Does Jayson Tatum’s Return Elevate Celtics to Favorites in the East?

Everyone is looking at Jayson Tatum and wondering if he is going to play.

And we had some developments with Tatum this weekend.

We had our network NBC announced they're doing a, uh, Tatum documentary, which is all the content he's been recording.

NBC's been recording leading up to, uh, this All-Star break.

I also noticed last week, and I forget what the date was, but NBC picked up a Celtics game in March, I believe.

They, they added one to the schedule, so it's like, all right, what do, what do we got going on here?

You know, I, I talked to some of Tatum's guys a lot.

Um, I'm pretty well connected with the, the Boston situation.

And look, it's a lot of the same stuff.

It's like, look, he's still got these boxes to check.

He's still gotta decide mentally if he's able to go out there and play as free as he wants to be able to play.

You've heard him say he wants to go out and be Jayson Tatum, but for the sake of argument, let's say Tatum comes back, miraculous comeback from this type of injury, comes back 10 months after tearing his Achilles, comes back down the home stretch for Boston.

How much of a needle mover is he with the Celtics, who just acquired Nikola Vusovich, they get a big dad to that front court.

Now you potentially get Tatum back to be a 2025 minute per game type of player.

Does that in your mind, make the Boston Celtics the team to beat in the Eastern Conference?

Team to beat, um, maybe not, because I, I'm just, I, I, I'm, I'm so nervous about him.

I want him to succeed so much.

I love Jayson Tatum, and I just, I worry about the mental side of it, of just becoming, and, and, and you and I had talked about this before, and, and I think we disagreed a little bit, but I think for me, I do worry about the chemistry of how well this team has played without him recently and like, They, like, Jalen Brown and Jayson Tatum are just are are tremendous forces.

Uh, individually, when they're on the court, they, there has to be a real, like, a chemistry, a little spark that works between them, and to , to relight that, especially with Jalen Brown playing at an MVP level, so things are different.

Things are different than the last time Jason was out there, cause Jason was the MVP type guy, and then Jalen was the Robin to him, and now Jalen's kind of taking this, I'm the Batman guy, um, so I, I would just be worried a little bit about the dynamics in that regard.

But holy crap, like, if Jason Tatum comes back and is anywhere near the Jason Tatum that we've been talking about, yeah, I mean.

That's that, if you went into the season with the Jayson Tatum playing like that, and this roster they have with Vusovich, you would say, yeah, that's one of the favorites in the east, like it would, we wouldn't even be like batting an eye at that, like, that's just a fact, like they would have been one of the favorites in the east, and I would say the same.

I think this team has been such a pleasure to watch this year, considering that they didn't have anything close to what You know, we thought talent wise they had in the last couple of years, and yet they have just produced, and I give the credit to the coaching staff, um, I give credit to the players that are there, that are competing on this way, and I give credit to the front office as well for making the right moves.

So I, I just I want to say, yes, that they would be like them a Detroit Pistons.

I think the Pistons play at such a fun team centric level, that'd be hard, um, and then I think soon we'll be talking about another team that I want to throw in there as well, but, um, yeah, I, I, I don't know, I, I, I, I, I think you disagree a little bit about the dynamics part of it.

I, I think it's possible and, and maybe even probable that there's an adjustment to the new way the Celtics are playing this year where the entire offense is funneled towards Jalen Brown and they're built a little bit differently, but It, it, it wouldn't give me pause about bringing it back and rolling them out there 2025 minutes and just telling these guys to figure it out because I do think there's a pretty big window to get at least to the finals, you know, this year.

You know, the Pistons, amazingly, best record in the NBA right now, percentage-wise, best record in the NBA.

I, I'm still worried about their perimeter shooting.

I think that could rear its head in the postseason.

They also don't have a lot of experience or any experience really going deep into the playoffs with this group, um.

New York, uneven, uh, up and down for most of the season .

What are they gonna look like in the playoffs?

Uh, Cleveland, everybody's kind of bullish on them right now with James Harden in the mix, but we'll see how that plays out over the next couple of weeks.

There's, there's just, there's a, there's a, a runway here.

There's a, a, a way to get Back into the finals.

And once you get to the finals, who knows what kind of war-torn team you're gonna play once you get there.

Like, what's Oklahoma City gonna look like?

Uh, what's Denver gonna look like?

What's San Antonio gonna look like?

Whoever gets to the finals is probably gonna have to survive a bunch of 6 and 7-game series in the Western Conference.

So, I mean, if you have a chance to win a championship, and Tatum is certain he can come back.

I, I, I gotta lean into it, you know, I gotta say, let's, let's do it.

Let's bring this guy back and let him and Jalen Brown figure it out.

Like, I don't know.

Look, maybe there's gonna be some friction there.

Jalen Brown's on track to being an all NBA forward this year, but you, you gotta trust these guys who, who by their own admission, like are, are different guys.

Never been like the best of friends over the years.

They've been great teammates.

They're not, you know, hanging out all the time.

Uh, but they've been able to make it work.

Let's see if they can make it work one more time.

Yeah, I, I, I want to make this clear.

I would love to see Jayson Tatum come back, cause I think just entertainment wise, I, I love his game.

I love the, I love what the Celtics are doing.

How fun would that be to see if the Celtics can make a run and the storylines that would come with that, uh, are incredible, so.

Yeah, I, I, I, and by the way, I also agree that if you ever have a chance to win a championship, you try to win a championship.

It is so hard to win championships in the NBA, so if you give yourself a shot, like, people act as if like the Thunder were such an unbeatable team the last year, but like, they took it to 7 games against the Pacers, and then, and then Halliburton, you know, gets hurt, so like, Think about this Pacers team, how, how they just got hot all of a sudden in the playoffs and played like a well-oiled machine, and all of a sudden they had a chance to win a title.

So yeah, if you ever have a chance to title, you, you go get that title.

So if Tatum can make that happen, yeah, let's let's go.

I just, I just have some reservations and some worries about it.

Yeah, I'll be very interested to see where we are when the calendar hits March.

I, I've long believed that like March 1st, first week in March was kind of the deadline cause it's gotta be a ramp up.

You can't just drop Jayson Tatum after an injury like that into a playoff-type atmosphere.

You've gotta give him some room to, to get comfortable out there on the floor.

I'm very curious to see where we are in March.

It is interesting that he's practicing.

I, I, I don't know how you, or you thought about it, but seeing them send him down to the Maine Celtics, that was interesting to me, going through a practice, that was something, it wasn't nothing.

Everything you're saying, I, I'll, I'll just be honest with you, I, I'm, I'm reading the tea leaves too, and yeah, I, I think he's gonna try to come back.

I, I think he's a competitor, and I think he wants to come back, and I, I just.

I think it's a hell of a story, and I think he's gonna try, and if, if it doesn't go right and they have to pull the plug on it, like, please pull the plug on it, cause I do not want to see him mess with his career by any stretch of the imagination.

But yeah, at this point, you, you , everything you've said, you're just like, kind of feels like he's gonna come back, but yeah, I don't know.

I don't think it would do is it would screw up my dream of having a Tatum Halliburton Lillard cover for the preview issue of next year's magazine, but, you know.

I'm sure they're not thinking of me when uh they're making these types of decisions.