Every morning, we compile the links of the day and dump them here… highlighting the big story line. Because there’s nothing quite as satisfying as a good morning dump.
With about nine minutes to go in the Boston Celtics 128-124 win over the Portland Trailblazers, Jayson Tatum drove from the right wing, drew three defenders, and found Jaylen Brown for a 3-pointer to tie the game.
Two minutes later, Tatum pulled down a miss, looked up the floor, and found Brown again, streaking for a dunk. Brown hit three more humungous 3′s, and each one came off a pass from Tatum.
Tatum, who led the team with 34 points, finished the game with 8 assists, and 6 of them came courtesy of Brown baskets, 5 in the fourth quarter alone.
With the Celtics tapped to play Miami today, lets accentuate the positive from Sunday’s near disaster against the Trail Blazers (PS: I was a little surprised that the NBA’s seeding schedule involved games against the opposite conference, but whatever, it’s their show).
And that is the Jays. Drafted in back-to-back years, they’re a reminder of what happens when a competent front office is handed draft picks usually reserved for the worst teams in the league. Neither pick was popular at the time. Jaylen was actually booed at the Garden, and there wasn’t even a consensus that Tatum was the third best player in the draft, let alone consideration that he might be the best player overall.
Tatum’s play in the fourth quarter on Sunday showed that he’s unlocked another level. It’s one thing to be a great scorer–it’s another thing to be a great scorer who knows when and where to pass the ball. That evinces an awareness of the entire court, not just your little corner of it. In fact, Tatum led the team in passes, per numbers crunched by A. Sherrod Blakely over at NBC Sports
55: Passes (a team-high) made by Jayson Tatum against the Blazers. In addition to scoring a game-high 34 points, Tatum also dished out eight assists which was a career-high for the third-year forward.
I am continually amazed that these guys, playing at floor level, in a sea of arms and legs, can see passes that are hard to spot watching the game from a bird’s eye view where you can see half the court at a time.
“I was just watching film, had to stay on balance,” Tatum said. “I think I was more on balance today shooting 3s and pull-up 3s that I missed the other day. Just getting back to the basics, getting back to my routine, shooting the ball the right way.”
That’s all it was: Just a small mechanical adjustment to the way he was playing, rather than something that could hold back the Celtics as they build toward the postseason. Tatum’s future stardom is all but assured, but the Celtics aren’t looking to the future. They want to win games now.
“We have a young team, but we don’t have time for young mistakes,” Brown said. “We have a lot of growing up and a short amount of time to do it in.”
I was not surprised to see Tatum struggle in Friday’s game against the Bucks. It would’ve been fun to see him hit the court in dominating fashion, but he looked iffy in the team’s first scrimmage against OKC and that echoed a rough November.
But as Jaylen pointed out they have a short amount of time to find their footing in this compacted season, and fortunately for the C’s, it looks like Tatum managed to compress the amount of time he needed to reacclimate to just a single game.
Page 2: Where Hayward is also looking good
Against the Blazers, Hayward had 22 points, eight rebounds and three assists. It was yet another impressive performance by Hayward, who has seemingly picked up where he left off in the first two games under the Orlando Bubble.
Since the restart of the season, Hayward has averaged 19.5 points, 8.5 rebounds and 4.5 assists with an identical 50 percent shooting from 3-point range (4-for-8) as well as from the field (12-for-24).
The C’s have signed three max contract players in the last four years, and none of the three were signed to fill the role typically associated with a max contract player–that of being the team’s primary scoring option. Like the team’s draft picks, these signings have not been universally popular. But teams that are basically run by fan consensus seldom show well in the standings. Overpaying one-dimensional players is not the path to success in the NBA.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
