Jaylen Brown said he got the stitches out of his injured right finger on Thursday and will be ready to go on Saturday when the Celtics host the Hawks in Game 1 of the playoffs.
“Feeling a lot better,” Brown said after Friday’s practice. “I’ll tell you that. Just working to get some reps in, be ready for (Saturday).”
Brown missed the final two games of the regular season after suffering a right finger laceration last Thursday at home. He said he cut the finger when he was picking up a piece of glass in his house from a vase he knocked over and broke while watering plants in his home. It required five stitches.
Brown returned to practice on Thursday and said Friday it’s been healing well.
Brown said he’ll wear something to protect the finger.
“I got like a bunch of different things I guess,” Brown said. “Try different methods that I’ve been trying over the last two days, but the one I tried today I think works the best, so I think I’m going to go with that. There’s like some protective stuff around it.”
Brown doesn’t think the injury and protection will impact his shooting too much. He’s not using it as an excuse.
“It’s the playoffs,” Brown said. “Everybody is dealing with something. So it’s unfortunate, but I’m not going to let it stop me from doing what I’ve got to do.”
Brown, an Atlanta native, is excited to face the Hawks in the playoffs. His grandma had foresight the matchup was coming.
“She called me like two weeks back, she was like, ‘You’re gonna be back here’ when we played Atlanta like a month ago maybe?” Brown said. “She was like, ‘You’re gonna be here.’ I was like, ‘How do you know?’ She was like, ‘Trust me.’ So I guess you can thank my grandma for that.”
The Celtics are heavy favorites to beat the Hawks in what should be a short series but Brown isn’t overlooking them.
“They’re a tough team,” Brown said. “I think they have a lot of athleticism that can bother us. We have to come out and handle our business and be really detailed. They got a lot of energy. They’re hungry. They’re young. I’ve been in that position, being an underdog, being a young team, being young in this league, and looking to make a name for yourself. So we have to be ready to go.”