Picks 'n Pops: An almost-trade for Jalen Brunson, how the Celtics learn, and couples therapy

Every week, I gather some thoughts about the Celtics, the NBA, and beyond and dump them here. Because all I want for Christmas is a new damn song. 

- Buried in a new Globe feature on new Celtics owner Bill Chisholm is this little nugget about a meeting between Chisholm and Brad Stevens: 

“Stevens projected his computer screen onto a wall and shared a rare glimpse into his basketball mind. He described how big deals were finalized, and why others crumbled, such as a near-miss for then-Mavericks point guard Jalen Brunson. Chisholm was captivated.”

I’m very curious about how this went down. Brunson was moved to New York in the summer of 2022. The Celtics traded for Derrick White during the 2021-22 season. Was this something Boston wanted to do instead of White? In addition to White? After acquiring White? 

I think part of this was Brunson’s desire to go to the Knicks, so even if they had a deal Dallas liked, Boston wouldn’t have done the deal if they couldn't sign Brunson long-term. 

Also, this is a great look at (a) how quiet the Celtics keep things. This is the first I’ve heard that the Celtics were even players for Brunson, never mind close enough to call it a “near-miss.” And then (b) how many things happen behind the scenes that we never know about.

NBA front offices are always talking. The seeds of negotiations are planted very early. Any time you see two GMs talking, there's almost certainly some level of discussion of players happening. It can be as simple as “how do you think this guy is doing?” And that can spark a discussion that leads to a bigger thing, which leads to some calls. 

Or it can lead to nothing.

I can tell you what ISN’T happening, and that's the Money Ball kind of calls that come out of nowhere and put a bunch of pressure on someone. Maybe some version of that happens at the deadline when word gets out of a potential deal happening and someone else wants to get in before time runs out, but even those tend to be the result of some kind of previous conversation.

Okay, with all that boring stuff out of the way … imagine how much fun Brunson would have been on this team? 

- I came to a realization this week that the Celtics were the Cheesecake Factory. Here’s what I mean: 

Cheesecake Factory has been the most popular restaurant in the NBA because it has everything. The Celtics have to do that too. Play big? Sure. Play small? Yup. Jordan Walsh at center? Josh Minott at center? Isolate a million times? Run a bunch of plays with 15 passes? Play a bunch of zone out of nowhere? 

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. 

And that puts pressure on players. The Celtics have no style. They are all styles. 

“To me it's what the environment requires,” Joe Mazzulla said. “You can only be as smart or dumb as your opponent allows you to be. So if your opponent is high level and they're making things, you have to adjust at the same rate or you're going to get left behind and you’re going to lose.”

I’ll just stop right there to say “you can only be as smart or as dumb as your opponent allows you to be,” is a banger quote. Bad teams allow you to play dumber basketball and still win. 

I’m stealing that line for sure. 

“It’s not really just as much as it's what I'm asking you to do, it's what the environment is asking you to do,” Mazzulla continued. “It’s what the game is asking you to do in the game today … and if and when that changes because of how the game is going, how quickly can you adjust to that? Sometimes it happens at a halftime, sometimes it happens at the free throw line, sometimes it happens at the end of the quarter. So there's not really a pressure as much as it is just a learning.”

The learning part is very interesting, because the perception is that NBA players memorize a bunch of plays and run them. But that's not it at all.

“It's a muscle memory on awareness and understanding, but it's not a memorization because it could change so much,” Mazzulla said. “I mean there are plays that we have to memorize, but within the plays you have to know all the different variables that go into that. You may run the same play five times, they may guard it three different ways of those five times, so you have to run the same play differently to get what you want out of that, and that's what you're learning. 

“I think that's kind of where we're at and you see some of our offensive lacking at times. It's not that we're not being intentional, it's that we're just missing that read a little bit. We're missing that coverage read, we’re missing that two-on-one read, and that just comes with time of learning. That’s not a memorization.”

I’ll pull a Mazzulla myself and say it’s not even learning as much as it is training your body to react. 

The best basketball players can recognize patterns in real time. They can pick up changes in coverage faster than others on the floor. They can anticipate better. 

What makes Luka Dončić “Luka Dončić?” He’s not faster than anyone. He can’t jump higher than anyone. But he knows what’s happening on the floor better than almost anyone in the league. The same applies to Nikola Jokić. 

The Celtics need to learn a lot, training themselves to react quickly as things change on the floor. In the short term, it will result in wins and losses. In the long term, the guys who do it best will stick around and be part of a championship contender. 

Hitting shots is nice. Guys definitely have to do that. Making the right reads on a consistent basis is what will keep someone around. 

- It’s tough to hear that Kristaps Porziņģis’ is going through another illness, which will keep him out for at least a month at this point. He says it’s not the same thing as last season, but it’s hard not to believe there is at least some connection. 

At this point, no one can rely on him to play any kind of consistent minutes. He’ll get his $30 million this season, and then I don’t know why anyone would sign him for more than the minimum … or at all. Why bring someone on board if you know he’s going to miss half the season and his availability for the playoffs is a crap shoot. 

Honestly, the Celtics might have gotten lucky that they got as much as they did out of him during the championship run. That was probably his peak. It’s probably time to head home to Latvia, relax, and try to figure out what to do with the next chapter of his life. Why would he want to keep going through this stuff?

- The Celtics have guys on the team who make presentations so the team can learn more about the individuals. “(Walsh) likes anime … He did a great presentation for the team on that,” Mazzulla said. “So I would say that's probably the most (interesting) thing (about him) outside of basketball.”

If you ever meet a young NBA player and you like anime, that's your in to start a conversation. Chances are good you’ll make a new friend.

- Anfernee Simons could become anything from a salary dump to a long-term bench option. I don’t know which way it goes right now. I had an extended conversation with Keith Smith of Spotrac about Simons staying in Boston:

- Keith also has a pretty good perspective on the Celtics not applying for the Disabled Player Exception for Jayson Tatum this season: 

- Practices can get intense.

- Jaylen Brown understands the business. 

They make good money, but the business side is still tough. I’d be willing to take that risk too if I got paid $50 million per year, but that doesn’t mean getting traded is any easier. I can’t imagine getting a call telling me “hey, thanks for everything, you now cover the Utah Jazz starting tomorrow.” I don’t care how much money you give me, that's not an easy transition. 

- Adam Silver on NBA expansion:

“I’d say in terms of domestic expansion, that is something we’re continuing to look at. Not a secret we’re looking at this market in Las Vegas. We are looking at Seattle. We’ve looked at other markets, as well. I’d say I want to be sensitive there about this notion that we’re somehow teasing these markets, because I know we’ve been talking about it for a while.”

I’m glad Silver has acknowledged the extended discussion about expanding to Seattle and Las Vegas as a tease. Either do it or don’t. 

It looks like they will. 

“I don’t have any doubt that Las Vegas, despite all of the other major league teams that are here now, the other entertainment properties, that this city could support an NBA team. I think now we’re in the process of working with our teams and gauging the level of interest and having a better understanding of what the economics would be on the ground for those particular teams and what a pro forma would look like for them, and then sometime in 2026 we’ll make a determination.”

Vegas is in a little bit of a downturn, but that's almost exclusively tourism-based, and people aren’t clamoring to spend money on non-essential things at the moment. I don’t know how much that concerns the NBA in making their final decision.

Adding two teams to the Western Conference and moving one of Memphis, Minnesota, or New Orleans to the East makes sense. Memphis makes the most sense geographically but Minnesota makes the most sense competitively. New Orleans makes the most sense for me, because I love the city and want more chances to go there. Memphis is the worst NBA city and I’d be happy to never go there again, which means they’ll probably be the choice.

- The Terry Rozier scandal is ongoing, which led to a question to Silver on sports betting: 

“We’re in the process, as I said right now, in working with our teams, thinking about anything else we can be doing, if there’s any aspect of our system that needs to be shored up, and that includes working with the regulators on some, certain kinds of problematic betting.

“For example, we know unders and prop bets are where we are most vulnerable, as I think you know, we don’t control the bets that are placed on our own sport right now. We’re left to lobby regulators or try to convince the legal sports betting companies that that’s bad for them, as well, because I also think in terms of their business, if their consumers don’t think that there’s integrity in the product, why would they be willing to place bets.”

The league is at least acknowledging the problem. They can try to take legal action but that will be expensive and go nowhere because sports betting is legal. They can try to pressure their partners, but I’m sure there's a fear of killing the golden goose. 

Ultimately, I think the four major sports leagues will have to get together and lobby jointly. They need the NFL’s backing on this. That's the juggernaut. If the NFL wants it, the gambling companies will cave. Silver and the NBA can’t do it alone.

- Silver has a problem with NBA officials. Ime Udoka and JB Bickerstaff have each taken unusual steps to call out specific officials for how the games have been handled. I know it’s a coach’s job to advocate for his team, but Udoka called Zach Zarba “star-struck” and Bickerstaff said John Goble is “not objective.” 

Fines aren’t the answer. They need whatever version of couples therapy exists in this situation to make this right.

- The Cavs are a mess and I don’t think they're going to get it back. Yes, they're hurt, but also I think a lot of last season’s success was part of a season-long shooting heater that they never got back. AND they're a second-apron team. 

It’s about to get ugly over there. 

- Cooper Flagg is going to win multiple MVPs. We might see him and Victor Wembanyama ping pong as winners for a while.

- The Bruins did a cool thing. 

It’s surreal when this kind of stuff happens in your backyard. I was in Providence, not far from Brown, on the night this was happening. 

The worst part about it is how numb I am to it. That's the worst place to be. I hate it. 

I hate that when I go to a Starbucks or something to get out of my house and do some work that I have to sit facing the door, with full knowledge of every exit, just in case. I hate that I’m watching everyone who comes in to see if they're reaching for something. 

It doesn’t have to be this way. 

- Former Celtics trainer Ed Lacerte has been diagnosed with leukemia. He will be receiving a blood stem cell transplant as part of the treatment. 

He’s not alone in this fight, so if you’d like to help be part of the solution for him and others and maybe save a life, you can join the national bone marrow registry.

- Happy Birthday to Kevin McHale, the man who made all this possible. I studied McHale’s moves as a young basketball player and it launched me on a trajectory that got me here. I was, without a doubt, the worst basketball player on the planet my first couple of seasons at Shea High School in Pawtucket. Turning myself into a McHale clone made me good enough to continue my career, and continuing my career got me into this business. So thanks, Kevin. 

One day I hope to thank him personally. 

- Don’t I look THRILLED to be doing my job?

I was actually watching Xavier Tillman and Chris Boucher shoot 3-pointers while Joe was talking, so that explains my face. 

- The New York Knicks won the NBA Cup, the first thing the Knicks have won in a long time. They celebrated like the league wanted them too, but word is they're not going to hang a banner for this, a move I respect. So for winning a thing, but not taking it TOO seriously, I say the Knicks are having the Best Week Ever!

- Here’s my latest podcast, if you’re bored.