INDIANAPOLIS — When Jaylen Brown heard his name, he was puzzled. As his teammates and coaches started grabbing him and cheering, he stood there stone-faced. The face you might see from Brown after a poster dunk or a game-winning 3.
The Celtics star has said he feels like he doesn’t get the recognition he deserves. His coach constantly talks about shedding those expectations.
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So when he heard Celtics legend Cedric Maxwell announce him as the Eastern Conference finals MVP winner, it took him a second to process the honor.
Then he uttered two simple words, “Oh s—.”
“I wasn’t expecting it at all. I don’t never win s—,” Brown said as he sat next to the Larry Bird MVP trophy following the Celtics’ 105-102 win to sweep the Indiana Pacers and book a ticket to the NBA Finals. “So, I’m just happy that we won.”
It was that exact reaction that endeared him to his teammates. Brown sets individual goals, but he’s consistently insisted it’s only under the guise it helps the team.
“I think it’s even better because he didn’t expect it,” Jrue Holiday said. “That really means that (it) didn’t matter to him. It was about winning and whatever it took however long it took, that’s what was important. So I think when you have that mentality and that mindset and you see great people get rewarded for the things that they do, it just brings joy.”
In the biggest moments, Brown looks calm. He has come through with big shots for the Celtics time repeatedly. They won Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals because he hit one of the biggest shots of his career to send it to overtime.
But he wasn’t awarded the trophy because of his scoring. He secured his second NBA Finals trip of his career doing the things he’s been telling everyone he can do all year: defending and playmaking.
JB with the block and Derrick White with the clutch 3 on the other end!!! pic.twitter.com/9Mi8lfshfH
— Celtics on NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSCeltics) May 28, 2024
When Andrew Nembhard beat him going downhill on a tricky switch, Brown pursued and made the block. Then he came down court, looked to give the ball to Jayson Tatum, then realized it was all on him.
As head coach Joe Mazzulla yelled to Tatum to give Brown space and for Holiday to bring Myles Turner into the action, Brown collapsed the entire defense, just so he could give the ball up.
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“That was special,” Jayson Tatum said. “We talked about it before as a team, however long it takes whatever it takes, whatever we gotta do to make sure that we move on and advance.”
Two years ago, when the Celtics beat his Bucks en route to their Finals berth, Holiday was often the one trying to defend Brown.
“I think our game plan then was to try to let JB do it by himself,” Holiday said. “He can literally get to the basket or in the paint whenever he wants to. But to make that extra pass out and just trusting his teammates has been big for us.”
This time around, it was Holiday setting the screen to give Brown his window to attack. That development didn’t happen overnight.
The loss to the Golden State Warriors didn’t just flip a switch in their previous finals. But it changed his approach. Now, Brown spends the end of every practice running through pick-and-roll scenarios with coaches. Last year, it started with left-handed skip passes. This year, it’s been handling double teams, adjusting to different coverages, and everything in between.
“Credit to him, he has a growth mindset, so he’s never afraid to work on a weakness,” Mazzulla said. “He’s never afraid to go after something that makes him uncomfortable. And between him and (assistant coach) Tony (Dobbins) and the player development staff, they put him in any and every situation possible.”
The coaches will wear big foam arms so he can handle passing through openings like there’s a bunch of Myles Turners out there. They will aggressively foul him so he can get used to the non-calls he’ll see with the game on the line.
Then when it came time to attack Turner with a minute left, he was able to fight through contact, regain a loose dribble, and then collapse the defense to find White open for 3.
“I knew he was unreal when I got here, but the great thing about JB is he’s gotten better every single year that he’s been in this league, which is a testament to his hard work and dedication,” White said. “And he was unreal this whole series on both sides of the ball. A complete player that you don’t really see much these days.”
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He knew he had to become a more complete player when the Celtics made the move last summer of trading Marcus Smart.
“He was one of the voices of our team. And when he wasn’t here I wanted to make sure I stepped in,” Brown said. “I wanted to make sure that everybody felt me and everybody knew what the standard was.”
Brown added that the Celtics didn’t skip steps all season. That they played the right way (nearly) every single game, even if it didn’t always lead to a win.
There was no public bickering over role and opportunity. Players who didn’t defend wouldn’t see the floor. Brown understood that for a team to be its best, the best players have to uphold the highest standard.
“I thought everybody (was) accountable,” Brown said. “And this is the byproduct.”
Last week, when Brown didn’t make the All-NBA team, he said the snub didn’t bother him.
Brown had laid out a goal entering this season. As much as All-NBA is the gold standard for most stars, he wanted to make an All-Defensive team.
He wanted to redefine who he was as a player. Scoring alone wasn’t putting him in the position for a championship.
The Game 7 loss to Miami that ended their season last year left an impression. Defense and taking care of the ball were the hurdles he’d need to clear. So he said he wanted to be All-Defense and started publicly calling for every matchup from Zion Williamson to Nikola Jokić.
He didn’t care who it was. If they were great, he wanted to make their night miserable. And he often did. The problem was that with Jrue Holiday and Derrick White on his team, the Celtics weren’t getting another guard on the All-Defensive team.
“That probably hurt me the most becausethat’s one of the things that I set out in this season that I wanted to be,” Brown said. “But as time has gone by and I’ve gotten to this point, I’ve stopped caring and I just embrace it.”
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Brown has increasingly dropped his filter over the past few years, stating his goals, criticizing officiating, and standing up for his teammates.
When ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith said recently that an NBA source texted him Brown is not as marketable as he should be because “He’s just not liked because of his ‘I am better than you attitude,’” Brown reposted the clip and wrote, “State your source.” After Game 4, he indirectly addressed it.
“Sometimes it makes people feel uncomfortable and sometimes I miss out on things,” Brown said. “I miss out on opportunities, awards, marketing deals, or whatever the case may be. And at this point, I just embrace it. I am who I am and I’m going to stand on my beliefs. And I’m one of those people who would die for what they believe in.”
He believed he was one of the 10 best defenders in the NBA this year. In the end, he received three votes for the first team, but didn’t get close to making it. That didn’t deter him from making a significant defensive impact in this series.
“We ask a lot of him. Tonight, he started out guarding (Andrew)Nembhard, then he switched up to (Pascal) Siakam, he probably was on Turner,” Al Horford said. “He was on different people all over. That versatility is what makes us so tough as a team.”
Brown was always good at the flashy stuff. This year has been about filling in the gaps his teammates held down for years. Not everyone sees it, but he’s accepted that.
“I don’t care who sees what. As long as my team knows my value, my city knows my value, my family, that’s all I really care about,” Brown said. “I like to set my hat on just being a versatile two-way wing and can do both at any point in time. The last kind of four minutes of this game, you saw that.”
Now as the Celtics once again make the NBA Finals, the defense will try to make Brown do it all by himself. But that’s not who he is anymore.
(Photo: Justin Casterline / Getty Images)
Jared Weiss is a staff writer covering the Boston Celtics and NBA for The Athletic. He has covered the Celtics since 2011, co-founding CLNS Media Network while in college before covering the team for SB Nation's CelticsBlog and USA Today. Before coming to The Athletic, Weiss spent a decade working for the government, primarily as a compliance bank regulator. Follow Jared on Twitter @JaredWeissNBA
