Despite a clear decline for Boston Celtics shooting guard Jaylen Brown in his third season in the league, head coach Brad Stevens has been surprisingly encouraged with his progress at the defensive end.
According to Second Spectrum, among the 204 NBA players to defend at least 20 direct isolations, Brown was tied for 150th, at 1.04 points per direct iso defended, per ESPN's Jackie MacMullan. Last season, he was tied for 73rd, allowing only 0.88 points per direct iso.
Yet Stevens, a known fan of advanced analytics, won't get too caught up in the dip of his numbers.
“We're asking Jaylen to guard a lot of different guys at a lot of different positions, from Tim Hardaway with the Knicks to Blake Griffin on a day-to-day basis,” said Stevens. “Within all of our schemes, with all the things we've been doing, I actually think Jaylen's gotten better. He's doing a lot of different things, both on and off the ball. That's why I don't get caught up too much in the individual defensive numbers.”
Brown's shooting hasn't helped him much either, going from a studly 39.5 percent from deep last season to a hair below 30 percent this year, a massive difference in reliability.
While there are those who had expected this regression to happen at some time or another, given the nonexistent slump in his second season, Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge won't make much of his early-season struggles.
“I'm not worried about Jaylen at all,” said Ainge. “He's a terrific player. Give me 80 games. I might care by the time we get to the playoffs, but the kid is 22 years old with a ton of upside. The criticism has been ridiculous.”
Jaylen Brown recently moved to the bench after suffering a back injury that kept him out for three games but has seen some progress in his recent outings, scoring 21, 23 and 19 points in his last three games coming off the bench.
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