Jaylen Brown finished the season with a partially torn right meniscus, ESPN’s Ramona Shelbourne reported on Saturday. He will be evaluated this week to determine if surgery is needed.
Brown missed the final three games of the regular season, but played in all 11 playoff games, averaging 22.3 points and 7.2 rebounds in 34 minutes a night. ESPN previously reported that he began receiving pain injections in his knee in March.
He declined to discuss his injury in detail throughout the postseason. On the Celtics’ injury report, the injury was officially deemed a right knee impingement. Brown said ahead of the second-round series against the Knicks he believed he was nearing 100%.
“I think I’m starting to turn the curve,” Brown said. “Structurally, everything is fine. I’ve had some other stuff going on, but I think I’m kind of trending in the right direction.”
Still, it was obvious that he was athletically limited and unable to explode the way he normally does throughout the postseason. His best performance of the postseason came in Game 5, when he posted 26 points and 12 assists just two days after Jayson Tatum went down with a ruptured Achilles tendon.
“I don’t make excuses,” he said after the Game 6 loss. “Obviously, it’s tough the way we went out like tonight, but the way we finished the year, personally, the way I finished the year, persevering through some physical stuff that I was battling through, I’m proud of our group.”
Brown first began dealing with a right knee injury in mid-February, missing two games leading up to the All-Star break. He mostly pushed through the knee pain in the second half of the season, but sat out to rest his knee in the final three games of the year.
Now, he’s one of several Celtics stars with uncertain offseason health. Tatum underwent surgery for his ruptured Achilles tendon on Tuesday and is expected to miss most if not all of next season, while Kristaps Porzingis continues to battle lingering effects from a viral illness.
