Brad Stevens reveals why it was such a hard decision to trade Jaylen Brown image
For a decade, Jaylen Brown was a loyal player for the Boston Celtics. They enjoyed his tenure with the team, with consistent appearances in the Playoffs, and they had two runs to the NBA Finals in 2022 and 2024.
In that 2024 run, Brown was a standout alongside his co-star Jayson Tatum. However, it was Brown who was awarded the NBA Finals MVP award. There was never an ego battle between the two stars, which was a dream for any front office with a couple of superstar-level players.
Brad Stevens knows it was a tough decision to trade Jaylen Brown
After a decade with the Celtics, Brown is no longer with the Celtics because he was the primary piece in a trade with the Philadelphia 76ers. The 76ers are now one of the best teams in the Eastern Conference after this deal because they also managed to snag LeBron James in the offseason.
This is a notable deal because not only are the 76ers a rival team in the same division, but they were the team that came back from a 3-1 deficit to eliminate the Celtics in the 2026 Playoffs.
MORE:Jayson Tatum fires back at the false narratives about his relationship with Jaylen Brown
As the chief decision-maker, the Celtics' team president Brad Stevens found it hard to make the trade. However, it seems that the finances were not in favor of keeping both Brown and Tatum on the same team.
"At the end of the day, the biggest thing is that when evaluating how the team played in the past couple of Playoffs, we have to build the depth to stay competitive as we can to build for a long, sustainable run; it was inevitable," Stevens said on SiriusXM NBA Radio about the decision to trade Brown.
"For us, it was a really hard decision. There were a lot of things that went into it. You have two max players, two max usage; those are the things you have to make a decision on... Jaylen's a great player, but I like the team we have."
Now, the Celtics will have to deal with competing against Brown in the same division. At the same time, the Celtics are on the backfoot now because there are a lot of teams in the Eastern Conference that could be better than them in the 2026-27 season, including the 76ers.
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