There continues to be a lot of trade talk but little action, even with the sword of Damocles that is today’s 3 p.m. NBA deadline perched overhead.

The free-spending days that accompanied the new television contracts have dissolved into a numbers crunch as teams weigh luxury-tax implications and try to properly structure their rosters to fit not only in terms of complementary skills, but by salary.

As a result, clubs seem to be interested in trades that look at least as good on paper as they do on the court, if not more so the former.

That leaves the Celtics hoping for a late break in the logjam or, more likely, focusing hard on the buyout market. (Any player waived by March 1 is eligible for the playoff roster.)

“It’s pretty quiet out there,” one source from the middle third of the NBA’s map said yesterday. “Teams are really valuing picks, even second-rounders.”

And when a club cannot get what it wants, it looks to protect the value of its assets. Thus you had the Clippers pulling Lou Williams off the less-than-hoped-for market and signing him to a friendly three-year deal, reportedly at $8 million per season, with the last one only partially guaranteed. That’s less than the mid-level exception of around $8.5 million.

The contract will make Williams even more valuable in the market this summer, as he no longer will be just a rental for the rest of the season before heading to free agency.

The signing had reverberations for the Celtics on two fronts. First, they did have hope for a time that it would be able to get Williams at a good price and shore up its bench scoring. Second, it signals that players need to recalibrate their contractual hopes, and that could mean a lot to Marcus Smart, who will be a restricted free agent.

Two years ago, Evan Turner, an unrestricted free agent, left the Celts for Portland and a four-year, $70 million deal. It’s doubtful you’ll see such terms for players of that strata again, or at least until the NBA gets further down the road with legalized gambling and the revenue pool expands.

The Celts have to be more confident they can keep Smart, if they so choose. Granted, Williams is 31 and Smart doesn’t turn 24 until next month, but Williams is averaging 23.3 points off the Clippers bench.

It also bears repeating that reports the C’s are offering Smart to other teams for a first-round pick are, according to several league sources, unfounded.

The Celtics are, however, still on the periphery of the Tyreke Evans talk, but it was looking yesterday as if Memphis has better offers. According to one third-party general manager who has been involved in the process, teams like the Celts look to be lying in wait in case more active talks stall.

The notion that president of basketball operations Danny Ainge will be exhausting all possibilities until the deadline is supported by the fact the Celts will wait until after 3 p.m. today to sign free agent Greg Monroe to fill their disabled player exception slot. They want to maintain flexibility until the last minute in case they need to do some roster maneuvering.

As reported here, Monroe did indeed join the C’s in Washington, and while he cannot go through shootaround with the club in advance of the evening’s game against the Wizards, he can do individual work with coaches to prepare him for activation.