The idea that Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown had to be best friends off the court was always a weird one to Draymond Green.
After the Celtics sent Brown to the Sixers in a stunning trade earlier this summer, the rumor mill cranked up. Some of it was about fit and roster construction. Some of it was about whether Tatum and Brown actually liked each other. There was never a report of a fight or a feud between the two forwards. But the fact that they weren’t known to hang out outside of practice became a talking point.
Green addressed it directly on his podcast.
“That sh*t don’t matter. We all have different lives,” Green said. “Does not mean they didn’t like each other. It simply means we don’t carry the same interests off the basketball court. None of you people who sit and judge hangout with every colleague that you work with.”
The partnership was never personal
Tatum and Brown played together for a decade. They took the Celtics to five Eastern Conference Finals, two NBA Finals appearances and won a title. On the floor, they worked. Off it, they just didn’t run in the same circles. That’s it.
Green went up against them in the 2022 NBA Finals when Golden State beat Boston in six games. He saw how they operated. He never saw tension that hurt the team.
The last season of the Tatum-Brown run was weird from the start. Tatum missed most of the year recovering from a torn Achilles he suffered in the 2025 playoffs. When he came back late in the season, Boston looked like a real contender again. They jumped out to a 3-1 lead over the Sixers in the first round of the 2026 playoffs.
Then they collapsed. Lost three straight. Lost Game 7 at home. A month later Brown was traded to Philadelphia.
What happens now
Brown starts fresh in Philly with Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey. Tatum stays in Boston as the guy. Both teams think they can win the East. Neither side seems to be losing sleep over whether the two stars were dinner buddies.
Green’s take is probably the most honest one we’ve heard on the whole thing. Sometimes teammates are just coworkers. And that’s fine.
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