An ex-NBA player thinks Jalen Brown should learn from his star peers.
The Boston Celtics dropped a 104-102 loss to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander's Oklahoma City Thunder on Thursday. Following the hard-fought defeat, Brown criticized NBA players' tendency to seek out contact.
"I don't foul bait," Brown said. "I'm not looking to flop or anything like that, but it's almost like you got to."
Chandler Parsons suggested on FanDuel's "Run It Back" that Brown should implement the same tactics as Gilgeous-Alexander and NBA stars best skilled at drawing fouls.
"It is such a part of the game now," Parsons said. "And Jaylen Brown, there's gonna be games and times and moments within the season and the playoffs that he is gonna be a victim of this, too. He is gonna try and create contact. He is gonna try and get a whistle."
Parsons watched a clip of Brown leaping to contest a Gilgeous-Alexander pump fake. The reigning MVP jumped into Boston's All-Star to net an easy call.
"That's a foul," Parsons noted. "Stay down. You're taught when you're 5 years old, stay down on a shot fake. How is that even a complaint right there when you move your feet?"
The former sharpshooter advised Brown to grow with the times and deploy those same optimal scoring strategies, even if it's not the most aesthetically pleasing form of basketball to watch.
"This has become such a normal part of the game that you have to adjust and adapt to it, or you're gonna miss this huge aspect of where you can get easy buckets," Parsons said. "And as a scorer, Jaylen Brown -- he's averaging 29 points a game -- he should be taking pages out of these guys' books because they are fouls.
"... Yes, it is eye roll. Yes, it is not that much fun to watch. You don't just want to see consistently guys going to the free-throw line. But good scorers are gonna be able to do it, and good scorers are going to do it better than the rest."
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