A video went round the world last week. The 76ers on a preseason visit to Boston, Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum a few steps apart at warm-up. They don’t speak. No nod. No look.
I watched it twice, folder open. I was looking for the event. There isn’t one. Warm-up is not on the sheet. There’s no column for hello.
At our place, before the game, the two captains come to the scorer’s table. They sign, one under the other, with my pen. They don’t speak to each other either. Nobody has ever filmed it.
On ESPN, reporter Malika Andrews said she put the question to Jaylen Brown at Philadelphia’s media day. She said he was a little bit murky, but the essence was: “No, not really. I went my way and he went his way.” Noted. It’s an answer that fits in one box.
Brown, for his part, didn’t sit on the bench that night. He was resting and followed the game from the locker room. A player in the locker room doesn’t get recorded either. He’s not on the court, he hasn’t been ejected. He’s elsewhere.
On 10 November, Boston travel to Philadelphia. That time there will be a sheet. Two teams, two captains, one signature each. After that, nobody goes back over it.
Line of the day: warm-up, no incident, nothing for the table.
It’s true, we checked: BasketNews.
