead on Causeway Street.

Every player from that team now is gone — Smart was the last to depart, as part of the home-run trade for Kristaps Porzingis last offseason — as is its status as the plucky underdog. Today’s Celtics are a full-blown juggernaut — a 64-win team that lost just three playoff games en route to an NBA title and now is set to return every player of consequence this season.

Thanks to some fortuitous timing, I had the chance to cover the Celtics’ entire 2024 postseason for the Herald. I watched as they systematically dismantled a series of injury-depleted Eastern Conference foes, then crushed the media-darling Mavericks in the NBA Finals. It was a ruthlessly efficient title run and one that featured almost zero internal locker-room drama, despite the best efforts of ESPN talking heads and Mavs head coach Jason Kidd.

It was the long-awaited championship breakthrough for franchise centerpieces Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, and a validation of Joe Mazzulla’s at times unorthodox coaching methods. But as Jrue Holiday said shortly after the confetti fell at TD Garden: “Another burden is doing it again.”

Can the Celtics, in an era of NBA parity not seen since the 1970s, become the first team since 2018 to repeat as champions? Can their “re-sign/extend everyone” strategy yield another title before they’re hit by a tsunami of luxury-tax penalties next offseason? Will Porzingis be the same uber-impactful player once he returns from his offseason leg surgery (likely around Christmas at the earliest)? Will rivals like the Knicks and 76ers, who both made big-ticket additions this offseason, be able to challenge Boston’s Eastern Conference supremacy?

And, most pressingly, what will Celtics ownership look like in the wake of Wyc Grousbeck’s seismic announcement that his family is selling its majority stake in the team? Will the new owner(s) run the storied franchise with the same care and dedication that Grousbeck and his partners did? Will his plan for a multi-phased sale, with Grousbeck staying on as governor until the whole thing is finalized in 2028, play out better than the Timberwolves’, which sparked a prolonged legal battle that has yet to be resolved?

Those are the stories I’m excited to tell this season. I hope you’ll follow along.