This offseason already has featured major moves — Giannis Antetokounmpo to the Miami Heat, Kawhi Leonard back with the Toronto Raptors and LaMelo Ball joining Anthony Edwards — and Wednesday night brought another blockbuster: the Boston Celtics traded Jaylen Brown to the Philadelphia 76ers for Paul George, two first-round picks and two second-round picks.
According to ESPN insider Shams Charania, Philadelphia sent Boston a 2028 first-round pick that could convert to a more favorable swap for Boston, an unprotected 2031 first-round pick, a 2028 second-round pick that will be the most favorable of GSW/OKC/MIL, and a 2030 second-round pick that will be the most favorable of WAS/POR/PHX.
The trade was graded D+ for Boston in the assessment. While the Celtics could still win 50-plus games next season — they went 56-26 last year despite Jayson Tatum appearing in only 16 games while recovering from a torn Achilles — swapping Brown for George is said to make Boston worse and to lower the team’s playoff ceiling. The write-up noted Boston added Mitchell Robinson this summer and has otherwise retained the core that produced a strong 2025-26 season; role players such as Hugo Gonzalez, Baylor Scheierman and Jordan Walsh were mentioned as possible regular-season minute-fillers for Brown’s departure.
The Celtics were described as the decade’s most successful franchise, ranking first in regular-season wins and playoff wins in the 2020s and standing as the only team in the decade to win a championship and reach another NBA Finals. The team had pursued Giannis Antetokounmpo about 10 days earlier and signed Robinson the same day as the Brown-George deal, moves that framed the sudden roster pivot.
Jaylen Brown spent 10 seasons with Boston and, per the report, won Finals MVP two years ago and finished sixth in the regular-season MVP voting two months ago after what was called the best individual season of his career. Paul George, 36, was characterized as a player who has declined from his peak: he served a two-month, 25-game suspension last season for violating the league’s anti-drug policy, played a combined 78 games across two seasons in Philadelphia, and has exceeded 56 games in a season just once since 2018-19.
