The Bounce: What is Jaylen Brown trying to accomplish, exactly?

The Bounce Newsletter  | This is The Athletic’s daily NBA newsletter. Sign up here to receive The Bounce directly in your inbox.

The good news is that James Harden joined Bob Cousy in a playoff stat! The bad news is that Harden tied Cousy with his 20th playoff game of shooting 25 percent or less with a minimum of 10 shot attempts. Harden went 3-of-13 from the field for 10 points vs. the Pistons last night. Speaking of which …

Trouble brewing?

What’s going on with Jaylen Brown?

There are a lot of questions right now about Jaylen Brown and his future with the Boston Celtics. I know, I know. We’ve been through this before. For years, it felt like people wondered if Brown and Jayson Tatum could coexist on the team, and … I’m not totally sure why. But it was a conversation!

With Tatum missing so much of this season, Brown got to be the unquestioned best player on the team. It will likely lead to an All-NBA First Team selection and placement in the top five in MVP voting. (We don’t have the results yet.)

The Celtics also just had a historic collapse against the 76ers in the first round. Since then, Brown has gone on a livestream tear that has people questioning whether he wants to be in Boston long-term.

Here’s the timeline of the last few days:

• May 2: Celtics blow a 3-1 lead to No. 7 seed Philadelphia and are eliminated.
• May 3: Brown hosts a livestream, criticizing officials and saying this was “the most fun season” he’s ever had.
• May 5: The NBA fines him $50,000.
• May 5: Tracy McGrady says Brown’s frustration “lies deeply within the organization and other things,” on a podcast. McGrady and Brown are close.
• May 6: Celtics president of basketball operations Brad Stevens tells the media, “I talked to Jaylen (on) Monday … It was nothing but positive. He has not expressed those frustrations to me.”
• May 6: On another livestream, Brown tried to clarify things by saying, “Me and Brad have a great relationship. I love Boston. If it were up to me, I would play in Boston for the next 10 years.”
• May 7: Jaylen gets into a social media spat with Stephen A. Smith after the ESPN pundit talked about these comments on TV.

OK, so you might be wondering why people are freaking out about Brown after this rundown. Let’s dive in.

What is alarming about what Brown has done or said? People have been grabbed by the comment that this was the “most fun season” Brown has had. Two years ago, Brown won Eastern Conference MVP, NBA Finals MVP and a championship. This year, he was one of the best players in the league, but his team was bounced in the first round. People are viewing this as a selfish viewpoint by Brown and thus questioning whether he wants to share the limelight with Tatum.

Is that a bad thing? Yes and no? Brown definitely feels like he’s one of the best players in the league, and those guys want to spread their wings sometimes. We’ve seen it a lot. Scottie Pippen got that chance when Michael Jordan retired the first time in Chicago. Harden got that chance when he ended up in Houston. Kyrie Irving got that chance when he found his way to Boston. It wouldn’t be outlandish to wonder if Brown wants that at some point. It doesn’t mean he’ll move toward trying to get his own team.

Then what’s the drama? Well … 1) It’s the internet, and that’s what we do. 2) T-Mac stating the stuff about frustrations sounded an alarm bell. I don’t expect Brown to demand a trade or anything, but hearing about frustrations — whether he’s expressed them to Stevens or not — raises an eyebrow or two.

What should we think of this? If you want to be dramatic about it or buy into drama, then I’d say lean toward the idea of Brown wanting to be the main star on his own team. That wouldn’t shock me.

However, I tend to think this is all just pointed toward a contract extension. The soon-to-be-30-year-old is extension-eligible this offseason. He has two guaranteed years left at $57 million and $61 million. Then he has a player option for nearly $65 million. An extension would tear that option up and give him another two years at over $140 million total. My guess is he’s angling for that extension.

The last 24

🏀 Surprise ranking? John Hollinger has his top 15 NBA Draft prospects. Wait, Darryn Peterson is fourth?

📺 Where’s the game? Shakeia Taylor investigates a key question: Why is it so hard to find NBA playoff games on TV at a bar? 

🏀 Tip-off. The WNBA season starts tonight. Here is one question for every team.

🗽 KAT connection. The biggest fan of Karl-Anthony Towns is the mother of a Marine who was killed in Afghanistan. Our Ian O’Connor tells the tale of their special bond.

Stream the NBA on Fubo (try it for free!) and catch out-of-market games on League Pass.

About last night

Pistons 107, Cavs 97 | Pistons lead 2-0

The game recaps for these playoffs have mostly been formulaic, unless the story calls for something else. I’ll suggest adjustments that could or should happen. I’ll give a telling stat that explains why the result occurred. Then we slap on a fun, emoji-driven Panic Meter score and move on to the rest of the newsletter. I’m not sure I even want to do that as I write this one in a stream of consciousness.

I want to give credit to the Pistons for having two good, encouraging games after a miserable first round against the Magic that sapped a lot of confidence in them. Detroit has been much better and more even to begin this second round. But I walked away from these first two games thinking “enough is enough” with the Cavs. Every year, we wonder if this team can do something in the playoffs. And every year, it comes up short. Not because things didn’t go the Cavs’ way. It’s because they can’t help but get in their own way.

These guys are not serious. They’re not tough. They don’t have any resilience. Jarrett Allen delivered, but you’d never know Evan Mobley was a recent Defensive Player of the Year. Harden plays like a wax statue version of himself and multiple times has not been able to dribble past Duncan Robinson. Their bench has no impact. People decided to believe in them because of the Harden acquisition at the trade deadline, ignoring his history of postseason failure and hoping injuries would be good enough to give them a pass.

Cade Cunningham just has to be on par with Donovan Mitchell in this series and trust his supporting cast will deliver. The Pistons’ defense is swarming and flustering the Cavs. I get that it’s early in the series and “anything can happen in Cleveland,” but the Cavs feel like they’re just wasting everybody’s time. 

• What’s the adjustment for Cleveland? Have its big men protect the paint and have its perimeter players cut off dribble penetration.
• How does Detroit take another one? Continue to fly all over the court and use its activity and aggressiveness to make the Cavs wilt.
• Telling stat: 7-of-32. That was the Cavs’ 3-point shooting. They’re down to 33.2 percent from deep in this postseason.

Playoff Panic Meter (out of five): ⚔️⚔️⚔️⚔️ for Cleveland

Thunder 125, Lakers 107 | Thunder lead 2-0

Game 1 of this series saw the Lakers throw a lot of different coverages at Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, frustrate him a bit, but ultimately lose because they only scored 90 points. They were much better offensively in Game 2, and Austin Reaves bounced back to put up 31 points. But it still wasn’t enough, because the Thunder broke through in the second half.

That’s the issue with playing the Thunder. Eventually, the dam breaks with them, and there are a couple of runs in a short amount of time you just can’t withstand. SGA had 22 points, as did Chet Holmgren. Ajay Mitchell had 20 points, and Jared McCain dropped 18 off the bench, making his trade from the 76ers this season even more bewildering.

• What’s the adjustment for Los Angeles? It has to cut down on the turnovers — 21 turnovers against the Thunder is death.
• How does OKC take another one? Just keep the wave of role players and depth coming. Eventually, it wears down this Lakers team.
• Telling stat: 20. The number of points for Mitchell, as we mentioned. He extended the Thunder’s record to 26-2 when he scores at least 15 points.

Playoff Panic Meter (out of five): 🎬🎬🎬🎬 for Los Angeles

Since we’re here, let’s do a quick preview of tonight’s Game 3s. All times Eastern.

Knicks at 76ers, 7 p.m. (Prime Video) | Knicks lead 2-0

• Adjustment for Philadelphia: Attack the paint. Doing this with pace will put the Knicks’ defense on its heels.
• Adjustment for New York: Keep playing inside-out. The Knicks’ ability to get the ball into the paint makes it hard for the Sixers to cover the rim and the perimeter.

Spurs at Wolves, 9:30 p.m. (Prime Video) | Series tied 1-1

• Adjustment for Minnesota: Start Anthony Edwards. It’s time to get him going from the start so he doesn’t have to get a feel for the game when he finally checks in.
• Adjustment for San Antonio: Keep playing inside-out. When it put pressure on the paint against Minnesota in Game 2, the Wolves couldn’t keep up.

Spin City

Let’s simulate the lottery one last time

As we lead up to Sunday’s NBA Draft Lottery, we’re taking a spin on the Tankathon lottery simulator every day this week.

Tankathon is the best website for tracking the lottery odds. It’s also the best site for simulating the lottery and seeing what comes up. We are trying to figure out what would happen with each random drawing. One spin and we play the result, no matter what. On Monday, Miami won the top pick. On Tuesday, it was Dallas going back-to-back. On Wednesday, Indiana took it. Yesterday, AJ Dybantsa stayed in Utah with the Jazz.

For our last one before the real lottery, it’s New Orleans’ worst nightmare:

The Derik Queen trade on draft night last year brought a really good building block to the Pelicans, but it didn’t bring Dybantsa from BYU to the Bayou. Instead, the Hawks luck out with the Pelicans winning the lottery, which sends the No. 1 pick to Atlanta. They’d absolutely take Dybantsa and add him to the size and athleticism they have on the wings.

Chicago gets a big boost for its new front office and a blue-chip prospect for the Windy City. Would the Bulls go with Kansas’ Peterson as their next star guard or go with a familiar family by taking Duke’s Cameron Boozer — whose dad, Carlos, played for the franchise from 2010-14? That might be up to the Reinsdorfs.

Indiana keeps its pick by locking in third and taking the player the Bulls don’t. All week, Washington has taken some rough spins in this experiment by us.

The draft lottery is Sunday at 3 p.m. ET on ESPN and ABC.