Jaylen Brown is in the midst of the best season of his career — which is saying something for a five-time All-Star who not only has a championship ring but also a Finals MVP trophy to pair with it. With Jayson Tatum out most of the season in Boston, Brown has stepped up as the No. 1 option, has career highs in points (28.3), rebounds (7.1) and assists (5.1) and has the Celtics looking like the favorites to come out of the East.
However, after his third season in the league in 2019, Brown questioned whether that success would ever come in Boston alongside Tatum, and whether he should push for a trade. In an appearance on the “Cousins” podcast with Vince Carter and Tracy McGrady, Brown revealed it was McGrady who talked him out of asking for a trade back in 2019. After that season, Brown went to live with McGrady in Houston for part of the offseason.
“Right around that time after that season that we lost in a second round to the Bucks (2019). I came right after that to Houston to get some work in. And I’m so grateful for that time and I’m I’m grateful to this day for you opening up your crib to me and just coming to be able to kick it with the fam and just ask questions and get some good advice about how I should look at the next couple years and how I should think about and where my mind should be at at the time. And you told me the potential that I have and what I needed to do if I needed to make it work and I followed those instructions to achieve and fast forward I became an NBA champion…
“Coming and sitting down with T-Mac. We spent a couple days just working out and talking, having some food, and he’s telling me like, I’m thinking like one thing and he’s thinking like, nah, you need to stay, it’s going to be you. He’s telling me all the stuff that all just manifested itself. So, I can’t even like, it’s crazy looking back on it now.”
That next season, Brown made a leap — he was not just taking more shots but was far more efficient — and he scored 20.3 points a game, his first time breaking 20 (and he has never been below that number since).
This season, Brown’s play has earned him MVP ballot consideration, as he has reached yet another level when his team needed him. However, we may never have seen that if seven years earlier, McGrady had not talked Brown out of the idea of leaving Boston.
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