Celtics trade Jaylen Brown for Paul George, picks

Jaylen Brown’s run in Boston ends as the Celtics trade him to the Philadelphia 76ers in exchange for Paul George and draft capital that could become two first-round and two second-round picks. The blockbuster reshapes Boston’s post-Brown era and sets up a new

Jaylen Brown didn’t just leave Boston—he left it for one of the league’s most intense rivalries, and with a deal that swings the balance of power right in the middle of the NBA’s offseason noise.

On Wednesday. the Celtics agreed to trade Brown to the Philadelphia 76ers. with the specifics of the agreement confirmed to an Associated Press contact who spoke on condition of anonymity because league approvals are still required. Brown’s name now sits alongside a fresh Celtics centerpiece: Paul George and multiple future draft assets that could turn into two first-round picks and two second-round picks.

The arrangement was first reported by ESPN and later confirmed by The Boston Globe.

For Boston. the move is a jolt to an era that’s been defined by the 1-2 punch of Brown and Jayson Tatum. That partnership helped carry the Celtics to the 2024 NBA title. But this offseason choice also lands with timing that explains why fans noticed the shift right away—Brown’s workload has already been stretched.

Tatum missed most of the 2024-25 season while recovering from an Achilles tear that happened during the 2025 playoffs. leaving Brown to carry more of the offense. He responded with career-best averages of 28.7 points. 6.9 rebounds. and 5.1 assists per game. putting a superstar burden on a player who had already been central to Boston’s identity.

Numbers like those don’t usually end with someone being moved across state lines.

“Welcome to Philly, JB!” Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro posted on social media. “Sixers get way better and, as a bonus, the Celtics got worse!”

Brown’s departure also breaks up what has been one of the NBA’s most productive pairings in recent years. Boston has won 523 games with Brown in the lineup, including playoff contests—six more than Denver has won with Nikola Jokic over that same span.

The tension around Brown’s value shows up in how public conversations evolved before the trade ever became official. Over the weekend, Brown posted about a belief that he’d been underappreciated.

“Nobody has won more combined regular-season and playoff games since I entered the league 10 years ago,” Brown wrote on social media.

It was a line with context, too. Brown’s frustration followed news that Boston had included him in trade talks with Milwaukee while Giannis Antetokounmpo was on the market.

Now, the question flips to Philadelphia: how does Brown fit beside Tyrese Maxey and Joel Embiid?

In Philly. Brown joins Maxey and Embiid. a lineup that could quickly become a centerpiece for a team hungry for a title. Embiid brings elite scoring history—he is a two-time NBA scoring champion—while Maxey was the league’s No. 5 scorer this past season. Brown, recently, has also been blunt about how he sees Embiid’s reputation.

“Joel Embird is a great player, one of the best bigs in (expletive) basketball history,” Brown said during a livestream. “Flops. He know it. This ain’t breaking news.”

For all the intrigue, the Celtics aren’t simply trading a player who’s been dominant on the court. They’re also turning an offseason chess move into a new direction by bringing in Paul George.

That trade ends a difficult two-year run for George in Philadelphia.

George was traded with two years left on a four-year, $212 million free-agent contract. The 36-year-old never reached the nine-time All-Star level expected in Philadelphia, and his time there included a 25-game suspension last season after he failed a drug test.

His scoring output reflected the drop: George averaged 16.7 points across two seasons with the 76ers, after scoring 20 points in nine straight seasons with Indiana, Oklahoma City, and the Los Angeles Clippers.

In the background of the performance issues were health and timing problems as well. George cited mental health reasons for why he failed the drug test and was suspended in late January for violating the NBA’s anti-drug program. His first season in Philadelphia was also marred by knee and adductor injuries. contributing to what was described as one of the worst years of his NBA career.

He averaged 16.2 points in just 41 games—his lowest scoring average in a full season since a 12.1-point mark with Indiana in his second NBA season. Then, in July, George had surgery on his left knee after being injured during a workout, and he missed the first 12 games of this past season.

This deal also carries institutional weight. It is the first blockbuster pulled off under Philadelphia’s new team president Mike Gansey. who replaced the fired Daryl Morey. Morey was dismissed after the 76ers failed to advance out of the second round of the Eastern Conference playoffs in his tenure and were swept by the eventual NBA champion Knicks in the second round last season—after erasing a 3-1 deficit to eliminate Boston in Round 1.

George and Brown now swap roles with very different expectations attached.

Brown said after the Game 7 loss to the 76ers—surely before he knew he’d be joining them a couple months later—that “Philadelphia is a good basketball team.”

His job now is to make that team even better.

For the Celtics, the responsibility is immediate. They’ve broken up a pairing that defined a winning stretch and sent Brown to a franchise that has long promised big-star combinations with Embiid and Maxey at the center. Brown will try to help Philadelphia reach the championship they’ve been chasing since 1983. and the Sixers’ decision to build around this new trio only intensifies the stakes of why Boston chose to move Brown now.

NBA Boston Celtics Philadelphia 76ers Jaylen Brown Paul George Jayson Tatum Joel Embiid Tyrese Maxey NBA trade offseason moves draft picks