BOSTON — Jaylen Brown understands that everyone has the right to their own opinion when it comes to the cohesiveness of Jayson Tatum and Brown, but he remains of the mindset that a continued partnership will benefit the Boston Celtics.
“I think we can play together. We have played together well for the majority of our career,” Brown said following Saturday’s win in which he recorded the first triple-double of his career. “The last year or so hasn’t gone as expected, but I think a lot of the adversity that we’ve gone through now is just going to help us grow and get better in the future. And if we get over this hump and continue to learn, I think it’s a lot of good basketball on the other side of this.
“I only can control what I can control. I understand everybody has to do their job, but me and JT talk,” Brown continued. “We talked after the game, communicated with each other and things like that. So we’re on the same page. I get where all the other frustration comes from, but as long as I’m on the same page with him, and he’s on the same page with me, I think that’s what we’re more so focused on. So tonight we wanted to come out and get a win, and we did.”
Brown again referred to the learning and development that continues to take place with both himself and Tatum. And while he knows the fact that Celtics currently are below .500, and can recall the 2020-21 campaign being a disappointment, performances like Saturday’s win against the New York Knicks are encouraging.
“I know that people are tired of hearing that, but a lot of learning and growth is still taking place,” Brown said. “I’m getting better as a basketball player, Jayson’s getting better as a basketball player and trying to put our guys in position to make them look good. It’s tougher than it looks. So we just got to continue to get better, make the right plays, trust ourselves, trust our teammates, trust our coach staff and let the chips fall as they may.”
As far as the cohesiveness between Brown and Tatum, it comes as the two All-Stars try to find their way to coexist on the court as scorers, and also as facilitators. Kendrick Perkins made it clear that he’s looking to see that while NBA analyst in Jalen Rose just wants to make sure the Celtics organization continues to let it play out with Brown and Tatum.
Brown came away with 11 assists Saturday in arguably his best performance of the season. Tatum chipped in 19 points, as well, while the two looked to play off of each other more so than they have for much of the season. Perhaps it’s going in the right direction, as Brown seems to believe.
