Brad Stevens Affirms Jaylen Brown While Discussing Knee Injury Treatment

BOSTON — Jaylen Brown expects to prioritize rest in the coming weeks to recover from a partial meniscus tear in his right knee, Brad Stevens said in his exit interview on Monday. ESPN first reported the injury and forthcoming evaluation to determine if surgery was necessary.

“Jaylen wants to play. Jaylen is a competitor. Jaylen is a warrior,” Stevens said. “Jaylen takes great pride in being out there. He saw our team docs and a couple of other people, and, as he even said a couple of weeks ago, the knee is in a good place, structurally. So I think he felt comfortable getting out there and going after it, and hopefully, he’ll feel better after being off of it for a couple of weeks here. The unfortunate part is we’re done in the middle of May, but some of these guys have some nicks, bruises, and other things that it’ll be good to get some rest.”

Brown mostly played through the knee ailment between March and April before prioritizing rest late in the season, mentioning that rest might not help the ailment before saying the line Stevens repeated following the Orlando series about the structural soundness and improvement with his knee injury. The team referred to it as a bone bruise and posterior impingement between a press release and injury reports he regularly landed on. Brown remained questionable for much of the Orlando series before the Celtics no longer listed him against New York.

Stevens didn’t receive a question about surgery specifically, but was asked multiple times about Brown’s standing in the organization with Jayson Tatum preparing for a long recovery. Stevens said he has full faith in Brown and that he’s a huge part of them remaining the best version of themselves, but steered clear from discussing specifics about the Celtics’ future before meeting with all involved stakeholders. He’ll address that closer to the NBA Draft when he speaks to the media again.

“What was reported this weekend, that’s been something that he’s had for a while, and it’s been stable, and he’s played with it. That’s been several scans through and through,” Stevens said. “We’ve known that for a long time, and he’s known that for a long time. It just tells you these guys care. They care about winning. They care about playing. They care about playing well. He’ll drive that, but certainly, we’re thankful for how much and how hard he’s played, but he was definitely experiencing some discomfort there in March. But, you guys all watched it in the last couple of weeks, I thought it got better and better and better, and I think he actually felt better, or, at least, he told me he felt better at the end of the Knicks series.”

Doctors CLNS Media spoke to confirmed it’s possible that a non-surgical recovery is possible for a partial tear, including injections that Brown already received late in the season that improved his playoff productivity and availability. Many players power through partial tears, one said, and can even suffer them without much pain.

Surgery would not necessarily improve his outcome unless he’s dealing with mechanical issues, though posterior tears do more often lead to surgery than others. Meniscus tears associated with arthritis would become more disruptive, though if there isn’t any, then a partial tear is not considered a major concern. It’s a decent one, another doctor said.

“If it’s still causing him issues, they will likely scope the knee and deal with it. The major concern is how healthy the knee is in general.”

Brown, among other players Stevens referenced throughout his press conference, are under contract for next season and multiple years into the future. They’ll weigh apron penalties the team knew for several years while factoring in Tatum’s injury and other considerations. Stevens stressed taking a deep breath following an emotional end to the season, which he blamed on blowing the first two games in the Knicks series and leaving themselves without room for error.

Meanwhile, Kristaps Porziņģis suffered from post-viral syndrome in the series, which the team thought he turned the corner from before it returned out of nowhere. They expect him to recover in time to play for Latvia in EuroBasket beginning in August.

“We went to Madison Square Garden (in April),” Stevens said. “He was so good, and then even in the first round. And then, for whatever reason, he just didn’t feel as good there early in the next series, and never really felt great. Now, in the middle of a playoff series where you play every other day, it’s not an ideal situation to feeling better, especially with the travel and everything else, and the amount of physical force these guys put on their bodies. So, our expectation is that, probably, these next couple of weeks will do him good to be off.” 

Stevens indicated that the Celtics are lucky to have Joe Mazzulla too, and said Mazzulla’s great when asked about the instability around the league regarding head coaching security. According to a Shams Charania report from 2023, Mazzulla received a three-year extension after the team removed his interim tag. That deal would run through 2025-26, setting him up for possible extension negotiations this summer.

While Stevens didn’t insinuate which way the front office’s direction points yet following the Tatum injury, nor did he know yet whether championship windows in the NBA appear to be shrinking, he left the door open for whoever returns next season to prove more competitive than expected.

“I never put a ceiling on a group of players,” he said. “Some years, you put a group together that you think has a better chance than others, but we’ll see how it all looks. But my goal is always, and will always be, to try to best position us to compete for championships.”