Jaylen Brown Explains Unique Method For Connecting With and Leading Celtics Teammates

Jaylen Brown has taken great pride in leading the Boston Celtics this season. Both on and off the court, his leadership has helped lead the Celtics well past expectations, and now possibly to a chance at the top seed in the East. 

“I didn’t know how talkative he was before,” Nikola Vučević recently said at the team’s practice facility. “He doesn’t always say a lot, but when he says something there's good intent behind it and it helps the team … even for me, the first couple of days I was here, he’s tried to help me out with stuff on the court, him and I just talking about things, things he likes, things I like, how to make it work. And he also helped me with a lot of stuff off the court, which is great.” 

To a man, the Celtics have bought into Brown’s leadership for some time now. And after the win over Golden State, Brown explained his very unique method for reaching his teammates. 

“I learned a lot about each and every one of our guys, even down to astrology,” Brown said. “I learned communication styles that work best for each individual, and started utilizing that when I speak to each and every guy. I didn't know if it would work before the season started, but that stuff definitely works.”

You don’t hear much about astrology coming into play inside an NBA locker room, but Brown swears it helps. 

“I memorized [everything],” he explained as he rattled off, from memory, everyone’s Chinese Zodiac. “Like [Neemias Queta], he’s year of the rabbit. So his communication is different from [Derrick] White. DWhite is year of the dog, so his communication style is different. Hugo [Gonzalez] is also a dog. Payton [Pritchard] is a tiger. [Jayson Tatum] is a tiger. Ron [Harper Jr.] is a dragon. Joe [Mazzulla]'s a dragon. Nikola, he's new to our team, he’s year of the horse. It’s year of the horse right now. Each of those have different communication styles.”

You can look up the traits of these animals and see that there is a lot that fits the respective Celtics personalities. But one could also argue that the traits are vague enough that they can fit whatever you’re looking to fit. But Brown didn’t just rely on that. 

“You can go into numerology as well,” he said. “Like, Sam [Hauser] is a five, I'm a five. So you know, different breakdowns. And then you can also go into like, star signs. Like, JT’s a Pisces, etc. I learned all of that different type of stuff, and I was able to communicate to guys in different ways that kind of help with my leadership this year.”

It’s easy to scoff at this stuff, but maybe it goes a little deeper than Brown relying on the stars and ancient superstitions. It might not be the traditional path to communication, but Brown did make an extraordinary effort to learn about his teammates and try to find a way to communicate to each of them on their own levels. 

How he got there is interesting. Some of us will believe it wholeheartedly, some will be skeptical, and some will simply point and laugh. But no matter where on that spectrum you fall, an indisputable truth is Brown put in time and effort to connect with his teammates. The path might be different, but the results speak for themselves. 

“Everybody has a different kind of makeup of who they are and how they approach things,” Brown said. “And if you learn a little bit about each person, kind of what makes them tick, you can kind of learn more about how to maximize potential. All that type of stuff added up over the course of the season. And here we are.”