Boston Celtics
“I love the city of Boston, I always have.”
Jaylen Brown Danielle Parhizkaran/Globe Staff
-
Brad Stevens ‘lost a lot of sleep’ over the Jaylen Brown trade
-
Report: Celtics’ Paul George turned down $3.9 million trade bonus
Jaylen Brown said that his community work in Boston will continue after he was traded from the Celtics to the 76ers.
On Tuesday, he kicked off the 7uice Foundation’s fifth annual summer bridge program at M.I.T. in Cambridge.
As Brown addressed the crowd Tuesday morning, he delivered a message about how the trade has not changed his feelings towards the city of Boston.
“It’s OK. Things happen,” Brown said in a video posted by S.B. Nation’s Noa Dalzell. “I love the city of Boston, I always have. I’ve been here for 10 years, a third of my life. I’ll be 30 in October. So, Boston is home and no management or organization will take that away.”
He smiled and told the kids that that he couldn’t wait to see what they learned. The four-day program offers lessons in S.T.E.A.M [science, technology, engineering, arts, and math] subjects, along with leadership development training. It is free of charge for local kids who are accepted into the program.
“When Jaylen came here as a 19-year-old, we knew that he had a lot of talent and a lot of ability to impact people in a lot of different ways,” Celtics president of basketball operations Brad Stevens said Monday. “He certainly did that by inspiring people with his play, but I think maybe more so and the thing that always impressed me even more was taking on the responsibility of being a great Boston athlete in the community.”
Governor Maura Healey proclaimed that July 7th will be 7uice Foundation Day in Massachusetts going forward. The date, which is the seventh day of the seventh month of the year, honors No. 7, the jersey that Brown wore with the Celtics.
“Jaylen, Boston will always love you,” Healey said. “Boston is always your home. Massachusetts will always love you, because what you’ve meant to our city, to our state, goes so far beyond basketball, and know that you have changed so many lives through the 7uice Foundation. You’re going to continue to bridge programs for students that you’ve inspired, the doors that you’ve opened, the example that you set, the greatness.”
Brown made the NBA All-Star team in five of his 10 seasons with the Celtics. He finished sixth in the MVP voting this past season. He was MVP of both the NBA Finals and Eastern Conference Finals when the Celtics captured their record 18th championship in 2024.
He won’t be going too far away, and he’ll have plenty of opportunities to face his former team. Boston and Philadelphia are both in the NBA’s Atlantic Division and they have met in the playoffs more than any other two teams in NBA history.
The Celtics blew a 3-1 series lead against the 76ers in the first round of the playoffs this past May. It was the first time the franchise’s 80-year history that the Celtics had blown that big of a lead in the playoffs.
Now, Brown will team up with Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey, and V.J. Edgecombe in Philadelphia.
Boston isn’t the only place where Brown chooses to give back. The Marietta, Georgia native also runs a summer bridge program in Atlanta.
Two years ago, Brown and Hall-of-Famer Jason Kidd launched the XChange, a program based in Boston and Oakland aimed at bridging America’s racial wealth gap. Brown’s ties to the Bay Area come from the year he spent in college at University of California, Berkeley.
Brown plays for Philadelphia now, but he plans to keep giving back to Boston.
“I’ve invested my own money into the city,” Brown said last week on his Twitch steam. “I’ve put millions of dollars into Boston and still will continue to. I just enjoyed every bit of it. You never know when things come to an end. You can’t control it sometimes, but you look forward to what the future may look like.”
Khari A. Thompson
Khari Thompson covers professional sports for Boston.com. Before joining the team in 2022, Khari covered college football for The Clarion Ledger in Jackson, Miss.
Get the latest Boston sports news
Receive updates on your favorite Boston teams, straight from our newsroom to your inbox.
