For a hot minute, it felt like the NBA was buzzing about a possible Jaylen Brown trade, but in the last few days, that discourse has almost died. It felt like things were close with a few different teams, and the Shams bomb felt like a matter of when, not if. But things have drastically changed.
We’ve seen other stars traded, and we keep hearing that teams are posturing, bowing out of the Brown talks, or at least balking at the idea of coming close to meeting Boston’s asking price for the 2024 Finals MVP.
In the latest bit of reporting, on Tuesday afternoon, Sam Amick of The Athletic stated that “Barring a drastic and unforeseen change in the market, the Boston Celtics will have to significantly lower their asking price if they plan on trading him anytime soon.”
He broke down how the Blazers, Nuggets, and Nets aren’t in the mix at the moment, and it’s starting to sound like unless there’s a drastic shift around the league, the Celtics aren’t going to get anything close to a Giannis-level return for JB, and as Shams mentioned on Monday, the offers seem to be closer to 40 cents on the dollar.
Celtics must keep Brown if offers are this bad
And unless that change does happen, it’s perfectly clear that Stevens and the Celtics have no choice but to keep JB in Boston. Maybe that’s not his first choice. Maybe it’s not the team’s first choice. But it’s what has to happen at this point. The Celtics clearly value Brown more than the rest of the league, and that's okay. He means more to Boston than anyone else, so it's appropriate to value him thusly.
He’s one of the greatest players in franchise history; he’s coming off an All-NBA season, and he’s still squarely in his prime. If you can sell high and get a haul of picks and young players to balance the books and the positional depth going forward around Jayson Tatum, so be it. If you can turn Brown into an even better player like Giannis, so be it.
But if the potential returns are more like salary filler, role players, and uninspiring draft capital, then it makes zero sense to move the second-best player on the team. That might mean some uncomfortable conversations have to take place, but as far as we know, the bridge isn’t burned. Brown is a professional. He’s very smart and understands the business.
He’s also beloved by the Boston fans and, if anything, has another chip on his shoulder and will come back with even more to prove next season. Brown and Tatum may no longer seem like a perfect pairing in the current CBA, but it’s still a dman good one, and one that has proven they can win together at the highest level.
There’s absolutely no reason to blow that up unless it’s for an insane return, which doesn’t seem to be the case. Brad needs to play some hardball and start patching up the relationships here. Perhaps that will cause a desperate team to blink, and they’ll get the deal they want. But if not, the Celtics need to do whatever it takes to play peacemaker and continue the Jays era in Boston until a clearly better option presents itself.
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