Jaylen Brown: More than enough in Year 8.
- Thread starter MyDaughterLovesTomGordon
- Start date
I trust Tatum more in almost all situations…however, at the end of the game, I like Brown having the ball.
He has much more conviction with his drives and puts more pressure on the defense.
You aren't the only one who has been actively biting their tongue (with the exception of a group of folks who haven't appeared in a while, but I'm sure are waiting for the next bad game he has). Obviously, my man crush on Jaylen Brown around here is really only rivaled by @tbb345 and we've been on that hill together for years. Frankly, what I'm seeing from Jaylen now isn't a whole lot different than what I've seen for a long time, with one exception. He seems to be accepting of the fact that his 3 ball isn't falling, and he recognizes that guys like White/KP/PP/Hauser are dropping them at insane rates, so instead of taking the 3, he's going to the hoop and blasting off and either finishing with ferocity or kicking it out. Last year, those kick outs always seemed to end up in the hands of Marcus Smart, now they're ending up in the hands of Derrick White. In the last 7 games, he's only had 1 game where he took more than 5 3PA's, and that was because he was smoking hot, going 5/8 in that game. Prior to that, he was averaging 7.0 3PA per game. He's not thinking, he's just doing and that's always been the best version of him. Full speed Jaylen.
His defense has some lapses in it at times, but whose doesn't? Other teams don't score 100+ points if everyone plays perfect defense all the time, and of course, other teams routinely score 100 points. He's guarding quick, fast guys on the perimeter every night and he's been a monster on ball. It's hard to keep that pace for 35 minutes every night, so when he loses a guy off ball once in a while, it is what it is, man needs to rest on occasion.
I said it in the game thread last night, if that 3 starts falling again at a 35% clip, Jaylen is right back in the All-NBA discussion.
Jaylen is absolutely killing it the last week or two. This team is a juggernaut at every level.
One thing that wasn't brought up enough at the time, because of the awful ending, but Jaylen's defense against the Warriors was insane. I was honestly in awe of how good he looked.
That type of effort and ability to be locked in is pretty much impossible to do every minute of an 82 game season but it's awesome to know that he has that in his back pocket when playoff time comes.
That type of effort and ability to be locked in is pretty much impossible to do every minute of an 82 game season but it's awesome to know that he has that in his back pocket when playoff time comes.
Jaylen's scoring is down, but his eFG% is very similar to last year: .550 last year and .536 this year. That's not that big of a difference. He's not getting to the line as much (5.1 FTA last year, 3.8 FTA this year), but I think the biggest thing is that he's just got other guys on the team that score more.
Last year:
- Tatum: 21.1 FGA, 30.1 points
- Brown: 20.6 FGA, 26.6 points
- Brogdon: 10.9 FGA, 14.9 points
- Smart: 9.9 FGA, 11.5 points
- White: 9.2 FGA, 12.4 points
TOT: 71.7 FGA, 95.5 points
This year:
- Tatum: 19.5 FGA, 26.8 points
- Brown: 18.6 FGA, 22.7 points
- Porzingis: 12.1 FGA, 19.2 points
- White: 11.1 FGA, 16.5 points
- Holiday: 10.8 FGA, 12.6 points
TOT: 72.1 FGA, 97.8 points
Almost the same number of FGA per game, and a tick more points per game, but the distribution is more even this year than last year. Tatum and Brown are both giving up a little scoring as they've got better secondary scorers than they had last year.
Last year:
- Tatum: 21.1 FGA, 30.1 points
- Brown: 20.6 FGA, 26.6 points
- Brogdon: 10.9 FGA, 14.9 points
- Smart: 9.9 FGA, 11.5 points
- White: 9.2 FGA, 12.4 points
TOT: 71.7 FGA, 95.5 points
This year:
- Tatum: 19.5 FGA, 26.8 points
- Brown: 18.6 FGA, 22.7 points
- Porzingis: 12.1 FGA, 19.2 points
- White: 11.1 FGA, 16.5 points
- Holiday: 10.8 FGA, 12.6 points
TOT: 72.1 FGA, 97.8 points
Almost the same number of FGA per game, and a tick more points per game, but the distribution is more even this year than last year. Tatum and Brown are both giving up a little scoring as they've got better secondary scorers than they had last year.
This just came into my head when reading this and maybe it's BS but I think it's worth a discussion...
I think Jaylen's weakest reads/vision/ability to pass are to the corners. This year it's been a lot more of pick and pop and passes that are to the middle of the floor/NOT the corners.
I believe that's why KP has helped him so much. He can run those pick and pops, pop and get a high percentage 3 off quick. I LOVE Al Horford but his shooting motion is slow as fuck. Those pick and pops with Horford popping just aren't that scary to the defense because most of the time they can recover.
IMO, this steady diet of being able to feed KP/White has improved his confidence markedly and we are now seeing him think less and read more.
It's really a joy to watch.
Whether people want to admit it or not, last night was a game where there were a lot of people waiting in the weeds to shit on Jaylen if it didn't go well. No Tatum and he was the hub of the offense...and he knocked it out of the fucking park.
I am going to toot my own horn here and say that I called this in the "Hot Takes" thread (I believe @Jimbodandy was on this as well). His passing ability and ability to read the defense has been gradually improving for the last two years but you had to squint to see it. Now it's fully on display
I'm not sure if I really believe this, but some would say that getting the giant contract has made Jaylen less concerned about scoring and his numbers now that he's got the bag. That has led to better playmaking and maybe more effort on the defensive end.
I think a big thing this year is the team is just much better offensively in terms of spacing and having high IQ players that now how to cut. We know the two-man game with Porzingis has been great, and you add in Jrue and D-White in a bigger role, it's a different squad and that has given Jaylen more space to attack and more options to playmake for.
Sounds like a cool story, someone should inform DARKO of his leap on both ends.
I see pretty much the same guy honestly (still a very good and useful player of course).
Really good individual scorer, some highlight dunks, mental lapses on D, trending down 3 PT%, maybe a bit more ornery with the media. His ball handling looks about the same to me (maybe taking a few less risks?), the TO% is a tick down and the assists are a tick up.
He does have some nice chemistry with KP so far, but big picture he's the same (very good) guy with worse 3 PT shooting.
Yeah there's something to be said for the bolded for sure. I've noticed that he seems to have a much better idea of where the cost/benefit line is now on passes, without having to think and process mechanically real-time. Not to say that he won't force still (he's testing the fences), but on the whole he seems to have expanded his vision concentrically if that makes sense.
Last dozen games or so, he sees someone and you can see him pick it up to pass and then think better of it (window isn't big enough). But he's also not driving with either pass or shoot in mind. He's driving. If the defense gives him, he takes. If they collapse, he seems to know now which guy has the good look based on who collapses and nails the pass with regularity (again without having to "process"). So yes, usually that's to the middle of the floor, because that's where he is. But if he's crashing the rim, and the weakside defender comes over, he's hitting the weakside corner (Hauser/Jrue/Al) with the pass.
Probably obvious to people with extensive playing/coaching careers, but he's making the one-pass pass fluently now and avoiding the guy in the two-passes location. Tatum is already pretty damn good at finding that guy in the 'two-passes-away' location, and that's still another thing for JB to unlock. But with his explosiveness and the gravity that it creates, teams are constantly hedging on him on one side or the other. As he gets really good and reading and reacting, he's either creating dunks for himself or truly easy spot-up looks for others. KP was awesome last night, but this was working with everyone. And of course the PNR looks with KP should always be there. I'm honestly a bit surprised that they're not using JT for some of that too.
DARKO does something weird with forward looking projections. If you change the time scale x-axis to games played the trend line goes out to somewhere close to 700 games. Jaylen has only played 601 games to date (496 regular season and 105 playoffs). I don't trust that he is actually trending down the way the curves indicate for the right most portions of the graphs.
Yeah I kinda agree with this too. And while some have stated it as some kind of confidence in the guys that JB and JT are passing too, I don't think that's it really. I think that JH and KP are more intelligent offensive players and know where to be, know how to shake defenders, have more physical attributes that help with scoring (height/explosiveness), and better skills to convert those good looks. I love Grant, Marcus, and Rob, but none are the offensive basketball savants that Jrue and KP are. And DW is a certified genius.
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DARKO is weighing a set of pretty bad games still into the regressions, not just the last few weeks of awesomeness. If JB keeps playing like this, the line should start moving back up. He didn't finish last year's regular season well, was spotty in the playoffs, and took a bit to get going this year. All data matters.
I'm not going to address the DARKO graph. I am not smart enough to understand all that goes into that secret sauce and I am not going to pretend that I am. So I am just going to address the eye test portion of this...
I am honestly stunned that you have watched him play, basically since the Charlotte game, and you see the same player.
Zach Lowe had a long monologue about him right after that game where he talked about how he didn't fit in with the current team and that he was the one to watch because he was forcing it and trying to live up to his contract.
He had a podcast with Tim Bontemps come out 2 days ago where he made it a point to talk about how much better Jaylen has been since that game and how he's picking his spots better and looking to play make more
It looks like the game has slowed down some, he trusts his teammates more, and he's slowing himself down a bit to make the proper reads. Not trying to be glib but I thought that we all agreed on that at this point
That makes sense. It is interesting to me that the leading 10-15% of each trend line is projected data while the trailing 85-90% is based on actual data.
JB is a very intelligent young man. Add a Jrue and a KP to this team, and the obvious move for a star wing known for pressing his offense is to be a bit more of a distributor, to both set up these talented teammates, and to create more operting room for himself.
I remember seeing some AAU video from Jaylen pre-draft, where he was driving and kicking the ball along with pushing his own offense. I always knew he could be that kind of all around offensive player, and now we are seeing it come to fruition.
I remember seeing some AAU video from Jaylen pre-draft, where he was driving and kicking the ball along with pushing his own offense. I always knew he could be that kind of all around offensive player, and now we are seeing it come to fruition.
Think about those players (in the bolded, I removed Rob because I think I could get an assist or two to prime TimeLord on a pick and roll) that are being replaced though and where they thrive/what their limitations are and what Jaylen's strengths and limitations are....
Grant got the well earned nickname "Corner Offense' for a reason...he was great from the corners, pretty terrible above the break/top of the key/or attempting to create at all.
Defenses wanted Smart to launch from the top of the key...he's also not the creator off the dribble that Holiday/White are.
Basically Brad took a guy that was much better suited to play with a Tatum (or Doncic type) In Grant Williams (not a knock on Tatum at all, basically Grant is best as a potted plant in the corner whose offense is entirely set up by a star) and replaced him with a top of the key sniper who can also get into the lane....aka the perfect pick and pop partner for Jaylen. Then replaced Smart's minutes with a combo of White and Holiday..both of whom are better from the top of the key than Smart
If DARKO thinks that Jaylen Brown has been trending down the past 1-2 months, the problem is DARKO, not Jaylen.
Just the difference between KP and TL is pretty dramatic if you just think from an offensive skillset perspective. TL was a very good roller and lob threat, but that was pretty much it. KP not only provides a lob threat, but he also can stretch the floor with his shooting, and is way, way more advanced passer out of the high post than Rob was (although TL could be sneaky good at that at times). Swapping those two players and it's no surprise everyone's offense is going to hum better.
I won't pretend to understand the statistical details of DARKO, but personally I don't really look at the line as much as the data points.
Simplistically, it seems to be just smoothing out a "best fit" and not necessarily the most up to date version of the data (the most recent data points sometimes are in the opposite direction of the line, as you alluded to).
But is there some reason to not believe the actual data points? I don't see signs of some significant improvement on a more granular level, at least on DARKO.
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He's played 600+ games and you're talking about a 13 game sample size. I think people are looking at they want to see and assuming it's some epiphany. He has had plenty of similar stretches in his career (or better).
Jaylen is good and I do think he's had a stretch of improved play. I'm hoping the KP connection is real and he continues to pick his spots to attack in an efficient way. He does seem a bit more energetic on D to my eye, though still loses his man way too often off the ball.
But big picture, I see a pretty similar guy. I don't buy the downward trajectory of the best fit line going forward (as JBD said its weighting a lot of semi-recent poor performance heavily), but I also can't say I see some big leap at age 27. His 3 PT shooting is definitely dragging down his overall value.
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As much as I sometimes appear to be the marketing department for DARKO, I don't think that I know more about how it calculates than most. What I will say is that it's factoring in all data, with some recency weighting for sure. But it wouldn't be very useful if it over-weighted the last few weeks of a guy in his eighth year.
The line is also (I assume) meant to be a nice smooth aesthetically pleasing view of the data. Bowiac can chime in if I'm way off here.
Maybe it would be a bit more accurate and "up to date" if you had it bounce around in a more choppy fashion, but that doesn't seem to be the way it's set up (the data points in the background seem to tell that more granular story).
"Sample size" is only meaningful for activities with lots of variance. You don't need a huge sample to see that Jrue Holiday is an elite defender, for example. Jaylen's recent playmaking is similar: it's stuff you either can do or you can't, and he couldn't really do it to that level before.
I'm not going to argue about the 13 game sample size (nor that people are looking for what they want to see. I think we are all guilty of that around here)
I feel like I am pretty good about noticing these changes for all Celtics players, and IMO, there's a real difference between right now and anything I've ever seen from him.
It was a very small play at the beginning of the game but I made a comment about it in the Game Thread. Jaylen initiated the offense and made a semi-no look chest pass to KP for a 3. It was completely in the shooting pocket, which allowed KP to step into the 3 and go up all in one motion. It was a high level pass that, quite frankly, you don't see a ton of around the NBA anymore. I will die on the hill that Jaylen doesn't make anything close to that read and pass before.
Well I for one certainly hope Jaylen's last dozen or so games have unlocked a new real level of playmaking from him.
I would say more often than not for someone with more than 600 games under their belt, it's more likely either entirely not real or not as real as some want to believe it is (as far as projecting future play).
I would say more often than not for someone with more than 600 games under their belt, it's more likely either entirely not real or not as real as some want to believe it is (as far as projecting future play).
Yeah I remember that same play. Read and react, help came his way, bam, super open 3 for KP. It portended good things to come last night. Last year, he was deciding what to do before the move.
Two things.
1. DARKO doesn't think Gordon is trending up, his recent data points are flat. The best fit line just has the momentum of the recent uptick.
2. The reason DARKO thinks they are similar players is that Gordon is a much better defensive player by DARKO. Jaylen is a better offensive player.
Different ways to provide value.
I wonder how much his 3 PT shooting is dragging down his DARKO. I think we can all agree he has been making much better decisions with the ball over the past month or so and limiting the killer live ball turnovers, but ~33% from deep on 7 attempts/game isn't great. Not sure it's hurting them, but it would be nice if he could shoot closer to his 36% career average.
Up to and through the zero-assist 30 point game, JB was at 3.2/2.5 A/TO ratio. Really not that great.
Then ESPN put up an insta post calling him out, JB called them "corny," and he has produced a 5.1/2.1 ratio. Much better.
Maybe a coincidence, maybe a little extra motivation, maybe a penny dropping, maybe a little bit of each. But interesting to note.
Then ESPN put up an insta post calling him out, JB called them "corny," and he has produced a 5.1/2.1 ratio. Much better.
Maybe a coincidence, maybe a little extra motivation, maybe a penny dropping, maybe a little bit of each. But interesting to note.
Correct.
It's honestly impossible to rate these guys anyways. Scheme/role on team/freedom with style of play are just impossible to quantify.
I tend to look at trading value columns and then piece together information that I hear from podcasts with insiders as to where players stack up to the people that matter (NBA front offices).
I will just say that the ability to get into the lane and create offense is something that is generally overvalued by "old media" and undervalued by advanced stats.
I also think that there is something to be said for players that are easy to build around plus that can be on the floor in the playoffs without being mercilessly hunted is something that's hard to capture with advanced stats as well...Immediate names that come to mind are Domantas Sabonis and Nikola Vucevic. Both very good offensive players but with very clear and glaring flaws that are exposed in 7 game series (Vucevic is a statue on defense, Sabonis's rim protection is atrocious which sort of cancels out how great he is as a small ball 5)
Don't you think you're missing context and things we know about the individual with this? I mean, if we are talking about a generic create a player here, odds are heavily skewed in your favor.
But the context about his new teammates that's been provided in this thread along with things that we know about Jaylen (maniacal worker, improves every offseason, a renewed offseason focus on reading defenses after the Miami debacle) I think it's much more likely that somethings been unlocked than you seem to be willing to admit.
EDIT: Maybe this is a science vs art thing. I appreciate the advanced stats, I like looking at them but I am always going to trust my eyes on this type of stuff. Especially improvements like this. I think I understand the game and know what to look for.
One last thing, that game last night is the best I have ever seen Jaylen playmake. He was THE primary option and got 6 assists and 0 turnovers. He only had one possession where I remember thinking "Uh-oh Jaylen's got the blinders on and he is going to shoot no matter what"...that's a really great number for a player of his caliber in that situation. I truly don't believe he has that type of game last year.
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You really cannot use these advanced metrics as a day-to-day mark-to-market of a player's worth just like you wouldn't use individual game plus/minus or other box score attributes. Too much noise IMO.
Not going to lie. Its extremely amusing that our biggest conflict on this board is over whether Jaylen Brown is a flawed but skilled player who didn't deserve All NBA or a Top-X player who is still in ascendancy, snatching souls one poster at a time.
Not going to lie. Its extremely amusing that our biggest conflict on this board is over whether Jaylen Brown is a flawed but skilled player who didn't deserve All NBA or a Top-X player who is still in ascendancy, snatching souls one poster at a time.
I was constantly pointing out early in the season that Jaylen's turnover numbers this year were being heavily skewed by offensive fouls, moving screen variety in particular, which count as turnovers. His career high in offensives was 27 last season (before that, it was 21), this year, he was at like 9 through 16 games. Now, he's at 11 through 26 games, and his turnover #'s have plummeted as it has regressed.
The thing is I don’t think he has.
Brown has had some crazy scoring streaks where he just overcomes defenses on his own and puts up lines of 40 points with 1 assist, but I have never seen him change his approach to the game as he has the past month. I don’t ever remember seeing Jaylen with this court vision for anywhere near this sustained period, small as a 13-15 game sample might be. Has he ever averaged 5 assists per game over a 5-game stretch, let alone 15? I’m not raising the Mission Accomplished banner, but this is the first time in a few years I’ve felt like Jaylen might reach another level that will include making his teammates better.
It would be weird if it took that to change his approach, but whatever works. My hope is coaching has played a role. KP no doubt helps, but half of this has been with KP off the court, it’s more than that.
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I think Jaylen had a pretty similar month last March, with regards to passing. 4.1 assists per game, only 2.5 TO’s, was making the correct read more than in the past. Then he cut his hand, and wasn’t the same in the playoffs.
I think this streak shows a bit more with regards to the tougher reads, though.
I think this streak shows a bit more with regards to the tougher reads, though.
We watch Jaylen, we follow the Celtics, we can create a story that fits what we are seeing and make it seem “real”.
I have a feeling fans of most players with a similar short term improvement in one facet of their game can create similar stories to fit their narrative.
If the odds are heavily skewed in my favor for a generic situation, we should be careful assuming Jaylen is some outlier.
Why? He’s trying harder? It’s all the addition of KP? Maybe I dunno. I wish there was a more tangible reason, like he just got new contacts or something.
We want it to be real and it’s tempting to create an entirely logical reason that Jaylen has unlocked something.
Time will tell. I’ll be rooting for it along side everyone else here. But count me as at least moderately skeptical.
This is not exactly right, sample size is good and necessary for all kinds of statistical approximations. But sports statistics are confounded by the fact that you can’t repeat conditions. A player taking a hundred shots is not the same as a hundred rolls of the dice. Each shot is taken in a different context. Some are more alike than others, but even if you control for game situation or opponent (for example) there are a bunch of unknowns that are impossible to control for.
That is where scouting comes in, among other things. But the reason why statistics work so well is that we still have biases and preconceptions that cloud our vision. I agree with everyone here that Jaylen has made a kind of leap. But it’s worth proceeding with caution and not dismissing lines of evidence that disagree with us.
Worth remembering also that progress is not linear. Tatum is a perfect example of that. He goes through stretches where things aren't clicking--particularly but not solely his outside shot--and then they are again. Brown still has some 0 assist 4 turnover games in him this season. But he has been on a good run of doing things that we're not used to seeing. Where the eyeball test factors IMO is in identifying whether a guy who has 5 assists is creating looks or just passing out of trouble to a shooter who buries a contested shot. What we have been seeing a lot of lately is the former, not the latter.
3 TO and 0 assists Dec 1 against Philly and 3 TO and 0 assists Dec 4 against Indy. Were those games before or after he was sprinkled with the magic playmaking dust? Perhaps we can throw out those games from our memory and evaluation
Agree on progress not being linear and if even a portion of this is sustainable rather than inevitable variation, I will be stoked. But people here pretending he's somehow suddenly unlocked some masterful playmaking dimension to his game are likely to be disappointed.
I'm actually more hopeful the 3 pointer comes back closer to his peak. That's something he's shown he can do over the course of 2 seasons.
Best part about this shit is that we get to watch it play out.3 TO and 0 assists Dec 1 against Philly and 3 TO and 0 assists Dec 4 against Indy. Were those games before or after he was sprinkled with the magic playmaking dust? Perhaps we can throw out those games from our memory and evaluation
Agree on progress not being linear and if even a portion of this is sustainable rather than inevitable variation, I will be stoked. But people here pretending he's somehow suddenly unlocked some masterful playmaking dimension to his game are likely to be disappointed.
I'm actually more hopeful the 3 pointer comes back closer to his peak. That's something he's shown he can do over the course of 2 seasons.
Sure, but we’ll continue to disagree here. Those of us who think Jaylen is flawed but good will likely continue to see that, and attribute a lot of what others are seeing to the fact that his teammates, and thus the team, are better. Others will see Jaylen as improved and lifting the team. Like, earlier people were posting about how this is a 50 win team without Tatum. That’s probably not far off but in my mind it’s not because Jaylen is a guy who can carry a team to 50 wins, it’s because each of Porzingis, Jrue, White, and Jaylen are very good players and Horford is still pretty good too. So we’re seeing the same thing from the team, but our belief as to the cause is different.
I will say I think Jaylen’s decision-making has looked marginally improved this year. I still think he has tunnel vision and forcing problems on offense, but less so. I still don’t think he has great vision. Like, I think he makes a decision as to how to approach each possession and doesn’t really adapt. But he’s been mixing in more possessions where that decision seems to be looking to create instead of score. And if he keeps doing that, he will improve despite the vision issues because he’ll be less predictable to the defense anyway.
I’ve mostly stopped posting in this thread though and will probably go back to it. I’m not convincing anyone that Jaylen is just good instead of great who believes otherwise and I don’t think anyone was getting anything out of the discussion anymore either on either side. In a world where my view on Jaylen changes and I think he really has made a leap, I will come back though to say that.
I think the bolded is true, but this is also what people are seeing in Jaylen's improvement: he's learning to maximally work with those other guys, particularly KP and DWhite.
This is reflected in the on/offs, where the team has gone from abysmal to monstrous when Tatum sits, which had been an issue forever.
Jaylen used to mesh on offense primarily by hitting 3s and attacking advantages, but now he's adding in the ability to consistently be the primary or secondary playmaker, and do a lot even when his 3 isn't falling. That's really, really valuable with KP and DWhite: the former needs creators around him, and the latter would be overstretched as the only playmaker in a lineup.
So while I agree that the Celtics have a ton of non-Tatum talent, the role Jaylen is playing within that group is really, really valuable. If you replaced Tatum with, say, Mikal Bridges, this is still a top-3 team in the East, and Jaylen's improved complementary play style on both ends is a huge part of that.
From Jay King today:
Even if one (correctly imo) thinks that KP and DWhite have a ton to do with this, it's non-trivial to find the guy who turns KP+DWhite+whomever into world-beaters.
DWhite is similar without Tatum, and I think my conclusion from that would be that he and JB are an elite duo, fringe All-NBA, around whom you could build quite a decent team, if not a title contender.
https://theathletic.com/5155775/2023/12/22/jayson-tatum-celtics-boston-bench/
+11 for Brown without Tatum is massive, and includes the whole season, not just cherrypicking the past month.
Even if one (correctly imo) thinks that KP and DWhite have a ton to do with this, it's non-trivial to find the guy who turns KP+DWhite+whomever into world-beaters.
DWhite is similar without Tatum, and I think my conclusion from that would be that he and JB are an elite duo, fringe All-NBA, around whom you could build quite a decent team, if not a title contender.
https://theathletic.com/5155775/2023/12/22/jayson-tatum-celtics-boston-bench/
I enjoy having the title favorite, personally lol. I’d also say let’s see where the numbers look like by the midseason point and further. I’d expect them to still be really good without Tatum either way, but 5 games ago, the team had a net of +4 with Jaylen on and Tatum off. It’s still early enough that a small stretch of games really affects the overall numbers.
I’m ecstatic that they are playing so well without Tatum, but they’d be second round toast with a Mikal Bridges instead. People definitely too in the moment with Tatum, IMO.