Category: Basketball

Rui Hachimura became the latest Lakers player to move on, agreeing to a two-year, $28-million deal with the Clippers on Monday, people familiar with the deal but not authorized to speak publicly on the matter confirmed to The Times.

Hachimura played at a high level for the Lakers in the playoffs, averaging 17.5 points per game in 10 postseason games, the third-highest average on the team.

He was a lights-out shooter, making 54.9 percent of his field goals and a sizzling 56.9 percent of his three-pointers, which ranked him fifth in three-point shooting during the NBA playoffs.

According to people familiar with the team but not authorized to speak publicly, some members of the Clippers coaching staff liked how Hachimura played and thought he would be a good pickup because of his shooting and athleticism.

Read more:Lakers' Adou Thiero hoping to learn and lead with Cameron Carr this summer

The Lakers acquired Hachimura, 28, from the Washington Wizards in Jan. 2023. He spent three-plus seasons with the Lakers and was a favorite of his teammates.

His ability to knock down three-pointers from the corner opened up things for Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves, both of whom could rely on Hachimura to be ready to catch and shot even when he didn’t get many touches.

Over 68 games last season with the Lakers, 41 as a starter, Hachimura averaged 11.5 points and shot 51.4 percent from the field and 44.3 percent from three-point range.

He started all 10 playoff games for the Lakers, scoring a playoff-high 25 points against the Thunder in 43 minutes, going nine-for-15 from the field, four-for-eight from three-point range.

Get the best, most interesting and strangest stories of the day from the L.A. sports scene and beyond from our newsletter The Sports Report.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

Once again, Walker Kessler sat hunched forward, ears and eyes intently locked onto the person whose words would change his life.

This wasn’t his bewildering 2022 NBA draft day experience captured on video that began with him hearing commissioner Adam Silver announce he had been chosen by the Memphis Grizzlies only to learn moments later that he had been traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves, only to learn two weeks after that he’d been dealt to the Utah Jazz.

No, this time it was about the love of his life, Abbie Stockard. Glued to a screen, Kessler reacted to the words, “Your new Miss America is ... Alabama!” as if he’d been electrocuted. He jumped from his chair and put his hands over his mouth, speechless as Stockard was crowned.

Nineteen months later, Kessler — now the Lakers center — found his voice while on a Fourth of July outing at Lake Martin, Ala., and asked Stockard to marry him. She said yes.

The Lakers obtained the 7-foot-2 Kessler from the Jazz on July 1 in exchange for 2031 and 2033 first-round picks and 2028 and 2030 pick swaps, bringing to L.A. a strong defensive presence to accompany offensive-first star guards Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves.

Read more:Lakers get their new center. How Walker Kessler, three free agents fit with Luka Doncic

Kessler, 24, agreed to a four-year, $130 million contract, not a bad nest egg for newlyweds. The Instagram story of the two sharing their engagement was captioned: “The future Kessler’s. Let’s get y’all married!!!”

Kessler’s mother, Andrea, played matchmaker two years ago, taking a photo of Stockard during an Auburn basketball game and sending it to her son. He messaged her on Instagram.

Stockard was on the dance team at Auburn, where she studied pediatric nursing. Now she is a former Miss America engaged to the Lakers’ newest star.

“I get to marry Walker Kessler — my best friend!,” she wrote on social media. “Our story is truly one that only the Lord could have written. So many things I once thought were coincidences were really His perfect plan unfolding, and our story is greater than anything I could have imagined.

“There’s no one else I’d rather spend the rest of my life with, doing life together and cheering each other on!”

In 201 games with the Jazz, Kessler averaged 9.5 points, 9.3 rebounds and 2.4 blocks across 25.3 minutes. He played only five games last season while recovering from a shoulder injury.

Get the best, most interesting and strangest stories of the day from the L.A. sports scene and beyond from our newsletter The Sports Report.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

While the Lakers are trying to build their roster into a championship contender, they’ve just lost a big piece of their team via free agency.

Rui Hachimura has reportedly agreed to sign with the Clippers on a two-year, $28 million deal, as first reported by Shams Charania of ESPN.

According to Charania, the Clippers and Hachimura agreed on a deal fairly early in free agency and waited to see if the Lakers were open to a sign-and-trade. However, the purple and gold were unwilling to work out a trade, likely due to the cap gymnastics they were already doing.

Realistically, a sign-and-trade would have never happened after the Lakers made their signings, so this feels like some agent posturing.

Rui shared a message to Lakers fans on his Instagram following the report from Shams.

Multiple reports in the aftermath of the signing indicated that Rui wanted to remain in Los Angeles but the Lakers did not prioritize him similarly, so he chose to sign with the Clippers over other teams.

This is a tough blow for the Lakers, even if not entirely unexpected. After the flurry of moves from the Lakers on the second day of free agency, Rui was left on the outside looking in. Some around the NBA wondered if he would return to the Lakers but their focus remained on Jonathan Kuminga, not Hachimura. Given Charania’s wording, that likely could have been because Rui and the Clippers had an agreement early on.

This past season, Hachimura carved out a solid role for himself as an elite shooter coming off the bench for head coach JJ Redick. He averaged 11.3 points and shot 44.3% from 3-point range in the 68 regular-season games he participated in.

In his 10 postseason games, all of his numbers improved as he averaged 17.5 points and shot a whopping 56.9% from 3-point range. Hachimura also averaged 4.0 rebounds and 1.7 assists per game.

His best game of the playoffs was arguably his Game 6 performance against the Rockets. He scored 21 points and went 5-7 from deep, helping LA eliminate Houston.

While he was a player whose flaws were oft-discussed, he was also someone who developed into a valuable role player during his time with the Lakers. Between that and becoming a fan favorite off the court, it’ll be tough to see him don a Clippers jersey next season.

You can follow Edwin on Twitter at @ECreates88 or on Bluesky at @ecreates88.bsky.social.

For the first time in a long time, the Sixers will not participate in the Salt Lake City Summer League, and instead will open play in Vegas.

The Vegas Summer League tips off later this week and the Sixers on Monday announced their roster for the games.

It’s a rookie-heavy roster, with Johni Broome being the only player with NBA experience. The second-year big man is looking to bounce back after an underwhelming rookie campaign which saw him miss time with a torn meniscus late in the regular season.

The headliner of the roster is the 22nd overall pick in the 2026 NBA Draft, Labaron Philon Jr. The rookie out of Alabama will likely factor into the team’s rotation this season, even with the signing of veteran guard Anferenee Simons.

There are a couple names that might like familiar to you true Sixers sickos. Forward Saint Thomas and big man Drew Cisse both spent time with the Delaware Blue Coats last season.

Meanwhile, Duke Miles, a bulldog guard who played his final collegiate season at Vanderbilt, was reportedly signed to an Exhibit 10 contract. That means Miles will be in camp with the Sixers, but will be financially-incentivized to join the Blue Coats over another G League affiliate.

The Sixers begin play this Thursday, July 9, as they go up against the Detroit Pistons at 5:30 p.m. on Amazon Prime. They then play Saturday, July 11, against the Indiana Pacers at 5:30 p.m., and Tuesday, July 14, vs. the Houston Rockets at 4 p.m. Those games will also be in Prime. They’ll close out the slate on Wednesday, July 15, against the Orlando Magic at 4 p.m. on ESPNU.

There will be more games after that. The top-four teams will participate in a playoff. The other 26 teams will play one additional game.

Las Vegas Summer League is only days away and suspense is starting to build as rosters, schedules, and media continues to be released. 

The Raptors first game will be against Boston this Friday at 9pm ET. Leading up to this, let’s take a look at five outcomes we’d like to see from this year’s roster:

1 – A Summer League championship

This one is obvious. Last year we were close, but eventually lost the semifinal game to Sacramento. The roster construction isn’t dissimilar, but had the benefit of a few more players with past NBA experience.

Like most Summer League Teams, Toronto has a combination of sophomore players, this year’s draft picks, undrafted players, and guys with previous NBA or G-League experience looking for a spot. 

Collin Murray-Boyles, Alijah Martin, and Chucky Hepburn, last year’s rookies, will all make an appearance. How much they play is still up for debate, especially CMB, given his phenomenal playoff performance. This could also change based on whether or not they clinch a playoff spot. If they do, it wouldn’t surprise me to see them get extra time.

This year’s draft picks, Allen Graves and Jaden Bradley, should see significant minutes as they already have contracts worked out for next year and this will be their first chance to play against NBA guys. 

Seth Lundy is the only other rostered player with previous NBA experience, who was drafted in the second round in 2023 by the Clippers. The remainder of the roster is composed of rookies: Brandon Angel (previous Summer League experience), Aziz Bandaogo (Raptors 905 G-League international draft pick), Nate Bittle, Nimari Burnett, Jalen Celestine, Tyson Degenhart (905 last year), AJ Hoggard (905 last season), Tyreke Key (905 for the last two seasons), Jamarion Sharp (prior G-League and professional experience), and Malik Thomas. 

While a lot of those names may not be familiar to you or jump off the page, this roster has lots of potential. Solid guards, size, and enough experienced guys to keep them competitive.

2 – Promising back-up guard play

One of the obvious questions about the Raptors’ current construction is at the guard position. Shead is improving in leaps and bounds and hopefully Quickley will have fewer injuries this year. Even still, having another option to slot in behind those guys or in the event of injuries is a must. Alijah Martin is the most obvious choice, especially with his G-League performance last year.

This is the perfect opportunity to let some of these guys get some run against NBA competition. Decision making, distribution, and long range shooting will all be things Toronto can use this season, and any of the guards on this roster could make a case for being the next guy up.

It would also be awesome to see a little bit more of this:

3 – Potential for a seven-footer

The other obvious question about the Raptors’ current construction is centre depth. Losing Mamu is definitely a blow, meaning CMB who’s a bit undersized and Jackson-Davis who barely saw the floor last season. The League seems to be slowly shifting to requiring a 7-footer, in part to guard guys like Wemby, Holmgren, Kessler, and (when he’s healthy) Porzingis. The Raptors don’t have anyone to fit that bill right now, and while it may be a bit of a long shot, there is a trio of 7-footers on this roster that will be fun to watch and could, at a minimum, have potential to make a two-way spot or the 905 roster. This will be a great opportunity to see how these guys are able to 

So far, Jamarion Sharp looks like the frontrunner right now (as you will see in a second), but Nate Bittle, and Aziz Bandaogo both have the height and build to fit the bill.

4 – Allen Graves in a Raptors uniform

Nothing like seeing your first round draft pick suiting up to build suspense for the upcoming season. Plus, like most years, at least half of the fan base has questions about Toronto’s pick, so it would be nice for him to silence some of the doubters with a strong Summer League performance. 

He’s shown a lot defensively, from long range, and operating off the catch from the point in college. Seeing how that could potentially work in our system is super exciting. 

5 – An absolute defensive clinic

If there’s one thing Toronto hangs their hat on, it’s defence. Last year they started rough, but had the fifth-best defence by the end of the season. Martin, Hepburn, Murray-Boyles, and Sharp are among the players on this roster that prioritize and are known for their defensive prowess. Ultimately, everyone here is trying to prove they’re fit for this system and it would be nice to see the guys coming up the pipeline have the same mindset and ability at that end of the court.

It’s also the most fun part of Toronto’s game to watch.

The NBA Draft has come and gone, Free Agency is open, and you all are talking to one another A LOT. 1500 comments on this last discussion page.

I know things start to break, so here’s a new one.

As I’m publishing this, the NBA Free Agency moratorium is ending shortly. That means a lot of reported deals get signed, but perhaps there will be surprises too. Then later this week we’ll have NBA Summer League to cover. Dallas plays Thursday, Saturday, and Monday. A significant cohort of Mavs Moneyball staff is going, so if you’re going, let me know.

The Mavericks actually have a pretty good team, so expect decent enough basketball.

As usual, have fun within this space. Let me know if there are issues.

There’s a specific kind of anxiety that lives in your phone now.

You’re at the grocery store or walking the dog or doing whatever normal people do in July when basketball isn’t happening, and a notification slides down from the top of the screen. Shams Charania, ESPN. You see a player’s name. Kyle Anderson. You see the years. You see the dollar figure. But you can’t see the team. Not until you tap it. Not until you open the app and let the full post load and your stomach does that little half-second gymnastics routine while your brain screams please don’t be Dallas, please don’t be Dallas, please don’t be…

Toronto Raptors.

Oh, thank the basketball gods.

This has happened to me at least five times in the last week. And every single time, the relief has been real, physical, almost spiritual. Because the Mavericks are having a quietly excellent offseason, and a huge part of what makes it excellent is what they haven’t done.

Masai Ujiri’s front office drafted Morez Johnson Jr. at nine. They grabbed Sergio de Larrea later in the first round via trade. They appear committed to holding onto Kyrie Irving as he returns to the floor this year. They traded a heavily protected first-round pick and two future seconds for Santi Aldama, a 25-year-old combo forward who averaged 14 points and nearly seven rebounds last year. They have a year-two Cooper Flagg who won’t turn 20 until December. Dereck Lively II is reportedly 7’3” now with a 7’9” wingspan. The positive ledger is long and it’s real.

But I want to talk about the negative space. The signings that didn’t happen. The alternate timeline.

The Darkest Timeline Has a Name

Because here’s the thing: as dark as the actual timeline got after the Dončić trade, we can imagine a darker one. A timeline where Nico Harrison and Jason Kidd are still running this franchise, scrolling through free agent lists with the same philosophical blinders that produced the worst trade in franchise history and perhaps in professional sports.

Harrison’s front office had a type. If you came up through the AAU circuit, if you were a sneaker-convention fixture, if you were a recognizable NBA name who could be acquired through a relationship rather than through rigorous evaluation, you were in the pipeline and on the dubious trade-target list, where Jrue was perilously close to the Joker. If you were a 20-year-old guard lighting up the ACB in Spain? Probably not on the radar.

The Harrison regime shed its European connective tissue and never replaced it with an overseas find of its own. There was no impactful effort to scout or recruit international talent from overseas that turned over a single gem during that era. The scouting lens was narrowed in its final analysis to who Nico knew or approved of in the abstract, and the results looked like it.

So let’s play a game. Let’s look at a few free agent moves from the last week, imagine how each one might have played out in the somehow-still-here Harrison timeline, and collectively exhale.

Kyle Anderson → Toronto Raptors (1 year, $3.9 million)

Anderson is 32, entering his 13th season, and has been traded to five different teams in the last two years. He’s a solid, unconventional player. In the Harrison timeline, Slow Mo might have been the starting small forward, with Nico calling it “veteran leadership.”

Have a nice season in Toronto, Kyle.

Mike Conley → Boston Celtics (1 year, minimum)

Conley is 38 years old and entering his 20th NBA season. He averaged a career-low 4.5 points in 18 minutes a game last year. He is, by all accounts, a wonderful human being and a respected locker room presence.

He is also the exact player Nico Harrison would have signed instead of trading for Marcus Sasser. I can see the press conference. I can hear the phrase “championship run.” I can feel my soul leaving my body.

Enjoy Boston, Mike.

Keon Ellis → Brooklyn Nets (2 years, $18 million)

Ellis is 26 and a perfectly useful 3-and-D wing who’s a little undersized at 6’4” and not much of a playmaker. He’s not a bad player. He may even be a helpful one in Brooklyn.

That’s the point. A disciplined front office can pass on a decent player because he doesn’t quite fit the build. The old Mavericks too often treated available and familiar as if they were synonyms for sensible. Sometimes the sign of a grown-up front office is not that it avoids obvious disasters. Sometimes it just declines the wrong perfectly fine player at the wrong perfectly fine price.

Good luck in Brooklyn, Keon.

Javonte Green → Detroit Pistons (1 year, $3.95 million)

Green re-signed with Detroit at 32, and this is the one that you can imagine easily in a post-Luka delusional Nico timeline. If he were still here, Harrison could easily be envisioned welcoming Javonte Green as the quintessential “win now charade” signing.

A 30-something journeyman role player who fills a roster spot and lets a GM gesture toward activity without actually building anything. In the Harrison timeline, Green is your sixth man and you’re being told to feel good about it.

Tobias Harris → San Antonio Spurs (2 years, $31 million)

Harris signed with a division rival for $31 million fully guaranteed, pushing his career earnings past $330 million. He’s turning 34 this month. He’s a fine player who will give San Antonio respectable minutes next to Wembanyama.

He’s also the kind of name and price tag that would have had Harrison feeling great about himself at the introductory press conference and Mavericks fans doing cap sheet math by December.

The Spurs can have him. Bon appétit.

Kyle Lowry → Retired

And then there’s Kyle Lowry, who announced his retirement this week. He’s 40 years old. He played 14 games last season as a locker room mentor in Philadelphia. The Raptors are signing him to a one-day contract on Monday so he can retire in Toronto, where he belongs.

In the Harrison timeline, Nico is on the phone before Kyle even gets the chance to schedule that ceremony. He’s pitching a championship run. He’s talking about those 40-year-old knees having one more season in them. He’s describing a veteran mentorship role that somehow also involves 22 minutes a game.

The Raptors are trying to set up a podium, and Nico Harrison would be trying to talk Kyle Lowry out of using it.

What the Negative Space Tells You

None of this is meant to disrespect any of those players. They’ve all had real careers and earned their money. The point is about organizational philosophy, and what it reveals when a front office consistently declines to do the thing that the previous regime would have done reflexively.

The Ujiri front office didn’t sign a single one of those players. They drafted a dynamic frontcourt player from Michigan, whose coach they just hired. They drafted a guard from the top Spanish league who’s drawing blatantly unfair early comparisons to another nifty passer with a Euro league past. They traded for a young combo forward on a team-friendly deal. Everything they’ve done has felt intentional. Even the things that haven’t worked out feel like they came from a plan rather than from panic.

John Hollinger of The Athletic named the Mavericks free agency “losers” this week, arguing that the frontcourt additions are making Cooper Flagg’s development trajectory as difficult as possible.

I think that read misses the phase of the build.

The Mavericks are rebuilding. You don’t pass on Morez Johnson Jr. at nine because Daniel Gafford is still on the roster. You don’t decline to trade for a 25-year-old combo forward at Aldama’s price because PJ Washington is still here. Those are veteran contracts, and veteran contracts move. There are months between now and the start of the regular season, and there is at least another year before genuine playoff aspirations should extend beyond a first-round exit at best.

Ujiri has been in the job for five proverbial minutes. The roster has open surgery scheduled. Diagnosing the patient mid-procedure and calling it a failure is the kind of analysis that sounds smart in a column and evaporates the moment a single trade clears the logjam that everyone, including the front office, already knows is there.

I’d love to be proven wrong on the timeline and see meaningful basketball deep into the playoffs out of nowhere. But calling this offseason a loss because the rebuild isn’t finished in week one? Bleak and dour stuff from a guy who should know better.

The Mavericks aren’t done building. The offseason still has moves to make and questions to answer. But right now, every time a Shams notification slides down your screen and the team turns out to be someone else, you can exhale.

The adults are running this.

Have a nice season, gentlemen. Genuinely. Just not here.

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It's a 6-pack of action in the NBA Summer League on Monday, with most eyes set on a dynamite matchup between No. 2 pick Darryn Peterson and No. 3 pick Cameron Boozer, as the Jazz take on the Grizzlies.

Other top 10 players that should be in action include Sacramento's Darius Acuff Jr, the debut of Brooklyn's Mikel Brown Jr (no. 6), and Atlanta's Kingston Flemings, the no. 9 pick.

Check out my NBA Summer League Predictions and free NBA picks for Monday, July 6.

NBA Summer League predictions for July 6

Pick
Memphis Grizzlies moneyline	-133
Sacramento Kings moneyline	+150
Atlanta Hawks moneyline	+100

Today's Summer League Picks

Grizzlies moneyline (-133 at Kalshi)

Utah Jazz rookie Darryn Peterson starred in his debut in an overtime win over Atlanta, pouring in 21 points on a cool 11-for-21 shooting.

Cameron Boozer looked great in his debut too, piling up 15 points on 7-for-11 shooting, four boards and four assists in a blowout win over OKC.

Different positions, but this is the first of many head-to-head matchups we will see at the pro level, and I think both want to shine.

Peterson wins the duel, but this Memphis Grizzlies roster is a little supercharged, with legit star Cedric Coward on the roster, and former 2023 Round 1 picks Olivier Maxence-Prosper and Taylor Hendricks battling for roster spots.

Kings moneyline (+150 at Kalshi)

Darius Acuff quite literally fit his pre-draft profile to a T in his debut: he led the Sacramento Kings in scoring with 25 points and wasn't bashful about hoisting them up, going 9-for-29 from the field while also adding three assists.

As I predicted, the hungry Milwaukee Bucks hammered the split Warriors squad, but then followed that up by getting beaten by 20 points by the Nets.

Acuff sat out the Kings' 91-85 win over Warriors Blue, and they may have unearthed a rotational big in Victor Lakhin.

The 6-foot-11 Russian, who went undrafted last year, led the Kings with 12 points, six rebounds and an assist.

The Bucks have yet to showcase their lottery picks, Braydon Burries and Nate Ament, in Summer League play, but the Kings should roll here.

Hawks moneyline (+100 at Kalshi)

The Oklahoma City Thunder Summer League roster consists of their three 2026 draft picks: Aday Mara, Bennett Stirtz, and Otega Oweh; 2025 2nd-Rounder Brooks Barnhizer; and 14 undrafted players, ranging from as far back as 2022 (Buddy Boeheim!) to eight from this last draft.

It's an experimental roster – as the Thunder are contender-ready, with even their top draft picks likely riding pine behind a slew of talent.

It's a different story for the Atlanta Hawks, who need their picks to fill legit roster spaces on a team that should be in the NBA Eastern Conference mix.

The three expected to make the most impact looked great in their debut.

No. 9 pick Kingston Flemings had 14 points, nine assists and four steals, while 13th pick Zuby Ejiofor had eight points and 11 boards (seven on the offensive end). Second-year man Asa Newell tied for the scoring lead with 15.

They should again be prominent over a Thunder side that's really just trying to catch some kind of lightning in a bottle.

Monday’s NBA Summer League parlay

Grizzlies moneyline

Kings moneyline

Hawks moneyline

+776 at Kalshi

This article originally appeared on Covers.com, read the full article here and view our best betting sites or check out our top sportsbook promos.

Five days ago, the Boston Celtics agreed to trade Jaylen Brown for Paul George and draft compensation. The trade could not be made official until today, so the team hasn’t been able to officially discuss the details or explain the thought process behind the trade. That airspace has invited rumors, inuendo, conspiracy theories, educated guesses (and some uneducated ones), and every opinion under the sun.

At 4PM today we’ll hear from Brad Stevens and Bill Chisholm directly. We’ll get their official statements on the trade and we’ll hear them respond to many questions. I’m just not entirely sure if we’ll hear the full truth of what transpired and what it means for the future of the franchise.

I don’t have a crystal ball, but here are some categories of subjects that are sure to be addressed.

Financial Flexibility

One reason they may have decided to move on from Brown was his contract. Several smart people have pointed out that he’s getting supermax money and probably wouldn’t be ranked by many as a top 5 player in the league (or pick your range). Which makes him a bit overpaid in a league where the 2nd apron is treated as a defacto hard cap. Sure, even the biggest Jaylen Brown fans might accept that, but that’s why you lean into cheaper, high value contracts (like the guys on rookie deals and Payton Pritchard who’s on one of the highest value deals in the league). It also doesn’t explain why you would take back Paul George, widely considered one of the worst contracts in basketball.

I have a feeling that Brad Stevens will talk about flexibility on some level, because flexibility is one of his favorite buzzwords. Chisholm will field questions about how much of this was an ownership mandate, but it doesn’t really come across as a cost cutting move because they didn’t actually cut much cost in the deal.

We probably won’t get the full picture of how much money influenced this deal.

Analytics

One of the most popular topics being discussed in the aftermath of this trade has been the role of analytics in the evaluation of Jaylen’s value. The “well actually” articles and data analysis deep dives have centered around his advanced analytics that can be looked at to paint a pretty negative picture of Jaylen’s value to a basketball team.

I’m not going to go into detail pro or con on those numbers. I think analytics are very much a critical part of the game today and need to be considered as part of the overall analysis. The limitations to Jaylen’s game are well documented and don’t always need numbers to back them up. But it has always seemed to me that his positive impact almost always outweighed his struggles.

This is going to be a very delicate thing to address at the press conference. How do they justify the deal with numbers without it looking like they are trashing their former pillar of the team going out?

If he is really a net negative on the court, why did the team invest so much into him in the first place? Why wouldn’t they have traded him earlier? What changed and when did it change? Again, I’m skeptical we’ll hear the full truth about how much the numbers influenced this decision.

The Human Element

There are a lot of other theories and rumors that I’m just going to lump together under the heading of “the Human Element.”

Did Jaylen want his own team? It has been reported that he never asked for a trade, so I’m guessing that won’t be a stated reason. We don’t know how much he indicated a desire to the team to move on or if he was planning on demanding a trade later.

Was the team frustrated with the way Jaylen spoke about the past season on his twitch streams? Honestly, this seems weak even writing it down. Many pearl clutching words have been written and spoken about his “favorite season” comments, which were addressed by him and easily explained away. I don’t buy that this was a big issue and I highly doubt that it will be named explicitly by the team as a reason for the trade.

Did Jayson Tatum want to move on? Personally, I doubt this has anything to do with it and even if it was, (for so many reasons) they would never admit it to be true or have anything to do with the trade.

Jaylen was an extremely popular player with the fanbase and in the community of Boston. The team will undoubtably be very careful with anything they say about him. If anything, they could and should lean into celebrating him as a person and beloved member of the franchise. So if there’s anything personal going on behind the scenes, we won’t hear about it today.

Style of Play

This might be the only thing that makes some sense to me, but on the other hand it doesn’t. Maybe Jaylen shoots too many contested two pointers for the analytics team to be comfortable with. Of course, those are sometimes the only shots that you can get in the playoffs when all the better shots are taken away. So it helps to have a guy that can make those shots.

Brad Stevens stressed the need to put more pressure on the rim. Well, Jaylen does a much better job of that than Paul George, who has evolved into more of a deep threat perimeter player than anything else.

Maybe the team wasn’t confident that Jaylen would be ok sliding back into the 1B role he had before (related to the above section on The Human Element) and George will be happy being a 2nd or 3rd option. That’s not a great reason to make this trade either, and most likely won’t be named as a primary reason.

Timing

One big question that should absolutely be addressed is “why now?” The word that keeps coming to mind is “desperation.” By all accounts, it seemed like the team did not have good offers for Jaylen but were urgently motivated to complete a deal now. Why?

In any negotiation, you need to have a feel for what your walking away price is and be prepared to walk away if you don’t get it. Somehow, they either put a much lower value on Jaylen than most would have expected, or they were so desperate to get a deal done that they accepted under market value. Couldn’t they have gotten this same kind of deal later in the summer or even at the trade deadline?

Are there other deals coming? If so when? And why couldn’t this have waited to be combined with those additional moves?

Not sure if we’ll get satisfactory answers for this topic, but it will be interesting to hear their responses.

Must See TV

One thing I know, I will be watching and listening very carefully to what is said (and isn’t said). We need answers from the Celtics leadership. I’m just not sure if the answers will tell the full story or if they will be satisfactory to fans.

The cognitive dissonance of this still puzzles me. Brad Stevens has “won” so many deals over the years and has built up so much trust. It is just so jarring to see him “lose” one of this magnitude. What does that mean for the near and long term future? Is there anything that he can say in this press conference that is going to restore part of that trust? I guess we’ll see.

We will, of course, report on the presser. Feel free to use this post as an open thread for comments below.

Ex-Celtic reveals Jayson Tatum's reaction to Jaylen Brown trade originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

It’s no secret that most Boston Celtics fans aren’t pleased with Wednesday’s trade that sent superstar Jaylen Brown to the Philadelphia 76ers. But what does Brown’s longtime teammate Jayson Tatum think of the move?

Tatum finally broke his silence on Friday with a social media tribute to Brown. On Monday, former Celtics guard Jeff Teague — an ex-teammate of Tatum and Brown in 2020-21 — shed more light on how Tatum feels about the C’s sending his co-star to an Eastern Conference rival.

“I talked to my boy yesterday, my boy JT motivated,” Teague said. “It ain’t no slight because he was legit like, ‘Damn, can’t believe that s— went down.’ You know what I mean? That’s some bulls—, really.

“You know what I said, I was like , ‘S—, what you gonna do? I was like, ‘S—, the pressure’s on now, killer.'”

You can watch the clip here.

Tatum has every reason to be irked by the trade. Not only did the Celtics part ways with Brown after 10 seasons, but they also shipped him to the team they blew a 3-1 series lead against in Round 1 of this year’s playoffs. With Brown now on their side, the Sixers will be an even tougher opponent in 2026-27.

Paul George will look to step up as the new 1B to Tatum’s 1A next season. The 36-year-old veteran averaged 17.3 points while shooting 43.9 percent from the floor in 37 games for Philly last season. Brown, meanwhile, set career highs in points per game (28.7), rebounds per game (6.9), and assists per game (5.1) in 71 games to propel Boston to the No. 2 seed in the East.

Tatum will have plenty on his shoulders as he looks to help the C’s overcome Brown’s departure. After missing most of the 2025-26 season with an Achilles injury, he’ll reprise his role as Boston’s No. 1 option.

The real question is, which members of Boston’s supporting cast will step up to help the team exceed expectations yet again?

Welcome to Inside the Suns, your weekly deep-down analysis of the current Phoenix Suns team. Each week, the Fantable — a round table of Bright Siders — gives their takes on the Suns’ latest issues and news.

This week, please join us in welcoming Zenzino as the newest member of the Fantable!

Fantable Questions of the Week

Q1: Because of his past, the acquisition of Miles Bridges has not been accepted well by many fans. Do you think it was a mistake by the front office?

Zenzino: It was jarring, to be sure. After all the talk about ‘character first’, this seems, at first glance, to be out of alignment.

At this writing, the trade is not official yet. I’m guessing we’ll be getting a press conference on or after the 6th. My opinion on this will depend on two things: how BG addresses Miles Bridges’ character and how Miles works to fit in during the season.

You can’t change the past. You can only move forward. Bridges has completed his mandated probation, domestic violence classes, parenting classes, and community service. For the past 2 years, he’s stayed out of trouble and worked to redeem himself in Charlotte. Sounds like he was largely successful. As I stated in a previous discussion, he’s going to have to do it again, probably to a lesser degree.

I’m a big believer in earning second chances, emphasis on ‘earning’. The stain can never be completely removed, but the FO addressing it head-on and Bridges demonstrating that he has learned from his mistakes will go a long way.

Ashton: I am already on the comment record for grading this trade as an F. I really have not let up in my criticism of this trade inside further comment remarks.

Let me point out the positives of the trade.

1. (Throws up in mouth)
2. Sorry all, I can’t do it. I am not really sure what benefit the Suns got in return. Cap space?

But seriously, what was the Front Office thinking? The Suns were supposed to be rehabilitating…er…rebuilding. That was the plan, and it was reasonable. Instead, they massively overpaid for a rehabbing project. I really hope the change of scenery does it, but it gets back to “do Zebras change their stripes?”. Can FO executives not make bad decisions on the golf course when the beverage cart rolls out in the summer?

I am going to stop here as I was looking for a bar of soap to wash my mouth out for the rest of my post and it turned out to be a coffee-flavored bar of soap. Somebody gave it to me as a stocking stuffer, so it could work? But the idea of coffee-flavored soap is as stupid as this trade.

To sum it up, I lost a lot of faith in the FO with this trade.

OldAz: For starters, it’s hard to blame any fan that does not want to root for accused wife-beaters, child abusers, or even just hot-headed bad dudes. Mr. Bridges has certainly earned every bit of being in that category with his on and off-court issues, regardless of what context or how much the others might have contributed to those incidents. His exploits have far too often spilled over onto innocent bystanders like the 16-year-old fan hit in the face by his mouth guard in his 2022 on-court tantrum, and the children who witnessed the incident with Bridges and their mother. At a minimum, we are talking about a dude with massive self-control and anger issues in his past.

With all that said, I tend to avoid these conversations in all areas of entertainment. I don’t look to athletes to be role models, just like I don’t look to actors or performers for advice on life or politics. If we are honest and had consistency in not rooting for or supporting bad people, then our sporting entertainment options would probably be limited to youth sporting events (where even some parents are not allowed to attend) or watching pick-up games at the Y (and even then, many of those dudes would be disqualified if we knew all their darkest acts).

As for the Suns’ decision, I will just say that it is a huge gamble. This is a franchise that has been to the precipice of winning it all with an overly likable team, and was there before with a team that (at the time) had Charles “I’m not a role model” Barkley, whom everyone loved because his on-court impact was greater than his (again, at the time) off-court antics.

It is also a team that shipped out good players who went on to have long and successful careers over far less than what Bridges has been accused of.

Grayson Allen and Dillon Brooks came with a lot of negative attention and became fan favorites, but all of their “negativity” was based on hard-nosed basketball within the game. Bridges brings that and a whole lot more for fans to “get over”.

In my opinion, fans will end up being forgiving for the most part if he plays well and shows a modicum of contrition and desire to grow and be a better person. However, no one really believes that Bridges is the final missing piece that puts them back playing deep into the playoffs, so this bar for playing well may be impossibly high. As I said, I think this is a huge gamble by the Suns, and as a fan, I hope it works out well for the team and Bridges.

Rod: I’m taking a wait-and-see position on this one. Yes, there’s been a good amount of backlash from many fans, but I’m willing to wait until the season gets underway before calling it a mistake or a win or something in-between. While some fans are likely never going to view this as anything more than a mistake, I want to see Bridges’ fit with and impact on the team before calling it that. Like it or not, he’s a member of the team now, and what he does on the court is how I’ll measure this trade as a mistake or not.

Q2: In your opinion, from a pure basketball point of view, have the roster changes the Suns made (so far) actually improved the team?

Zenzino: Short answer: I don’t know.

How do we define ‘improved’? Better record? Higher seed? 2nd Round of Playoffs? Finishing stronger?
I was a very vocal ‘run it back’ supporter. I felt that they would get better with the same roster. The injuries to Green and Brooks were anomalous. I expected to see more of the ‘rookies’. A more experienced Ott. More time playing together. The list goes on.

On paper, they have improved. But, I have concerns.

• Chemistry – In addition to the grit, one of the big things that was a breath mighty wind of fresh air was how this team obviously liked each other and loved playing together. That locker room chemistry was a huge part of what made them so much fun to watch last season. My hope is that this environment is something that Bridges embraces and thrives in.
• Shot Distribution – Green and Brooks averaged around 17 shots per game last season, and Booker and Bridges averaged around 18. That’s almost 80% of shots per game from only 4 players, and no one should be averaging close to what Booker averages. I would like to see offensive-minded Book from the pre-KD trade this season. Brooks came here wanting to prove he has an offensive game, so I don’t see him backing off and Green and Bridges are volume scorers; they need those attempts.
• Playing Time – I was thinking that Man Man and Rasheer would get some solid minutes in the rotation this season and maybe Sheer even cracks the starting lineup. Now, I don’t see that happening. More than ever, it looks like the Suns are working the ’two timelines’ game, and I’m not sure if that ever works out.

The trade brings with it more questions that can only be answered throughout the season. If Green and Bridges can work some downhill chemistry, they could be devastating with rim pressure, not to mention highlights. That pressure could open up Book to be the mid-range assassin he built his reputation with. Kennard was a great (and improbable) signing. He’s definitely going to have to get his shot attempts up.

All that being said, I am cautiously optimistic. Despite all the angst during the playoffs, this coaching staff and FO have earned my trust this past season. We spend a lot of time thinking about the goal, but the journey is what keeps us entertained, and I’m here for it.

Ashton: Losing RO and GA hurt, but Kennard was a good pickup to fill the shooting vacuum.

But this whole buzzword of being a 50-win team is ludicrous. 45 wins last year was ludicrous, and I would caution against expecting any more than 40 wins in a rebuilt Western Conference. I want to see how the final trade cycle ends, as well as Summer League viewing to give my final prognostication on the Suns win total.

But, for the most part, I like the direction that the Suns have taken with keeping the roster intact. Until, whatever Q1 was.

OldAz: I 100% think they will be better (although it may take some time to see it). The one area that they have stepped back is obviously shooting. Kennard helps there, but only when he is on the court. And even then, Kennard is 2″ taller than Allen, who was often playing in the front court last season.

By swapping Royce O’Neale for Bridges, many point out that Bridges is almost the same size, but they ignore that Bridges has played both forward positions his entire career, whereas RO was clearly out of his depth when he was matched up with the 2nd largest player for the opponent. In this way, Bridges is a lot like Brooks as both are undersized when playing the “power forward” role, but both are strong enough and athletic enough to pull it off. When the Suns were going well last season, all of Brooks’ minutes were at the PF position.

Also, by reducing the log jam of guards at the top of the rotation, Fleming should have a clearer path to earn playing time if (or when, from my perspective) he proves worthy. One of the centers flanked by ANY combination of Brooks, Bridges, Fleming, Dunn, or even Highsmith is superior to what Ott was running out there for long stretches late last season, which was a center surrounded by Allen, O’Neale, or Goodwin along with 2 smaller guards. Yes, they have to solve the shooting, and yes, on paper this is a lot of high-volume, low-efficiency scorers, but they did what I and many fans were asking for by getting longer and more athletic and clearing the way for some of the youngsters to contribute more. In the long run, I think this will make them better.

Rod: Yes, I believe they have. They lost a bit of their downtown shooting but have picked up some bigger bodies and added more quality depth to the roster…especially if we see even small jumps by Fleming and Maluach this season (which I have no reason to bet against). Last season, this was a tough team to beat…IF their threes were falling. If those threes weren’t falling, they faltered. They had no one other than Green (who missed most of the season) who really attacked the basket. They weren’t balanced offensively, but this season they have moved to correct that.

I don’t expect the Suns to be a far better team than last year, but still better. I believe the key to just how much better will rest upon Ott’s shoulders and his ability to best use the new tools he now has on the roster.

And there are some other teams in the West that are still in the process of making changes this summer. Some of them might look good on paper, but who knows how they’ll actually look on the court. What other teams are doing now will play a part in the Suns’ degree of success — or lack thereof — in 2026-27.

Q3: The Suns have moved early on everything this offseason. They could stand pat until training camp, but do you think they should do so?

Zenzino: I think they are done for now and I’m good with that.

They have a(n over) full roster (the news just broke about Pat Spencer). I don’t think there are any margin moves at this point that would make a difference. And I am absolutely in the camp of let’s see what a full season of Jalen Green looks like before we give up on him.

From the looks of it, they did everything quickly on purpose. They didn’t wait around for the FA market to develop. They went after what they wanted straight out of the gate. Ever since the season ended, the whole team was ready to get back to work, and I think they wanted to solidify the roster asap so they could do just that.

Ashton: Yeah, that works for me. BG gets an early vacation, and everyone else gets to gel with teammates over the summer. There are still a lot of NBA teams trying to finalize their rosters, and who the heck knows where LeBron ends up. Not interested.

No further movements needed other than to finalize the two-ways. Pat Spencer has one. That does seem like a good pick-up. There are two spots left, and they can only play 50 games on the “extended audition” for the regular roster.

OldAz: This totally depends on what opportunities arise. I think they are set and can totally go into the season with this roster and hope to be competitive and even build on what they did last season. This isn’t predicting any championships, and even second round of the playoffs would be a total stretch, but they are moving forward and not making themselves worse IMO. However, they have to stay engaged with what else is out there.

If someone talks themselves into wanting Green or Brooks or any of the current roster and it brings back an upgrade (starting PG who can also shoot/score, or a bigger PF/wing), then you have to be ready to move. This probably does not look like what fans throw out there on Twitter/X, as fans often get infatuated with older players who are beyond their primes and are stuck seeing them through the lens of that player’s no-longer-existent prime. This may look more like swapping young players who both need a new start, but fit a different role in roster construction.

If that opportunity presents itself, they need to be ready always. If it does not, they should stand pat and go into the season comfortable that they executed on what they wanted to accomplish.

Rod: I don’t think they will and believe they shouldn’t. They may not actually make any more moves, but they shouldn’t take the rest of the offseason off and should be continuously working the phones in search of any possible upgrade over what they already have. What that move might be, I won’t speculate on, but you never know what might pop up between now and the beginning of the 2026-27 season.

As always, many thanks to our Fantable members for all their extra effort this week!

Quotes of the Week

“It’s special being from the Valley. Just watching [the Suns] through the years, seeing how much better they’ve gotten. To be part of that journey now is a super special moment for me. I’m just blessed to be in this position. That next morning, I was still trying to take it in and still couldn’t believe I’m a Phoenix Sun. Still can’t believe it, honestly. I’m just super excited.” – Koa Peat

“The most important thing for us, with Koa, is that he plays with passion, he plays with energy. There’s a juice about him when he’s on the court. I know he brings that every single day. The impact he has on the court with winning basketball is critical.” – Brian Gregory

Suns Trivia/History

On July 5, 1988, the Phoenix Suns officially signed power forward Tom Chambers, formerly of the Seattle Supersonics, to a 5-year $9 million contract. This was the first unrestricted free agent signing in NBA history.

On July 7, 1982, the Suns traded PF Truck Robinson for PF Maurice Lucas of the NY Knicks. Truck had been with Phoenix for three seasons, averaging 18.4 points and 9.6 rebounds as a Sun but had struggled in the 1982 NBA Playoffs and criticized head coach John MacLeod for a lack of minutes.

On July 11, 2012, Steve Nash was traded to the Los Angeles Lakers for a 2013 1st round draft pick (Nemanja Nedovic was later selected), a 2013 2nd round draft pick (Alex Oriakhi was later selected), a 2014 2nd round draft pick (Johnny O’Bryant was later selected) and a 2018 1st round draft pick (Mikal Bridges was later selected). In 2015, the 2018 1st round pick was traded to Philadelphia as part of a three-team trade that brought Brandon Knight to the Suns from Milwaukee. Many fans were upset when that draft pick was traded but later delighted when they still got the player selected with it (Bridges) in a draft night trade with Philadelphia in 2018.

On July 11, 2015, Devin Booker made his NBA Summer League debut for the Suns in Las Vegas against the Washington Wizards. He had 12 points and 4 rebounds on a disappointing shooting night making only 4 of 11 shots and missing all four of his three-point attempts. Booker’s teammate-of-the-future and fellow rookie, Kelly Oubre Jr., also had his Summer League debut that night and led the Wizards with 20 points and 10 rebounds. Archie Goodwin led Phoenix in scoring with 22 points in the 86-77 Summer Suns win.

Important Future Dates

July 6 – Moratorium ends, official free agent contract signings can begin
July 9-19 – NBA 2K Summer League 2026 in Las Vegas
July 10 – Suns vs. Trail Blazers 8:00 PM (local), 11:00 PM (ET) ESPNU
July 12 – Suns vs. Pelicans 12:00 PM (local), 3:00 PM (ET) ESPN2
July 13 – Suns vs. Bucks 7:00 PM (local), 10:00 PM (ET) Prime
July 15 – Suns vs. Pistons 3:00 PM (local), 6:00 PM (ET) ESPNU
The Suns will play a fifth game based on the results of their first four.
Late September (dates TBD) – NBA Training Camps open

The Boston Celtics’ decision to trade Jaylen Brown to the Philadelphia 76ers for what initially felt like a paltry return was so shocking in the moment that a lot of people felt compelled to lie to rationalize it. The prevailing wisdom was that Boston had to trade their All-NBA wing because they already offered him to the Milwaukee Bucks for Giannis Antetokounmpo, and in doing so broke the trust between the two parties. I’m not buying that, because Shams Charania maintained Brown never requested a trade even after the Bucks chose Miami’s (much better) offer. Long-time talking head Collin Cowherd reported that Brown has a “disease” where he thinks he’s the smartest guy in the room. That quote just scans as racist, and also doesn’t get the real reason Boston traded Brown.

It’s easy to understand why the average NBA fan or analyst thinks Jaylen Brown is an elite player. He helped power the Celtics to 56 wins last season while Jayson Tatum was recovering from a torn Achilles, finishing No. 6 in MVP voting in the process. He helped the Celtics win the 2024 championship, and was named NBA Finals MVP for his efforts.

How could the Celtics possibly trade a guy like that for two first-round picks and an even worse contract in Paul George? Well, it’s because Boston’s front office thinks Brown is massively overrated by fans and media. Apparently the rest of the NBA agrees, considering the Celtics reportedly shopped him to the entire league, and this was the best offer they could get.

The sticker shock was real when the deal was announced. That’s all the Celtics could get!? The trade grades industrial complex was not kind to Boston. ESPN gave the Celtics a D+ and the Sixers an A-. CBS Sports gave Boston a D- and Philly an A+. The Sporting News gave the Celtics a C- for the deal. I gave the Celtics a C+ and the Sixers an A- in my instant grades, which somehow made me one of the highest media members on the deal. Other smart basketball writers were immediately calling me out, asking if I was okay and touting this as the most “lopsided trade since Luka.”

By the next morning, I wish I had been a lot higher on the deal for Boston. I would give both sides a B now if I regraded it. I think there’s a strong chance the Celtics actually won the trade.

The simple version for why the Celtics traded Brown is because he’s a good player, but a bad asset. He’s owed $180 million over the next three years, and the Celtics decided their team wasn’t good enough right now with him on that deal to win a championship. In this version of the CBA, it’s hard for teams to have massive contracts like that on their cap sheet if the player isn’t elite. By Steph Noh’s salary model, Brown is worth $41 million while making $57 million, bleeding $16 million per year in value. The Celtics opted for more long-term flexibility with the draft picks and George, whose contract is a year shorter.

Who’s to say Brown isn’t elite? He averaged 29-7-5! He won NBA Finals MVP! Well, if you’re reading this article, you already know this is a conversation about “analytics.” Brown simply doesn’t grade out very well in the advanced metrics that have now overtaken NBA front offices. This trade feels like a watershed moment for the analytics movement, and if Boston is still very good next season (which they should be) and if Philly falls short of an NBA Finals berth (which is likely to happen), this trade will be remembered as the moment when basketball analytics went fully mainstream.

Why did the Celtics trade Brown? I don’t think it’s because he believes he’s the smartest guy in the room, or because they couldn’t repair the relationship. It’s more because Brown finished with a -1.6 RAPM last season. By time decay RAPM, Brown ranks No. 270 in the league. What’s RAPM? It stands for “regularized adjusted plus-minus,” and it’s a metric that doesn’t consider traditional box score numbers like points and rebounds, instead measuring a player’s individual impact on their team’s scoring margin per 100 possessions. It’s adjusted for the strength of teammates and opponents, and features “ridge regression” to filter out statistical noise.

What this essentially comes down to is that the Celtics are better with Brown off the court. If it happened in one or two years, that might be a fluke. Instead, Boston is better with Brown on the bench when accounting for his entire 10-year career.

Why have the Celtics been better with Brown off the floor? It’s because Brown negatively impacts Boston’s turnover rate and second chance points on offense, while also negatively impacting their opponent’s true shooting percentage, takeaway rate, and second-chance points given up on defense. Through this lens, the advanced metrics are easier to understand: it’s bad to turn the ball over and give up offensive rebounds. There are simply a lot of holes in Brown’s game that are covered up by this scoring.

The turnovers are a major issue. Brown’s “scoring turnover percentage” was 10.3 percent last season, which ranked in the 1st percentile of the league. His “creation adjusted turnover percentage” was 9.6 percent, which ranked in the 36th percentile . Brown isn’t a good playmaker for his teammates, either. He averaged 1.9 potential assists per minute, which ranked in the 15th percentile of the league. His assist-to-turnover ratio of +0.92 was ninth-best on the Celtics and No. 150 league-wide.

That’s just offense. Brown is even worse on defense, where his spacey off-ball defense leads to tons of breakdowns. People have been noticing Brown’s bad off-ball defense for years, but they can usually point to his strong on-ball defense to show his value. If you think about defense on a team level, defending off the ball is a lot more important than defending on the ball, because every player spends a lot more time doing it. At its core, defense is a team accomplishment. Being able to guard at the point of attack is obviously a valuable skill, but over a long sample, breakdowns off the ball hurt the team a lot more than staying strong on-ball when teams go at you.

The other important point about Brown’s departure is that the Celtics are simply redistributing his touches to other players. People have laughed at the idea that Payton Pritchard can be the Celtics’ Jalen Brunson, but one similarity they both have is elite turnover suppression. Pritchard’s assist-to-turnover ratio was +7.2, which was No. 1 in the entire NBA. By replacing Brown’s time on ball with more Pritchard, the Celtics are immediately gaining a turnover advantage they didn’t previously enjoy. It will also be interesting to see if Derrick White can shoot the ball better now, assuming he gets to play in better rhythm without such a high-usage teammate. Brown’s impact on his teammates sure wasn’t great.

It’s understandable if you think this all sounds like bullshit. The thing is, the Celtics are widely considered to have a top-2 front office in the NBA alongside the Thunder, and they apparently believe in it. In ripping Boston for the trade, there’s a lot of people who believe they’re smarter than Brad Stevens, Mike Zarren, and Dave Lewin. I respect having conviction in your takes, but chances are those guys are going to beat the NBA consensus more times than not, because they’ve already proven to be really, really good at this whole team-building thing.

The Celtics are probably going to be damn good next season. In fact, in early July, I think they have a pretty good chance to be the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference. They’re essentially replacing Brown with a full season of Tatum while adding Mitchell Robinson and Paul George, and maybe even getting some additional growth from their young players like Hugo Gonzalez, Jordan Walsh, and Baylor Scheierman. With the Brown trade, the Celtics are leaning even further into their identity of chucking threes and crashing the offensive glass. George is a better spot-up three-point shooter than Brown. Robinson is one of the game’s best offensive rebounders. Eliminating all of Brown’s mid-range jumpers — he ranked in the 98th percentile of midrange frequency, per Cleaning the Glass — is one way to help the Celtics address another problem that has constantly plagued them: the need to get to the rim more.

You win basketball games by getting more scoring chances than your opponent, and by being more efficient with your scoring chances than your opponent. Through that lens, the idea of the Celtics improving without Brown really isn’t that hard to believe.

A good front office makes a trade a year early rather than a year late. That’s what the Celtics did here. In the process, they’ve saddled one of their biggest rivals with another bad contract while gaining more future draft picks from them. My quick list of the “least team friendly” contracts in the NBA right now would include Joel Embiid, De’Aaron Fox, and Brown. The Sixers have two of those guys. This better work for Philly quickly, because if it doesn’t, the bill is going to come due really quick.

If basketball is played on spreadsheets now, why even watch? The thing about analytics is they’re designed to capture truth over a long, large sample. In the NBA, championships are determined over a much shorter sample called the playoffs. Anything can happen in the playoffs, when the old axiom of “it’s a make or miss league” takes on greater importance. The Celtics might math-ball their way to a lot of regular season success, but they will have different issues come playoff time. I’d be shocked if they make the 2027 NBA Finals even if I think they may end up as the No. 1 seed.

When the Celtics lose in the playoffs, the people who bashed the Brown trade will take a victory lap. I’m not sure that will be deserved considering the Celtics just lost in the first-round as a favorite with Brown as their best player this past season. When the Sixers lose in the playoffs, the analytics crowd will say they were right, and that taking on Brown wasn’t worth it. This is how most things end, with both sides declaring victory and no true winners having been decided.

On a broader level, I think the Jaylen Brown trade will mark the moment when more fans and analysts fully embrace analytics. The end game here is probably the league office deciding to make some rule changes to make the game more watchable as teams continue to buy into what the numbers are telling them. Baseball has already done this to great effect.

I understand the hesitancy to embrace some of this stuff for fans and media. Listen, I think I have a pretty good eye test too after covering high school, college, NBA, and WNBA basketball for this site since 2012. I’m not smart enough to build one of these fancy data models, but I’m also not stupid enough to discount them. Basketball has been slowly building toward embracing analytics for the last 10 or 15 years. Something tells me the Brown trade will accelerate the movement.

The Warriors can’t waste another season for Steph Curry. 

They need to go all in on trying to acquire LeBron James, which means they need to get Anthony Davis. 

James reportedly would be much more interested in going to Golden State if they acquire Davis, whom he played alongside on the Lakers for 5 ½ seasons, winning a championship in 2020. 

The Warriors need to make it happen. 

Free agency is flying past them, and they virtually have the same roster they had last season. Curry will turn 39 during the upcoming season. Their only chance to compete for another championship is adding James — and Davis — to their roster. 

Acquiring Davis would mean trading Jimmy Butler for salary-matching purposes. It would mean they’d have to give up multiple first-round picks and pick swaps. It would mean they’d dent their future. 

But it would also mean the sunset of Curry’s career wouldn’t be wasted.

Curry, who’s widely considered the greatest shooter of all time, is still a top-10 player. The Warriors need to give him a real chance to win his fifth ring. They need to take some risks. 

They kept the band together by re-signing longtime coach Steve Kerr. Now they have to give the band a chance to really sing. 

For the Warriors, acquiring the oft-injured Davis is widely considered foolish around the league. 

He’s 33 years old. He appeared in just 20 games last season for the Mavericks before being traded to the Wizards in February. His contract is worth $58 million this season and a nearly $63 million player option for 2027-28. In other words, it’s gigantic. 

But what other option do the Warriors have to vastly improve their roster and compete for a title?

As for giving up first-round picks, yes, that’s a tough pill to swallow. But it’s the only way they can complete this blockbuster deal. Not pulling the trigger means they’re going to tread water for another season. It means mediocrity.

Other teams are taking big risks.

Look at what the Lakers paid for Walker Kessler: $130 million over four years AND two first-round picks and two swaps. Was that a great deal? No way. Was it worth it for them to give Luka Doncic his dream center and a shot at competing in the West? Clearly. 

As currently constructed, there’s no way the Warriors can get past the elite teams in the West. If they convinced James to come aboard and traded for Davis, they’d have a shot.

Even though James will turn 42 next season, he’s still capable of being the best player on the court on any given night. Last season, he averaged 20.9 points, 6.1 rebounds and 7.2 assists. He pretty much single-handedly carried the Lakers past the Rockets in the first round of the playoffs. 

James changes the Warriors’ ceiling. He’d bring so much business to The Bay. Imagine how much people would pay to watch James and Curry share the court? They’d be the hottest ticket in the league.

As for Davis, he’s vastly underrated here.

Let’s not forget that when Davis is healthy, he’s an absolute force on both ends of the court. He’s a 10-time All-Star, five-time All-Defensive Team selection and a three-time league leader in blocks. 

He arguably should’ve won a Defensive Player of the Year award as well.

Davis’ stock plummeted when the Lakers traded him to the Mavericks for Doncic in February 2025. Since then, he has been injury-riddled. He has been the butt of jokes. 

Next season, Davis is going to be out for revenge, especially if you put him alongside James, Curry and defensive wizard Draymond Green. If each of those guys believed they had a real shot to win, they’d each elevate their games. They’d be dangerous.

The Warriors must go all in. 

And they must act fast. 

It’s clear the Warriors are falling out of the James sweepstakes. 

James’ agent, Rich Paul, is a mastermind at controlling narratives. In an episode of his “Game Over” podcast that aired Friday, he showed a whiteboard that listed the 10 teams that could land James in free agency.

The Warriors were tucked into the top left corner of the board as though they were an afterthought, while the 76ers, Heat, Timberwolves, Nuggets and Cavaliers were featured front and center. 

When asked if the Warriors’ placement on the board meant something, Paul balked. 

“You can think whatever you think,” Paul said. “This is my board. You decide what you want to think.” 

It was cryptic. It was confusing. 

But above all else, it was a warning. 

If the Warriors want to compete, they need to take a big risk. 

They need to get Davis so they can get James.

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