There is no more buttoned up, by the book, measured postgame interview than Al Horford. He’s the king of the filler quote -- the two or three sentences that finish a thought for the author and allow a nice transition to the next thought.
So when I asked him about Jaylen Brown aggressively attacking the basket, I thought nothing of it when he said “It’s just great. It puts a lot of pressure on the defense and I feel like it continues to open up our offense. Eventually they have to make a decision and if they close out to him then I feel like all of us are spaced, we’ll benefit from that.”
But that wasn’t all. He continued, and as he did, a little smirk showed up on his face.
“But a Jaylen that’s going to the basket I like. A guy that’s being aggressive, that’s looking to finish at the rim. That’s definitely what I expect and what we need from him,” he said.
So why the smile, Al, when you said that last part?
“It’s just, when he drives, I feel like people feel it,” he said with the smirk still there. “When he’s hitting you when he’s driving, that’s real. So it’s good to see him play at that level and have his mind made up that he’s going to attack the paint.”
Brown took 21 shots against the Pelicans, and not only were 15 of them two pointers, he got to the line nine times due to his aggressiveness. Seven of his shots were layups (he made six), two of those layups drew and-1s, and three more of drives ended with shooting fouls. So 19 of his 41 points, almost half, were a direct result of getting to the rim.
“It was good to see him get into that rhythm for our team but I just thought he did a great job of taking what the defense gave him, recognizing the defense and making the right play,” Joe Mazzulla said. “I didn't think he was hesitant tonight, I thought he was very aggressive … It was good to see him play that way.”
The way Brown played was about as perfect a game as we’ll see from him. He was patient and in control, he attacked when the opportunity was there, but he also pulled up from his sweet spot in the mid-range when the lanes to the basket weren’t fully there.
He was 6-8 on mid-range shots, which have become a specialty of his this season. It has added an element of unguardability (™ John Karalis, Webster's Dictionary folks give me a call) to his game.
Seriously, who can stop this shot?
When Brown stays under control, shots like that will be there. In this one, he wasn’t just under control, he was in control of the entire game.
“I think I can get to the rim at a good rate this year. I definitely want to keep that up,” Brown said after the win over New Orleans. “I don’t want to let the defense off the hook but I feel good about a lot of the shots I took from three. Some of them went down, some of them haven’t. But I definitely still think I’m going to look to get to the basket a lot more for sure just for the remainder of the year.”
Brown can do so much more when he’s not looking to do too much in a game. He had two turnovers in this game, but one was an illegal screen and the other was a great look to Jayson Tatum right in front of the rim that Tatum might not have been expecting, and that might have had a little too much mustard on it. There were no plays where he got too deep to force a drive and he couldn't find a bailout. There were no out-of-control dribbles.
He played this game with impeccable pace and great recognition. He was present in the moment, leading to some nice defensive plays. Brown has admitted to being his own worst enemy at times, and this game is what happens when he avoids doing that.
Why do you think Horford was smiling? Why did this version of Brown give Horford a little twinkle in his eye?
It’s because this Jaylen Brown is special. This version of Brown makes him less a complement to Tatum and more a direct partner. When Tatum was not great for three quarters, Brown was the one playing at an MVP level. When CJ McCollum came out with white glove in hand to smack across someone’s face for a duel to basketball death, Brown answered the challenge and won.
Brown has been around so long we tend to forget he’s still only 26 and just starting to touch his prime years. We forget how far he’s come, and that he’s still getting better.
“Every year presents different challenges. So you gotta be flexible, you gotta be durable, you gotta be able to grow with the game and do what the game needs you to do,” he said “I think that's the fun part about basketball, that it’s not the same, it's gonna be different, and it's okay if it's not. You just gotta continue to grow and improve and let the game tell you what it wants you to do.”
If Brown continues to listen to the game, he’ll have more nights like this. Unlike our own egos, the game never lies. Against the Pelicans, the game told Brown to attack, and he followed the instructions perfectly.