The Boston Celtics pulled off one of the most consequential trades in franchise history last week, when they dumped off Jaylen Brown to the Sixers for a package built around 36-year-old aging star Paul George and two first-round draft picks. The Celtics had been heavily involved in talks for Giannis Antetokounmpo, but the problem for Boston was that, once those talks fell apart, the impetus to trade Brown had not changed. The Celtics felt they were not getting enough bang for the max-contract buck, and needed to continue to find a way to make a move.
The Celtics took calls from all over the league, were most disappointed in what the potential return package for Brown was shaping up to be, and eventually circled back to the Sixers, a team they’d been in contact with throughout the spring.
New Sixers executive Mike Gansey, hired from the Cavaliers to replace Daryl Morey, kept his finger in the Jaylen Brown pie. But the thing is, he was very uncertain a deal would come through–and the fact that it did came “out of nowhere.”
Celtics Trade of Jaylen Brown Was a Shock
That was an admission Gansey made on Philadelphia radio this week (via MassLive). The Celtics trading Brown to their biggest division rival after an MVP-level season sounded like a longshot, until it actually happened.
Said Gansey: “We were talking to Boston. Jaylen was obviously out there in the media and as every team does, we make a call and see if he was available. We kept talking to Boston for a couple weeks. Didn’t know if anything would really happen but kept talking to them and talking to them. Next thing you know, they wanted to do a deal. That’s kind of how it happened.
“It kind of came out of nowhere a little bit but kind of kept the conversation going. We got lucky and are excited to have Jaylen.”
Sixers Got Lucky to Get Jaylen Brown
The misfortune of the Celtics and their fans, then, is the Sixers’ luck. That’s the double whammy here. While New York and Boston are, as cities and in baseball/football, heated rivals, the Knicks and Celtics have never been good at the same time. The Celtics’ true Eastern Conference rival is Philadelphia.
And Boston sent its second-best player to the Sixers, voluntarily.
Last week, Celtics president Brad Stevens admitted that it was not an easy decision, but the Sixers did have the best offer. He had to put aside the rivalry notion.
“The Philly part, I’m with you,” Stevens said. “That is a hard thing to trade a guy that you first of all care so much about, and secondly, you have so much respect and admiration for, to a team that just beat you in the playoffs. …But I do think that ultimately when you do a deal, you have to be thinking about you first and the optionality it creates for you.
“If I was being honest, if that exact deal came from a team out West and you were comparing the two, then you’d probably take the team out West. But that’s not the way it would work.”
Celtics Jaylen Brown Trade Gets Surprise Admission From Sixers