Jaylen Brown called Derrick White to clear things up about Olympic roster snub

“I feel like he has gotten a short end of the stick, whether it’s All-Star selections or All-NBA,” Tatum says. “I feel like he, in a sense, made up for some of those shortcomings that people didn’t vote him for. I was happy that he got it.” -via Sports Illustrated / July 26, 2024

Jayson Tatum will cop to some missteps over the years. But he insists he never wanted Jaylen Brown to be traded. “Most stars don’t make a conference finals until they are 27, 28,” Tatum says. “We were doing it when we were 19, 20.” He does admit, however, that he could have been more vocal. -via Sports Illustrated / July 25, 2024

“I’ve always told him that maybe I could have done a better job of voicing my feelings in the public eye,” Tatum says. “He always knew that I wanted him here. I would always tell him like, ‘Man, I don’t get involved with any of those talks.’ I never went to [Celtics president of basketball operations] Brad Stevens or went to any player like, ‘Yo, I want this guy in, I want this guy out of here.’ I show up and I want to do my job and play basketball. And looking back on in those moments, I didn’t know how that could affect somebody, because I was never in that situation. I feel like maybe I could have done a better job of publicly saying, ‘No, we don’t want anybody, we want JB.’ I just was always like, ‘I want to stay out of it.’ ” -via Sports Illustrated / July 25, 2024

“When you’re around the legends of the game, just watching them, that’s a blessing, and you learn so much,” White said. “Even just being around them in the meal room and seeing how they act and how they prepare, just stuff like that you don’t really get playing against them. So it’s pretty cool to see the behind-the-scenes, what makes them so special.” -via Boston Globe / July 27, 2024

One phone call changed everything. USA Basketball informed White that forward Kawhi Leonard was withdrawing from the Paris Olympics due to concerns about his surgically repaired right knee, and they wanted White to replace him. “I just had to change plans really quickly,” White told the Globe on Saturday. “I was super excited. Once I got that call, I changed my focus. It’s really a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.” -via Boston Globe / July 27, 2024

Cameron Tabatabaie: The whole Celtics crew in Paris for the opening ceremony -via Twitter @CTabatabaie / July 26, 2024