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Jaylen Brown blasts refs for ‘targeting’ him and calls out Joel Embiid for flopping
"They clearly had an agenda," Brown said of the officials.
Celtics guard Jaylen Brown went live on his Twitch stream over the weekend after losing Game 7 to the 76ers, and touched on a range of topics.
He mentioned that this season was his favorite of the ten he has played in the NBA. He said talking on his stream felt “like therapy,” and he spoke about how proud he was of his teammates despite the Celtics’ early playoff exit.
“This group was a special group, I’m so proud of this group and the way we played. I wish we trusted that style a little bit more but I know that the playoffs kind of shifted our rotations and what we wanted to do. I’m so proud, and it was my favorite year of my basketball career.”
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He talked about how sore his back was after trying to guard former league MVP Joel Embiid, who averaged 28 points, nine rebounds, and seven assists in four games against the Celtics this postseason.
Brown said he had never seen Embiid play with that level of dominance before. He also called out the 76ers star for flopping.
“This is my personal opinion on basketball,” Brown said. “Some of y’all might disagree, but argue with your grandma.”
“Flopping has ruined our game. Joel Embiid is a great player, one of the best bigs in basketball history. He flops. He knows it. It’s not breaking news.”
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He broke down several plays on the stream and accused referees of “targeting” him.
“If you’re going to call a push-off, call that,” he said while discussing a step-back 3-pointer that Paul George hit over Sam Hauser. “Same move, same refs. Oh, it’s nothing? Play on, right? It’s weird activity. You’re going to call me, right? Same move, everybody does it. This is a 3-point play, he makes a three right here, and if it would have been me it would have been an offensive foul.”
Brown said some of his past comments about the officiating may have impacted the way the calls went during the most recent playoff series.
“They clearly had an agenda,” Brown said. “They clearly had on the red board, if Jaylen does this move, call an offensive foul on him every time.
“I don’t know if it’s because I pissed the refs off, I’ve been critical about them a bunch of times, and they were like in the playoffs, ‘You know what? I got you — watch this.’ That’s exactly what they did.”
“When you’re in the middle of the series, I don’t have time to say that because it’s a distraction and I’m trying to focus, but now that it’s over that’s some bull****.”
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