Jaylen Brown was not pleased that he got ejected during the Boston Celtics‘ 125-116 loss against the San Antonio Spurs on Tuesday.
“I felt like I was ready to have a big-time performance, and my night got cut short,” Brown told reporters after Boston’s 104-102 loss against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Thursday, his first media availability since the ejection, via ESPN. “In certain spots, maybe I could have been a little bit better, but you’re passionate. It’s a big game. You want to see emotion. You want to see your star players showing that emotion. I don’t think I deserve to get tossed. And I think the NBA agreed, because I didn’t get fined or anything like that. So it is what it is. It happens. People make mistakes, but I’m just looking forward now.”
Brown was assessed two technical fouls with 3:42 left in the first half after yelling at two officials. He was upset that a foul hadn’t been called when he lost the ball out of bounds. He finished the game with eight points on 4-for-8 shooting and seven assists in 15 minutes and said he was “pissed” that he didn’t get to play more in a “big-time matchup that I had circled on my calendar,” per The Athletic.
Brown used this as a jumping-off point to express his displeasure with “foul baiting.” Maybe, if he had embellished the contact, he would have gotten the call against the Spurs. He suggested that he could have sold calls on multiple drives late in the Thunder game, too.
“I just don’t foul bait,” Brown told reporters. “I’m not looking to flop or anything like that, but it’s almost like you got to. It’s almost like, because there’s a couple of plays in the fourth quarter where I felt like I drove strong, went up strong, and I didn’t get the benefit of the doubt. But maybe if I would have flopped, maybe I would have been able to sell that call. And those decide games.
“So it’s like, we commend players for playing the game the right way, but we give the benefit to those who necessarily are trying to manipulate the game into their advantage. I just don’t think it’s basketball. Let’s just play basketball. All the foul baiting, I think it’s whatever for me.”
Brown lamented that players are rewarded for accentuating contact.
“It’s one thing to get fouled, but it’s like when you’re not even trying to score when you’re driving and flailing your body into [a defender] just to make it look like you’re getting fouled,” he said. “I think that’s the part where it’s like, all right, come on. But I mean, that’s where our league is at. That’s where the NBA is at. So it’s like, get down or lay down. So maybe I need to flop a little bit more.”
Against Oklahoma City, Brown shot 14 free throws. He said it “might be a record this season.” (Close, but no — he attempted 15 against Detroit in October and 16 against Cleveland in November.) Notably, he made this point after a game against the Thunder, but he didn’t say Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s name, nor did he call out any other player specifically.
Brown has a career-high 32.5% free throw rate (i.e. FTA per FGA) this season, despite the fact that, according to Cleaning The Glass, a career-low 24% of his shots have been at the rim. As a team, Boston ranks dead last in free-throw rate, but that’s not particularly surprising given its shot profile. The Celtics take the fewest rim attempts, the most above-the-break 3s and the second-most midrange shots in the league, per CTG.
