The Boston Celtics asked Jaylen Brown to be their de factor best player this season with Jayson Tatum absent for most of it. Brown willingly obliged them, putting on the best performance of his career.
28.7 points, 6.9 rebounds, and 5.1 assists were all career-highs. His shooting efficiency wasn't great - 47.7/34.7/79.5 splits - but Brown held his own. In fact, he even cleaned up one of his biggest flaws as a player at the free throw line.
He definitely is worthy of making an All-NBA first team, but following the NBA's latest ruling - making Luka Doncic and Cade Cunningham eligible for All-NBA awards - Brown may not get the recognition.
Without trying to make this a discussion about who deserves it, the biggest shame of if and when Brown doesn't make the first team isn't even the fact that the aforementioned players got it over him. It's that this season was likely his best chance to make the first team.
Brown may never get this chance ever again
Brown did about as close to a picture-perfect job of running the show while Tatum was on the shelf. It's why, when Tatum returned, people didn't see it as Tatum saving the day. Rather, it was about adding him to an Eastern Conference contender. That would not have happened without Brown.
With Tatum back and looking more and more like the Tatum of old, Brown will be put back into his role as the No. 2 in Boston's rotation. Thankfully, the Celtics star is and always has been team-first, so it's not like he'll have a problem with that - that's part of why Brown should be appreciated more - but at the same time, he won't put up the same numbers he did this season with Tatum leading the way.
That's not to say he will never make an All-NBA team again, as he will certainly do that this season and will probably make a few more appearances before his career is all said and done. But he'll never get another chance to make the first team despite proving himself to be talented enough to play with the big boys when asked to.
Brown is a franchise cornerstone, will get more All-Star Game and All-NBA nods, is on track to be a first ballot Hall of Famer, will get his number retired as a Celtics legend, and may very well win more titles in Boston over the next several years.
He'll be more than happy to have all of those accolades to his name, but it is a shame that the one year he could get the best individual accolade possible for him, he may not in the end, and may not get the chance again.
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