Why This is Jayson Tatum's Best Chance at an MVP, and What it Would Take to Win

Jayson Tatum, a five-time All-NBA player (four first-team), has never finished higher than fourth in MVP voting. The league has always seen him as one of the best player in the NBA, but he’s never quite been able to crack that top tier of players where guys like Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Nikola Jokic, and Giannis Antetokounmpo live.

But if that is ever going to change, this is the year it will happen.

Last Star Standing

He’s the lone Boston Celtics superstar after the blockbuster trade that sent Jaylen Brown to Philadelphia. Now that he is on his own, he’ll be the lone focus, which gives him all the attention he needs to make his case.

Chances are this is the only season this will be true. If all goes to plan, the Celtics will use Paul George’s contract and the picks they acquired from Philadelphia to acquire some more high-level help. This will be the only season, much like last season with Brown, that a single player will get the lion’s share of the love for the on-court results.

Obviously, the first thing Tatum needs is to be his usual self. We saw incredible signs of that happening last season, but his return from his Achilles injury was limited to 16 games. Even at the massively accelerated pace of his return, Tatum was still not where he needed to be.

“All things considered, for me to even be able to come back and play and play at the level I was playing at even at 80, 85% ... one of my legs is still smaller than the other one,” Tatum said after being eliminated in the playoffs. “Now I get a long offseason to really get back to 110%, I guess that's the silver lining of it all.”

If Tatum is truly back to normal, then he has a chance to take advantage of the situation in front of him.

MVP Formula

First, he’ll certainly get more opportunities to rack up the stats voters are looking for. Brown finished last season with a 36.2% usage rate (the amount of possessions a player uses, ending in a shot, free throw attempt, or turnover. Assists are not part of the equation), the highest single-season rate in team history. That's a lot, but Tatum occupies four of the top-10 spots with rates over 30.8%.

Tatum can dominate the ball, and we shouldn’t be surprised if he does it again this season. So how does he actually win the MVP award?

The formula generally starts with being on a winning team, so the Celtics will probably need to finish in the top three of a very tough Eastern Conference. It would be very difficult for Tatum to make his case if the Celtics are flirting with the play-in. So, as always, a little help from his friends will be very helpful.

One plus in that regard is that Derrick White has historically played better with Tatum than he has with Jaylen Brown. His net plus/minus is nearly two points higher with Tatum over the past six seasons, according to Databallr.com. A bounceback season from White could certainly help the Celtics exceed expectations.

In fact, the analytics discussion surrounding Brown this summer has shown that, statistically, the Celtics have been better in general with Tatum on the floor. That's not to denigrate Brown in any way, it’s just to show that as good as the team was with Brown last season, there's a chance that could improve with Tatum as the main offensive engine.

Beyond the wins, MVPs are either (a) dominant, 30-plus point per game scorers with good averages in the other counting stats, or (b) a high 20-something point per game scorer with double-digit averages elsewhere. This has been true of the last 11 MVPs, which bodes well for Tatum.

He has one season averaging over 30 points (30.1 in 2023), and in his 16 games last season he showed an increased rebounding ability, getting his defensive rebounding rate over 30% for the first time in his career (only three players, Victor Wembanyama, Karl-Anthony Towns, and Nikola Jokic, had defensive rebounding rates over 30% for the full season). If he could maintain that, there would be a good chance he could average a double-double for the season.

At the same time, Tatum has become a pretty good distributor, with an assist percentage just under 27% over the 89 games he played over the last two seasons. Keeping his assist average above six per game would really boost his MVP case. Only three of the last 10 MVPs dipped below six (Joel Embiid and Giannis Antetokounmpo twice), and they made up for it by averaging better than 12 rebounds per game.

Internal Improvements

The biggest internal obstacle Tatum faces is his own shooting. His peak two-point shooting percentages have been between 54%-56%. He’s never shot better than 56% on two-pointers, but that can’t remain the case. Gilgeous-Alexander shot 60.2% last season and 57.1% on twos in his two MVP seasons. Tatum only drives half as much as SGA, so he either needs to increase that number or become hyper-efficient when he does.

The three-point shooting has to support the rest of his offense, too. He shot 34.3% in 2025, 37.6% the year before, and just about 35% the two seasons before that. The league average last season was 36%, so Tatum has to find more efficiency beyond the arc to help him get where he needs to be.

The good news is that he doesn’t need to do TOO much to bump those percentages up. For example, he shot 55.9% from two in 2025, but to shoot 60%, he would have needed to make just 30 more shots from inside the arc. That's just .42 more per game. He also shot 34.3% from three, but hitting 26 more would have gotten him to 38% and 41 more would get him to 40%.

Basically, he’d need to hit one more three and one more two every other game. In reality, if he can pull out of a couple of shooting slumps one game sooner than he has in the past, that can account for a lot of what I'm talking about.

All of this is very achievable. Tatum averaging 30, or close to it, is very doable. If he can keep up his rebounding and bump his percentages up, then he’ll be in a very good place. From there, it could just be a matter of team success. The formula is there for Tatum to make his MVP run, and this is his best chance to make it happen.

Add us as a preferred source on Google