Jaylen Brown is already talking about the playoffs like they are here, and Jordan Walsh sounds ready to listen. On Brown’s Twitch stream on April 6, the Celtics star told the 22-year-old wing he had “a great year,” then asked, “Are you ready for the smoke, my boy?” Walsh answered, “For sure,” and said he had been waiting for Year 3 and for a chance to matter when the games get bigger.
Brown framed it in the language of spring basketball. “Now it’s like Christmas time. Playoffs, best time of the year. Celtics legends are born during the playoffs,” he said on the stream, a reminder that Boston’s postseason identity has long been built around role players becoming something more than they were in the regular season. Walsh, for his part, sounded like a player who thinks his turn has finally arrived. “After we won the first year I’ve been so excited to go back,” he said. “This time I get a chance to impact the game, oh yeah...It’s the moment I’ve been waiting on.”
The timing matters. With four games left in the regular season, Boston held the second seed in the Eastern Conference and was headed toward the playoffs as the second seed or, at worst, the third. The Celtics hosted the 43-36 Charlotte Hornets on Tuesday night after the article was published, but the larger picture already pointed past the final stretch and toward what Walsh might look like when the games start to count.
Read Also: Jordan Walsh emerges as Celtics weigh playoff rotation beyond eight
That is a real shift for a player who entered just eight postseason games in his first two seasons with the Celtics and averaged a little over three minutes per game in those appearances. Walsh was drafted in the second round, and for most of his time in Boston he has been a deep-bench piece rather than a playoff factor. This season, though, he is averaging career highs across the board, which is why the conversation around him has changed from whether he belongs to how much he might play.
Brown had been seeing it before the stream, too. In an early December postgame press conference on December 3, 2025, he said, “I’m starting to see Jordan play like a grown man,” adding, “It’s amazing to see just from him coming out of his shell, being aggressive.” Those comments were a snapshot of where Walsh stood then: still young, still earning trust, but increasingly visible in a rotation that had begun to take him seriously.
Read Also: Neemias Queta makes strong Most Improved Player case for Celtics
Even so, there is a limit on how far the opening can stretch. Jayson Tatum returned for the Celtics and is an obvious starter over Walsh, which means the 22-year-old is not walking into a clean path to big playoff minutes. Boston’s postseason story will still run through its established core. Walsh’s opening may come in smaller bursts, in the kind of possessions that decide whether a young wing becomes part of the spring picture or simply gets a first real taste of it.
Brown has seen enough to believe Walsh is no longer just along for the ride. If the Celtics get what they expect from their top end, the pressure on the edges gets sharper, and that is where Walsh’s year suddenly becomes relevant. He has waited through two quiet springs for a chance to matter. Now the playoffs are closing in, and Boston may finally have a reason to use him like it knows what he can do.
