{"id":824866,"date":"2026-08-31T15:36:26","date_gmt":"2026-08-31T15:36:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/824866\/"},"modified":"2026-08-31T15:36:26","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T15:36:26","slug":"jalen-brunson-opens-up-about-mitchell-robinsons-decision-to-leave-knicks-for-rival-celtics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/824866\/","title":{"rendered":"Jalen Brunson Opens Up About Mitchell Robinson’s Decision to Leave Knicks for ‘Rival’ Celtics"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jalen Brunson is going to miss Mitchell Robinson.<\/p>\n

The three-time All-Star opened up about Robinson’s decision to leave the New York Knicks for the Boston Celtics<\/a> in an interview with the New York Post’s Stefan Bondy.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously playing for a rival and I know people want every team to hate each other,” Brunson said<\/a>. “But there are some people you really care for, and that\u2019s my guy. I\u2019m happy for him. And now, whenever we play him \u2014 four times a year \u2014 he\u2019s not my friend that day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brunson and Mitchell were teammates for four seasons. They achieved a lot of success together and reached the mountaintop in 2026, capturing New York’s first NBA championship in 53 years.<\/p>\n

MORE:\u00a0Why Paul George Becomes Easier for Celtics to Trade This Week<\/a><\/p>\n

The Celtics signed Robinson to a three-year, $47.4 million contract.<\/p>\n

After signing the contract, Robinson indicated that he didn’t want to leave New York.<\/p>\n

“I tried, brother,” Robinson responded to OG Anunoby on Instagram<\/a>. “I didn’t want this to happen. Hopefully, the truth comes out at some point.”<\/p>\n

Robinson won’t have to wait long to face Brunson and his former team \u2014 Boston’s second game of the 2026-27 season is against New York at TD Garden on Oct. 23 \u2014 but he won’t make his return to Madison Square Garden until March 14.<\/p>\n

Robinson might play for a rival now, but it’s hard to imagine him not getting a warm welcome from the Knicks crowd.<\/p>\n

More Celtics<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jalen Brunson is going to miss Mitchell Robinson. The three-time All-Star opened up about Robinson’s decision to leave…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":824867,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3766],"tags":[7,45,75,3798,46,6],"class_list":["post-824866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boston-celtics","tag-basketball","tag-boston","tag-boston-celtics","tag-bostonceltics","tag-celtics","tag-nba"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/117190864621547883","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/824866","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=824866"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/824866\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/824867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=824866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=824866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=824866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}