After initial doubts about restart, Jaylen Brown and Celtics are all-in on Orlando

It’s been an uncertain four months for much of the sports world as games have been put on hold amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The Celtics will be one of several teams in Orlando that are expected to have perfect attendance on their 17-man roster for the bubble environment when the season resumes on July 30th, but everyone taking part wasn’t always a sure thing. Several members of the roster, including Jaylen Brown himself on Monday, admitted doubts about taking part in the restart at first.

“I think a lot of people including myself had some apprehensions not just because of social injustice but COVID-related, etc,” he said. “And a lot of us just initially – even on this team – just didn’t want to go.”

When asked to elaborate on those initial concerns, Brown pointed to the long period of uncertainty before NBA plans started to become more concrete.

“I think it was misinformation, or a lack of information being shared,” Brown explained of his early concerns. “It was kind of a moment where a lot of us around the league felt like we didn’t have any information. We didn’t know what was going on. Once we found out, a lot of guys came around to making their decision. For me, I can speak for myself better than anybody, I want to make that clear: I didn’t want to go to Orlando. Like I had apprehensions not just because of social justice, but COVID-related and had some family issues as well.”

Grant Williams echoed those concerns as well in the initial stages of the NBA's planning.

“I feel like it was difficult, especially at first,” Williams said. “No one knew what to expect, so I don't think we had any plan whether we were going to restart or not restart. …Especially in the beginning, no one had information so I could understand why he felt discomfort and a lot of other guys did as well.”

The NBA took their time ironing out all the details, logistics and hypotheticals that they felt would be needed for players to successfully play safely in a bubble environment. And while it remains to be seen whether the league will be successful in pulling this season off safely over the next three months, communicating those detailed plans along with a commitment to magnifying social justice issues was enough for Brown and other Celtics to put aside those concerns about playing.

“Credit to the league,” Williams explained. “When we did kind of get going and understanding that they started reaching out to the player reps, including me and Jaylen on the executive committee. They did a good job communicating from then on.”

Brown himself is looking forward to raising awareness on critical issues of social justice reform from within the bubble itself as well, something that eliminated doubts about taking part.

“I thought about the opportunity that the organization and the NBA presented to play for something bigger than myself, I would have signed up right away. I plan on using my voice when I’m down there, I plan on inspiring and spreading light on things that are getting dimmed, and hopefully the NBA and our organization can understand.

“I think a lot of guys are choosing to go down to Orlando because we have an ability to play for something bigger than ourselves. … I think a lot of guys will sign up for that nine times out of 10 – 10 times out of 10.”

While others around the league, such as Kyrie Irving, floated the possibility of players sitting out to make a statement about social justice, Brown, an NBPA Vice President along with Irving and several others, took a different attitude about how he could make a meaningful impact.

“People made decisions based off of how they felt and what they decided for their family,” Brown said of players opting out of the bubble. “And the talks that I was on, there were no wrong answers. I appreciate the NBA’s openness in giving players the choice of whether they wanted to do something or not. There were a few players that decided to take care of their families and I don’t think they should be ridiculed or talked about in a negative way, because that’s a decision they made. At the end of the day, black lives matter, and black athletes’ lives matter as well. So I respect any guy’s decision. My decision was to play just because I felt like it’s bigger than me and it’s bigger than my family and it’s bigger than all of us. People have died for the opportunity to be able to shed light and speak on certain causes. The least I could do is play basketball.”

The Celtics are set to leave for Orlando later mid-week after continuing individual training at the Auerbach Center.