Mario Chalmers knows all about how an NBA team’s fortunes can change overnight.
The former longtime NBA point guard saw the Miami Heat go from a playoff team eliminated in back-to-back years to becoming the NBA’s team to beat overnight. That occurred when the Heat added the likes of LeBron James and Chris Bosh to add to a core that already featured himself and Dwyane Wade. After acquiring James and Bosh, Miami would advance to the next four NBA Finals, winning two of those in the process.
Fast forward to the present day and there’s a lot of offseason overhaul in the NBA. However, it’s hard to pick a trade more unexpected than the one that saw Jaylen Brown land with the Philadelphia 76ers. The Boston Celtics merely acquired 36-year-old Paul George and a number of draft picks in exchange for the 2024 Finals MVP.
Chalmers — who is now a member of the Miami 305 in the BIG3 League — didn’t hold back in saying that the move was “weird” to him.
“That was weird to me,” said Chalmers. “Especially that’s always been a rival, Boston and Philly, and you traded one of the best players there to deal with him when it comes to a playoff series. We made that team better. That’s your rival. So for Philly, I love the trade. I think that’s a perfect person to come to the team. But for Boston, I really didn’t understand that.”
Why Jaylen Brown’s Trade to 76ers is ‘Weird’
For context, the Sixers just eliminated the Celtics as a seventh seed in the first round of the NBA playoffs. That was after trailing 3-1 in the series. To top it all off, they’re both not only Eastern Conference rivals, they’re also division rivals.
The move — including the lack of young pieces the Celtics received in return — showed their desperation in getting rid of Brown, who suddenly soured on the organization. Brown was coming off of an MVP-caliber year, leading the Celtics — who were without Jayson Tatum for almost the entire season — to the No. 2 seed.
When asked why the Celtics would pull off a trade with nearly four months left to go until the start of the regular season, Chalmers said he believes “rumors” got out too fast when it relates to Brown and they wanted to move on quickly before things became worse in the locker room.
“I think those rumors got out too fast, and those trade talks got out too fast, and once you got a disgruntled employee like that, you just don’t want to come to the season with that headache and over a team and have players thinking about that, instead of focusing on winning, making a winning atmosphere, and getting better each and every day.”
Jaylen Brown’s Trade to 76ers Could Backfire on Celtics
It’s clear that the Celtics were all-in on moving on from Brown and building around Tatum as evidenced by their attempts to trade for Giannis Antetokounmpo. The Milwaukee Bucks instead opted to trade Antetokounmpo to the Heat, which forced the Celtics’ hand in taking a much lesser offer. Instead of opting to trade with a lesser Eastern Conference team or a Western Conference squad, Boston traded Brown to one of their top rivals.
We’ll see how this trade ends up impacting both teams moving forward, but this is a move that could end up costing the Celtics in the long run — while majorly benefiting the Sixers.
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