{"id":820651,"date":"2026-07-24T10:29:19","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T10:29:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/820651\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T10:29:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T10:29:19","slug":"time-to-let-loose-on-the-celtics-satisfying-a-desire-to-offload-jaylen-brown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/820651\/","title":{"rendered":"Time to let loose on the Celtics satisfying a desire to offload Jaylen Brown"},"content":{"rendered":"

Given the level of exigency the Celtics operated with in shopping their longest-tenured player after the best season of his career, it\u2019s clear in hindsight that their pursuit of Giannis Antetokounmpo wasn\u2019t actually about Giannis. It was camouflaging the Celtics\u2019 desire to offload the iconoclastic Brown as quickly as possible, as discreetly as possible, for value that wouldn\u2019t raise any eyebrows. Normally imperturbable, Stevens looked squirrelly and chagrined the night of the first round of the NBA Draft, after Milwaukee chose Miami\u2019s offer for Giannis<\/a> and the Celtics steward was forced to tap dance on Brown\u2019s future.<\/p>\n

Get Starting Point<\/p>\n

A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday.<\/p>\n

At the Celtics Inquisition<\/a>, Stevens lamented how it was challenging to have 70 percent of your cap space tied up in two players. <\/p>\n

Well, the Celtics remain so with the 36-year-old, injury-prone George, one of the great playoff underperformers of his generation, saddled with the derisive sobriquet \u201cPlayoff P\u201d and with a $56.5 million player option for 2027-28. <\/p>\n

Stevens rebutted this by pointing out the Celtics now have more draft capital \u2014 a 2028 first-round pick with complicated provisions that could land in the top eight, or in a very remote scenario, not be conveyed at all<\/a>, and a 2031 unprotected first-rounder from Philly. <\/p>\n

That rationale fails to factor in the opportunity cost of potentially wasting two years of Tatum\u2019s prime with a lesser team and a lesser running mate in George, who has played more than 57 games in a regular season just once this decade.<\/p>\n

Will Celtics be better without Jaylen Brown? Brad Stevens responds to Shaughnessy<\/p>\n

Brad Stevens and Bill Chisholm addressed the media about the Jaylen Brown trade. Dan Shaughnessy asked them some burning questions about the move.<\/p>\n

From a pure basketball standpoint, it would\u2019ve made more sense to reunite Brown and Tatum, then sell off Brown when teams are more desperate \u2014 either at the trade deadline or next summer, when a frustrated superstar threatening to demand a trade (say Nikola Joki\u0107) upped the Celtics\u2019 leverage.<\/p>\n

But this wasn\u2019t a pure basketball decision. <\/p>\n

\u25aa The resuscitated Red Sox provided the feel-good story of the summer with their team-record-tying 15-game winning streak<\/a>. They\u2019re serving a reverse 1978. Morgan Magic meet Tracy Sorcery. The turnaround is remarkable, but is it long-term sustainable? Does it fit into the category of the sustainability pledge the Red Sox have been preaching this decade? No. <\/p>\n

Claiming that would be simple if the inspired stretch were underpinned by performances from celebrated prospects Roman Anthony, Marcelo Mayer, and Kristian Campbell.<\/p>\n

Give chief baseball officer Craig Breslow credit: He nailed the pitching and defense hallelujah chorus. Run Prevention 2.0 isn\u2019t a racket. But the Sox spurt coincided with the injury exit of Mayer and his sub-.600 OPS, and the insertion into the lineup of bench players\/4A types Anthony Seigler, Andruw Monasterio, Tsung-Che Cheng, and last year\u2019s patron saint, Romy Gonzalez. It helped enormously that Caleb Durbin morphed into Adrian Beltre<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The Sox did something similar last year with deposed manager Alex Cora<\/a>, Gonzalez, Abraham Toro, Rob Refsnyder, Nathaniel Lowe, etc., to secure a playoff berth. Breslow declared the team\u2019s window of contention open, but the Sox went splat to start this season. There\u2019s a difference between a blueprint and a patch job.<\/p>\n

\u25aa Everybody loves Derrick White<\/a>. How can you not? But he\u2019s skating like few athletes in Boston sports history after an abysmal playoff performance that was one of the leading causes of the Celtics\u2019 first-round playoff implosion against Philadelphia. Those in Greenlandia tend to venerate role players, but paradoxically assign virtually zero accountability to the same basketball binkies in failure.<\/p>\n

When the Celtics blew a 13-point lead in the second half of Game 5 at the Garden<\/a>, White was a team-worst minus-20. (Brown was minus-16, Tatum minus-15.) In the blowout loss in Game 6<\/a>, White was a team-worst minus-25. In Game 7<\/a>, he played a splendid first half, scoring 19 points, but disintegrated with the series and the season on the line, shooting 3 for 13 and 1 of 9 from 3-point range in the second half while registering a minus-4. For the series in the fourth quarter, White shot 29.4 percent and 27.3 percent from three, matching his overall 3-point mark for the series.<\/p>\n

\"FanFan favorite Derrick White remains a Celtic after a tough go of it in the playoffs against the 76ers.Danielle Parhizkaran\/Globe Staff<\/p>\n

Yet, the team rebuffed reported \u201caggressive\u201d trade offers for the 32-year-old White while peddling Brown, an All-NBA talent, like a scuffed-up piece of furniture on Facebook Marketplace.<\/p>\n

\u25aa I\u2019m not an artificial intelligence-averse troglodyte, but the tyranny of analytics in evaluating sports has become intolerable. Yes, analytics are more objective than the eye test. However, they\u2019re not without bias. Analytics<\/a> prioritize efficiency over production. Efficiency is ideal, but not necessarily essential in basketball, where more than 200 points and 100-plus possessions are routine. <\/p>\n

Analytics ignore outcomes to emphasize value and process, i.e., Mazzulla claiming all the 3-pointers the Celtics take when they lose are good shots. Or delusional Cavaliers coach Kenny Atkinson contuining the emphasize his team was up, 2-1, vs. the Knicks in the Eastern Conference finals, according to expected score analytics, when it was down, 0-3.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s definitely value in analytics, but don\u2019t treat them as infallible gospel.<\/p>\n

\u25aa While the revivified Red Sox have rewritten the story of their season, let\u2019s not subscribe to the revisionist history that this only could\u2019ve happened by sacking Cora and most of the Red Sox coaching staff after a 10-17 start<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If Cora, who identified Monasterio as an asset in spring training, had been able to go with grit guys, too, he could\u2019ve engineered this type of turnaround. Other than the streaky Durbin, there\u2019s no one producing at the plate now who hadn\u2019t previously produced under Cora. Canning Cora and his coaches was still hasty and recriminatory. Correlation is not causation, nor justification.<\/p>\n

\"ComingComing off a Super Bowl trip in his first season as Patriots coach, Mike Vrabel has the team back in Foxborough for the start of training camp.Danielle Parhizkaran\/Globe Staff<\/p>\n

\u25aa Patriots<\/a> coach Mike Vrabel distanced and differentiated his program from the Dynasty Days, but it will be interesting to see if he shares one belief in common with his old coach \u2014 the idea that having a highly paid lockdown cornerback is a luxury. Belichick enjoyed Ty Law, Darrelle Revis, and Stephon Gilmore. He also wasn\u2019t afraid to let them go, believing he could compensate with coaching and scheme. <\/p>\n

That philosophy wouldn\u2019t bode well for Christian Gonzalez in his quest for a new contract<\/a>. I\u2019m not sold the Patriots genuinely believe having Gonzalez in the Foxborough fold is a non-negotiable for Super Bowl success. <\/p>\n

\u25aa The World Cup<\/a> showed we can do big events in Boston. The Tartan Army taught us that traffic cones can be a symbol of joy and revelry. No longer should NIMBY-ism be our default stance.<\/p>\n

\u25aa It\u2019s uncanny how adept Breslow, a former lefthanded reliever, is at identifying lefthanded pitchers. The latest is rookie Jake Bennett, who has been a revelation in the rotation. It makes you wonder if Breslow shops at the real-life Leftorium<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Christopher L. Gasper is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at christopher.gasper@globe.com<\/a>. Follow him @cgasper<\/a> and on Instagram @cgaspersports<\/a>.<\/p>\n