“I think mental health and mental wellness is one of the most important things we can do, talk about, recognize,” Stevens said after the team’s practice Saturday. “I think the first assumption as a coach [is] we just have to run harder and do it tougher.

Celtics coach Brad Stevens praised the All-Star duo for their admission and said he has stressed to his players the importance of mental health and seeking help and guidance from professionals.

WALTHAM — Since the Raptors’ DeMar DeRozan and the Cavaliers’ Kevin Love came forward to reveal their issues with depression and anxiety, awareness has been raised throughout the NBA about the importance of mental health.


“You have to understand that everybody is a human being. You have to understand that everybody has something that they’re dealing with. For those two guys to talk about it, it’s really important. The stigma attached to mental wellness, for me it’s the same as we tape ankles every day: Let’s take care of all of ourselves.”

Stevens said he arranged to have a mental health professional accessible for players, team employees, and their families.

“At the start of the season, we actually have had a local expert in that area come and speak to our team and is available a couple of times of month here and is available any time that our players need it throughout the course of the year for anyone,” he said. “When you start looking at the numbers, people that are affected by depression, anxiety, it’s a lot of people. We want to make sure we’re on top of that. It’s really important to me.”

Stevens actually began his post-college career in the pharmaceutical industry at Eli Lilly and said that experience taught him the importance of mental health and how much people rely on medication for mental disorders.


“The two drugs that we were most responsible for monitoring the sales of was Prozac, for anti depression and Zyprexa, for bipolar and schizophrenia,” he said. “When you work in the pharmaceutical industry, you realize there’s a lot out of people’s control. There’s ways that people can be helped, and if we can do something to help show people it’s not only OK, we encourage asking for help.

“We take care of everybody’s physical needs all over the place. We should all be on top of our mental and wellness needs. It’s really important to me. Thrilled that the NBA and some of its best players have come out and talked about it the last couple of weeks.”

The Celtics’ Marcus Smart said that the mental strains on and off the court are understated for professional athletes. He acknowledged there’s a stigma that still remains for athletes who admit they are struggling with mental health.

“As men, we’ve grown up to feel like we’ve got to be able to do everything on our own,” he said. “If we ask for help, it shows a sign of weakness. Fortunately, it’s not that way. You do need help. You can’t do it on your own, nobody is perfect, especially in this business of this game, this life.

“There’s a lot of things that goes on, you have a lot of distractions and that can be hectic. It’s good to see those guys to come out and say those things to encourage others you don’t have to be afraid. It’s OK to speak out on it.”


Smart, who has lost a brother to cancer and endured many tragedies in his life, said the key is surrounding himself with supportive people, which includes Stevens.

“You’ve got to have a good supporting cast around you. Some people do forget that we have lives outside of basketball, just like everybody else we do have hard times,” he said. “That’s what’s [ironic]: Brad was preaching this about mental health before this stuff became public. That just shows who Brad really is, he’s thinking about others. He’s one of those guys that we count on. He’s part of our support system.”

Gary Washburn can be reached at gwashburn@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @GwashburnGlobe.