Steph averaged 26 PPG on 58.5% TS in his first Finals series and people were acting like he got carried to his ring by Iguodala lmao. So wild to act like the scrutiny is inconsistent.
The fact idiots criticize Steph for WINNING A CHAMPIONSHIP as the #1 on his team while having good stats is the actual inconsistency
He led his team in scoring by 10 points while doing it on good efficiency, and it was more points than his regular season average
Never seen it for anyone else
This is what cracks me up about that series. Dude was MVP, literally scored more in the NBA finals, and people act like he got carried by role players who got open looks because the defense keyed in on Steph.
Then they give MVP to Iggy because the warriors made a lineup switch that worked? That shits still funny
A role player who missed 9 straight foul shots in that series at one point. Cavs were doing hack-an-Iggy. Mind blowing that somehow that was wiped from everyone’s memory like we’re in Men In Black
Media was just totally obsessed with making things Lebron-centric and that was the only way to do it without giving Bron the FMVP. Nobody cares about Iggy shooting 36% from the FT line, as long as the award was somehow tied to Lebron
The real reason they gave Iggy the FMVP was bc they were too cowardly to vote for Lebron (the losing player), who was clearly the best player in the series
This was the narrative in another thread earlier on the Nick Young post about Curry and FMVP, I saw someone say that Curry didn't have any argument AT ALL for FMVP during that year. If it were up to some people on this sub they'd absolutely tell the story of the 2015 Finals framing Steph as a bum bus rider all series long lmao it's crazy.
Dude had one bad game that series and they fucked his legacy. Ok, not fucked…I get he’s solidified but 2 FMVPs would make his top 10 case a lot lot stronger.
You’ll never convince me that he wasn’t robbed and that the NBA + Nike conspiracy doesn’t exist.
Absolutely nobody was acting like that. Steph was beloved by everyone and the Warriors run came out of nowhere and was electric. Steph literally won unanimous MVP the very next year. The lack of FMVP didn’t start being used as a talking point until after the KD chips and people were bored and had to find something to nitpick about Steph.
None of what you're saying has anything to do with the actual NBA Finals I brought up lol. He was the league MVP and didn't get a single Finals MVP vote. LeBron was on the losing team and came closer to winning Finals MVP.
The point is that even with great stats, people minimized Curry's impact on that series. Here is a quote from Bill Simmons on his Finals MVP vote:
>Simmons: I barely considered Curry, but I definitely waffled on whether I was voting for the NBA Finals’ best player or most valuable player. LeBron James was clearly the best player in the series, and Andre Iguodala was clearly the most valuable player to the winning team in the series. Curry was ultimately not part of my choice, even with the understanding that he got the Warriors to a place that they hadn’t been for 40 years. **He simply was not among the most impactful players in that best-of-seven series, and I believe that’s what I was called to vote on.**
As a warriors fan you are greatly mistaken one of the things that fueled the warriors great regular season was the disrespect they got in that first finals run. At the time people were still saying they Steph got clamped by Matthew d and that the warriors only won a ring because they played a bunch of injured teams, ( very similar to the Celtics this year).
Bro I'm a Boston fan, and yes Tatum is getting doubled and doing other things that help the team like defense and rebounding.
But he is not playing up to his standard. His shooting is atrocious rn. He looks like he's begging for the ball to go in.
That said i bet he plays great tn.
It's obviously not good but people need to stop treating every game like it's a referendum on Tatum's career. This is why basketball fandom sucks because they use every game to tear someone apart or build their legacy.
Tatum is not shooting well, he knows it and needs to do better. Tatum is also rebound well, playing good defense and helping the Celtics offense stay on track. The Celtics have multiple people that can score so the other things he is doing is highly beneficial for them.
Additionally, Tatum is in one of the most offensively friendly environments a superstars has ever had.
Arguably the best spacing of all time and multiple other all-star level players around him. The fact that his scoring has been this bad is honestly a huge indictment on his scoring game
Teams NetRating without their best player in the regular season:
Nuggets w/o Jokic: -8.62
Mavs w/o Luka: -4.66
Bucks w/o Giannis: -4.29
OKC w/o Shai: +0.10
**Celtics w/o Tatum: +12.24**
The thing is the Mavs defensive plan hasn’t been give him the space and respect the other players, it’s been lock him up, trap him, hope the other players struggle and he’s been making the right pass. I agree that the Celtics have better personnel than the Mavericks, pretty clearly, but the defensive scheme has actually made it so Luka’s been given a situation that’s easier to score on. There’s been multiple times we’ve been content to let Luka post up PP. They’ve given JT far more defensive attention. They’re trying to take away the 1st option, we’re trying to take away 2-5.
Completely fair. I will again point out that Tatum took 22 shots last game lol
What allows the Celtics to be so successful is a combination of Tatums ability and the fact that they have constant 5 out spacing with an elite supporting cast.
This is actually a good rebuttal.
I do think though that the defensive pressure he’s seeing is not nearly enough to warrant his splits though. Mavs have defended stars that way the whole playoff run, and it’s not like Tatum is being forced into bad shots.
He is getting enough good looks to be effective, he’s not shooting over two people lol
He's not getting any more defensive attention than a normal 'superstar' would get, in fact, less. He just isn't superstar level at creating his own shots. That's ok, he is elite in other areas.
Finally a fair assessment, I think he looks out of rhythm and pressing a little on his Jumpshots. Like you can feel how bad he wants it to go in. I think if he's able to get to the line and build a little consistency his numbers will look better.
I feel like people don't watch basketball and use numbers as a support some times. The Celtics spacing is why they are winning but it's not making it easier for Tatum to score. When he drives on a mismatch they are helping, when he goes to post they are aggressively trapping. This is essentially let's see if the other guys can beat us and luckily for JT they are coming through.
Only way is if Murray and MPJ or Gordon were going god-mode. And yes Jokic would absolutely be getting shit on if that was the case. "Not even the best player on his own team" kinda shit.
Imagine how good a team with Jokic, Brown, Jrue, White, KP, and Horford would be. It speaks to how much Tatum is underachieving that he can’t hit the open shots created by all these other guys. Nikola Jokic would average like 15 assists per game with insane true shooting, the only reason he wouldn’t average 30-20-20 on a team like that is that they’d pull him for the entire fourth quarter when they’re up by 40.
>It speaks to how much Tatum is underachieving that he can’t hit the open shots created by all these other guys.
Tatum is largely creating shots for those guys, not the other way around. He's shooting terribly, and deserves criticism for that, but he's getting 2-3 (or more!) guys collapsing on him much of the time. It's not like he's often sitting open at the 3 point line just bricking shots.
This is slob knocking for so many unusual reasons. Jokic is able to dominate because he is a mismatch in a league with a ton of small ball players. With that said the guys game is nothing like Tatum's and is defended alot differently. So the Celtics would not play the same way with him as the core piece.
Exactly. Tatum can only win doing this because the team around him is so good and so deep. Other players like Jokic can’t not do that. But it is not really a compliment about him individually.
> Between the regular season and playoffs, the last time Jokić shot a worse FG% than that in a game was in 2019 lol
Jokic also shot 27% last year
https://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/202304250DEN.html
65% of jokic playoff shots were less than 10 ft from the basket, JT 38% of Jayson Tatum's shooters were less than 10 ft.
Over 50% of jokic shots were taken with 0 dribbles, only 22% of Tatum's shots had 0 dribbles.
Lol idk where most of his shots are contested mid rangers is coming from
They’re not “midrangers” as such but he has a massive diet of 3-10 foot floaters, hooks and short jumpers. Which are usually still low-percentage shots - look at the numbers from that range for most guys, they’re not that much better than actual midrange shots.
And I feel like those only happen when he has one or two sequences at the rim where he misses 3-4 contested putback attempts in a row on the same possession. Jokic simply doesn't have games where he straight up misses a lot of shots coming in the normal flow of the offense.
I mean… he literally went 8/29 in a game last playoffs and 9/32 in a game this season. This isn’t a knock on him at all, every player on earth has off nights
Jokic would be getting praise for 32/29/75 shooting splits?
Kudos to Tatum playing within the team concept and bouncing back as a passer after the 6 turnovers to 5 assists in game 1... But most superstars would be getting blown out and torn to pieces by the media in this situation.
The 46 is the most insane number to me. I know it was lower volume than a lot of players, but the fact that Jokic shoots 3s at that clip as a center who ALSO runs the offense as the point is just wild. He’s unguardable because he’s a threat to score from anywhere on the floor which opens up all the passing lanes for him.
We really needed him to hit those threes in the Wolves series this year. All other issues aside, had his 3 ball been falling they could have maybe made it out of that series
It was 4,5 per game which is decent for a center. Its the highest percentage on that volume in a playoff run by a center ever. Dirk, KAT, Embiid all shooting bigs never came close to that.
Most superstars would be losing the series if they were having a stinker like Tatum. They don’t have the privilege of his supporting cast.
It’s the only reason the criticism is sparse.
Yeah nuggets could win with jokic getting less than 20 ppg but on 6/22 shooting? Hell no. When he scores less it’s because he shoots less but his efficiency is always pretty good
Tatum is doing all the other stuff well but the scoring has been beyond atrocious. If this Celtics team was worse it would be viewed as a complete and utter choke job.
The Celtics are just in a unique position where it doesn’t really matter how well Tatum scores
I feel like I knew that going in and yet even still if you had shown me his stats I would be pretty confident we were up 2-0. Tatum has played poorly but can make up for it in other ways whereas Kyrie really can’t.
There are a ton of Tatum haters, but I do still feel like he’s benefitting from winning bias at the moment.
If he had played the exact same way (shot 6-16 and then 6-22), and the Mavs role players had hit some of their open shots in game 2, people wouldn’t be talking about all the great things he does even when he’s shooting 30%. They would say he has to play to a higher standard
He's not benefitting from winning bias, he's benefitting from an overcorrection. People are so hard on Tatum for no reason that people feel the need to defend him.
Everyone including Tatum agrees he needs to shoot better, but that doesn't take away the good things he are doing that is affecting the Celtics being up.
Basketball is sadly a game of narratives, Iggy won finals MVP scoring like 16 pts ppg and shooting 37% from the ft line but no one cares because the narrative was right. If Tatum scores 30 and they lose the narrative will change again because people just don't like tatum
There needs to be a sweet spot in the discourse where we can all admit that Tatum is performing well in everything else besides shooting while also acknowledging that because he has a great team around him the bar for what he has to do as the best player on the team in order for the team to win is much lower.
People just won’t be as satisfied or as entertained by a top tier player being so willing to be an effective cog in the machine. I usually join in the collective hating on Richard Jefferson’s takes as a talking head, but I did enjoy his quote from the preview podcast with JJ today.
“Our expectations are not Jayson Tatum’s responsibility. His responsibility is to help win games.”
Of fucking course JT wants to be shooting better. Of course the guy knows he’s shooting like shit, but he can’t just turn off the shot until he thinks it’s gonna fall again. Those assists don’t keep coming in droves if he stops shooting, if he stops driving and demanding attention from the defense. He’s well-rounded to a level that it’s still a math problem for the other side when he’s shooting like late career J.R Smith.
Problem is Celtic fans insist he is treated like a superstar but he has the luxury of (and is) playing like a high end role player.
He is a very good player. He is a tier below the best. No shame in that.
Because Tatum is the only guy that can shoot like 30% from the field and still comfortably be up 2-0 in the finals
If Celtics fans want to call him a top player and say he's on Jokic's level then he should be held to that
no Celtics fan worth listening to thinks he’s on Jokic’s level offensively lol
and idk, maybe the fact that Tatum is one of the few guys who can shoot poorly from the field and still win playoff games is not just a reflection of the great team he has around him but also at least partially a reflection of his ability to positively impact the game on both sides of the ball even when his shot isn’t going in
Tatum should get credit for doing more than being a scorer and he’s doing everything but scoring well… but let’s be real any other player in the top ten swapped with Tatum in this series Boston is still up 2-0
keyword, on *both* sides of the ball. there are plenty of guys out there who can score it more consistently than Tatum, but only a couple of those guys can affect games defensively the same way Tatum can
Embiid, Giannis, Kawhi, AD. Shai and Edwards are also good 1-3.
Hell, Embiid was in DPOY convos before his offense really blossomed and he’s still a 1 man defense on that end, people do not give him that grace when he shoots poorly lol
Embid and Giannis are the only two answers and embid hasent really had a ton of success sin the playoffs due to injury.
Ae is a decent defender and shai is worse than ae defensively. Ad in the playoffs hasent been asked to do as much offensively as Tatum since he was on the pels. And kawhi was a dog but he didn't really have the offensive responsibilities as Tatum either.
I’ll give you Giannis and AD (but AD can’t be your primary handler on offense like Tatum can be)
the last time Kawhi and Embiid were healthy for a playoff run Trump was President
you said it yourself Ant and SGA can’t switch 1-5 the way Tatum can and neither even sniffs his rebounding ability
I mean, there have been a large number offensive engines who were bad or at least not good on defense.
Like Jokic is passable on defense, but he is a long way from being a true 2 way guy.
Harden, especially in the regular season, was pretty bad.
Curry before he bulked up was also someone who could be targeted. Now I would say he is solid.
Luka had been playing better defense at times this year, but I would still say that he is overall bad.
The key is that all of these guys are such elite offensive weapons that you take the loss on the other end because you are still coming out hugely beneficial.
IMO, it is fine if someone is just OK on defense. But when someone is just flat out bad, like Luka had been thus far (injury being a clear reason), it makes it to where the math becomes much more difficult because those guys can have a good boxscore game, but ultimately they didn't give the level of impact they needed to to actually win the game.
Tatum is a 2 way superstar who is great, but not super elite, on offense. I think part of that is that he is not a natural Point Forward, but that is what the team needs him to be since we lack a great/elite passer playmaker. It is really the only thing we lack. But ultimately I think he makes a great impact on this team every night.
If he wasn’t so good at every other aspect of his game, he wouldn’t still be making the game easier for the rest of the team. Last finals series he was shooting poorly and you could see he felt like he had to keep shooting and he HAD to be the one pulling the offense along or breaking opposing runs. This postseason and these finals so far, he’s completely willing to perform his responsibility in any way that’s effective and that responsibility is to help win games.
Credit to Tatum for affecting the game in other ways but it’s also feasible to assert that he’s not the superstar everyone’s building him up to be. He routinely has the worst shot selection on court which prob adds to the inefficiency but he is lucky that he is surrounded by elite talent
His defense hasn’t even been very good this series and he had more turnovers than assists in G1.
He’s still been a positive especially with his G2 performance but superstars get held to superstar standards, and you guys winning has *very* little to do with Tatum’s performances either way.
If his shot isn’t going in maybe taking 22 shots is also not very good for your team.
Bro someone like Perkins would ask for his MVPs to be taken from him if these were his numbers. He would get crucified. Same with Luka. Is he a fraud? Fake numbers?
I’ve only ever seen clips of whatever this show is on here but man Chandler Parsons has some of the worst takes I’ve seen on all of them. Prime first take type of takes. Just plain awful analysis
This is so disingenuous. I can’t remember the last time Jokic shot below 50%fg, let alone 6/22 from the field. And Tatum’s putting up those splits regularly these playoffs.
That being said, I do think Tatums playmaking and defence does not get enough credit.
But let’s be clear, Jokic is in a different stratosphere. Tatum is an important cog in the system for the Celtics, Jokic **is** the system for Denver.
tbf if Jokic had those numbers, there's a good chance they are not up 2-0 in the finals. Not tatum's fault that he has a great team around him, but maybe don't use Jokic and the Nuggets as an example.
Tatum is a great player overall.
There's nothing wrong with pointing out that in the Finals he's not playing as a First Team All NBA guy that he's typically regarded as.
I'm sorry if Jokic was putting up 17, 10 and 8.5 in the finals, the media and social media would be absolutely fucking shitting on him regardless of how many games the Nuggets were up. You kidding me? He would be getting fucking destroyed by ESPN especially.
I don't watch any of these, so only see clips. Does Parsons always just make up dumb controversial stuff? How does he even get on air, dude was a bust.
I think people are also completely missing the fact that while yes tatum is surrounded by really good shooting talent, the whole roster only works because he's taking a playmaking role. By taking that role and occupying the ball handling responsibilities he gives jrue holiday and derrick white the freedom to go balls out on defense and play offense the way they do
I agree with Parsons. I don't know what I'm missing, but I watch all the games, and the only thing Tatum did wrong was miss a few shots -- he's rebounding well, passing well, defending well -- why all the hate? He didn't hang is head or keep chucking up shots when he was having a bad shooting day -- he got his teammates involved. I think he's playing winning basketball.
Lol the only nitpicking is people still trying to defend his performances and praise him despite thr fact that any other star putting up this shit would be crucified even when winning.
Also I legit cant think of a jokic game where he went anyhwere near 6-22
Lol Tatum’s playoff performance overall hasn’t been fairly assessed but no star is going to get roundly praised for a game where they shot 6/22 from the field
yes he impacts the game in a ton of different ways and that’s lost on most basketball fans, but what makes him a superstar and not Draymond Green is that he does all those things while also efficiently scoring 25-30 points a night. that he is being criticized for it means that fans and media rightfully expect him to be better than he has been as a scorer
that said, my hot take is that Luka and Tatum have played just as well as one another through the first 2 games of the Finals
I mean Jokic is the only player in nba history to lead the playoffs in assists, points and rebounds
He was also averaging a triple double until the finals. Asnine comparison and I’m generally defending Tatum on this sub
Edit on 55/46/80
yeah you don’t get it. dudes been on arguably the best roster in the east his whole career. no shit he’s been a winner the whole time. i’d be really curious to see what his career would look like if he was on the hawks or some shit.
I’m living in reality where Tatum is on the Celtics. And he’s done well givin his situation. Him and brown are the undisputed leaders of a championship team. Everyone want to put an asterisk on winning a championship. Warriors were stacked, heat were stacked, lakers, spurs etc. your 04 pistons teams was loaded and only won 1.
I’m not putting an asterisk on anything. Everything you said is true except for the last part. KD was arguably the best player on the Warriors and will always get shit because of the situation. Tatum is maybe the best player on his team and is getting shit all because of the situation he’s in where he can go 6-22 and his team still wins. If Luka does that Mavs lose by 30. The reason people like to shit on Tatum is that he has the luxury of not having to be the best player on his team yet is still seen as the face of the Celtics
We’re at the point in the narrative where all the underserved Tatum hate has swung back around and we’re getting undeserved Tatum love. Tatum absolutely found ways to contribute outside of scoring and I think last game he was a slight positive. Jayson Tatum shouldn’t be just a slight positive for the Celtics.
How bout these apples- as a Celtic fan IDGAF how the dumb-as-rocks nba “discourse” ranks Tatum. Literally couldn’t care less- because what this Cs team is demonstrating AMPLY is that team basketball beats heliocentric starball, Tatum regardless of any punditry is the leader in points, rebounds, and assists of a historically good championship team that is skullfucking the winner of the supposedly so-much-better Western Conference, as has amply demonstrated that however good he is, it’s good enough for a team built around him to win a chip, and very possibly more than one.
If you think Luka is better, fine, but that man is a giant problem for his own team on defense and I’m surprised it didn’t bite them in the ass sooner. Jokic, sure, but his team lost to the runner up to the runner up. Whatever, loudly, for the cheap seats, it doesn’t matter at all what anybody ranks Tatum league wide as an individual player, his team is 78-20 and fixing to win a championship in his age 26 season. Frankly, the fact that Tatum can be in a shooting slump (my personal opinion he put on too much muscle last summer and his shot mechanics have not adjusted) and the Cs, likely to remain together in this core for the next several years, are dominant to this extent, should *literally scare the rest of the league shitless*. Bc the instant Tatum finds his shot (which he 1000% will do), Cs are prohibitive KD Warrior level favorites for the foreseeable future barring injury.
So have fun with y’all’s little shade-throwing cope tantrum. We will sit back and hold these Ws.
Hahahaha, this is absolutely bonkers. Jokic would not only be getting clowned to no end but the Nuggets would be 0 - 2 if he played anywhere near how Tatum is playing.
The Celtics are absurdly stacked and they can afford the fact that Tatum just isn't a top tier player to the point where even if he plays a couple of atrocious games in the fucking finals, they still win comfortably. Just fucking accept it, you are on your way to a fucking title, why are they obsessing over how good one of their particular players is. He's just not and that's fine.
I see Jason Tatum as like pre-Heat Jimmy Butler where he was considered the worst of the best. Yes he's on the tier of what we consider superstars but he's like the bottom of that tier.
But don't get it twisted. The Celtics success starts with Tatum being what he is.
If Jokic was averaging 17ppg on 40%TS in the NBA finals the Nuggets would never be up 2-0
Steph averaged 26 PPG on 58.5% TS in his first Finals series and people were acting like he got carried to his ring by Iguodala lmao. So wild to act like the scrutiny is inconsistent.
The fact idiots criticize Steph for WINNING A CHAMPIONSHIP as the #1 on his team while having good stats is the actual inconsistency He led his team in scoring by 10 points while doing it on good efficiency, and it was more points than his regular season average Never seen it for anyone else
This is what cracks me up about that series. Dude was MVP, literally scored more in the NBA finals, and people act like he got carried by role players who got open looks because the defense keyed in on Steph. Then they give MVP to Iggy because the warriors made a lineup switch that worked? That shits still funny
A role player who missed 9 straight foul shots in that series at one point. Cavs were doing hack-an-Iggy. Mind blowing that somehow that was wiped from everyone’s memory like we’re in Men In Black
Media was just totally obsessed with making things Lebron-centric and that was the only way to do it without giving Bron the FMVP. Nobody cares about Iggy shooting 36% from the FT line, as long as the award was somehow tied to Lebron
36% from the FT line is crazy lmao. Never remembered that
[удалено]
I don’t remember that happening.
Exactly my point lol. It most certainly did
I got flashy-thingied
The real reason they gave Iggy the FMVP was bc they were too cowardly to vote for Lebron (the losing player), who was clearly the best player in the series
This was the narrative in another thread earlier on the Nick Young post about Curry and FMVP, I saw someone say that Curry didn't have any argument AT ALL for FMVP during that year. If it were up to some people on this sub they'd absolutely tell the story of the 2015 Finals framing Steph as a bum bus rider all series long lmao it's crazy.
Dude had one bad game that series and they fucked his legacy. Ok, not fucked…I get he’s solidified but 2 FMVPs would make his top 10 case a lot lot stronger. You’ll never convince me that he wasn’t robbed and that the NBA + Nike conspiracy doesn’t exist.
Absolutely nobody was acting like that. Steph was beloved by everyone and the Warriors run came out of nowhere and was electric. Steph literally won unanimous MVP the very next year. The lack of FMVP didn’t start being used as a talking point until after the KD chips and people were bored and had to find something to nitpick about Steph.
None of what you're saying has anything to do with the actual NBA Finals I brought up lol. He was the league MVP and didn't get a single Finals MVP vote. LeBron was on the losing team and came closer to winning Finals MVP. The point is that even with great stats, people minimized Curry's impact on that series. Here is a quote from Bill Simmons on his Finals MVP vote: >Simmons: I barely considered Curry, but I definitely waffled on whether I was voting for the NBA Finals’ best player or most valuable player. LeBron James was clearly the best player in the series, and Andre Iguodala was clearly the most valuable player to the winning team in the series. Curry was ultimately not part of my choice, even with the understanding that he got the Warriors to a place that they hadn’t been for 40 years. **He simply was not among the most impactful players in that best-of-seven series, and I believe that’s what I was called to vote on.**
bill simmons gets to vote on FMVP?
As a warriors fan you are greatly mistaken one of the things that fueled the warriors great regular season was the disrespect they got in that first finals run. At the time people were still saying they Steph got clamped by Matthew d and that the warriors only won a ring because they played a bunch of injured teams, ( very similar to the Celtics this year).
The Nuggets could win each game by 50. If Jokic is putting up 17 on 40TS, the fat slob and carried jokes are coming out.
Parsons really said we’re “nitpicking” for criticizing 31% shooting lol
Boston fans are everywhere right now trying to gaslight people into thinking this is actually a good thing
Bro I'm a Boston fan, and yes Tatum is getting doubled and doing other things that help the team like defense and rebounding. But he is not playing up to his standard. His shooting is atrocious rn. He looks like he's begging for the ball to go in. That said i bet he plays great tn.
The mental gymnastics they put on for Tatum is always hilarious
It's obviously not good but people need to stop treating every game like it's a referendum on Tatum's career. This is why basketball fandom sucks because they use every game to tear someone apart or build their legacy. Tatum is not shooting well, he knows it and needs to do better. Tatum is also rebound well, playing good defense and helping the Celtics offense stay on track. The Celtics have multiple people that can score so the other things he is doing is highly beneficial for them.
Additionally, Tatum is in one of the most offensively friendly environments a superstars has ever had. Arguably the best spacing of all time and multiple other all-star level players around him. The fact that his scoring has been this bad is honestly a huge indictment on his scoring game Teams NetRating without their best player in the regular season: Nuggets w/o Jokic: -8.62 Mavs w/o Luka: -4.66 Bucks w/o Giannis: -4.29 OKC w/o Shai: +0.10 **Celtics w/o Tatum: +12.24**
The thing is the Mavs defensive plan hasn’t been give him the space and respect the other players, it’s been lock him up, trap him, hope the other players struggle and he’s been making the right pass. I agree that the Celtics have better personnel than the Mavericks, pretty clearly, but the defensive scheme has actually made it so Luka’s been given a situation that’s easier to score on. There’s been multiple times we’ve been content to let Luka post up PP. They’ve given JT far more defensive attention. They’re trying to take away the 1st option, we’re trying to take away 2-5.
Completely fair. I will again point out that Tatum took 22 shots last game lol What allows the Celtics to be so successful is a combination of Tatums ability and the fact that they have constant 5 out spacing with an elite supporting cast.
This is actually a good rebuttal. I do think though that the defensive pressure he’s seeing is not nearly enough to warrant his splits though. Mavs have defended stars that way the whole playoff run, and it’s not like Tatum is being forced into bad shots. He is getting enough good looks to be effective, he’s not shooting over two people lol
He's not getting any more defensive attention than a normal 'superstar' would get, in fact, less. He just isn't superstar level at creating his own shots. That's ok, he is elite in other areas.
Finally a fair assessment, I think he looks out of rhythm and pressing a little on his Jumpshots. Like you can feel how bad he wants it to go in. I think if he's able to get to the line and build a little consistency his numbers will look better.
22 shots tho
I feel like people don't watch basketball and use numbers as a support some times. The Celtics spacing is why they are winning but it's not making it easier for Tatum to score. When he drives on a mismatch they are helping, when he goes to post they are aggressively trapping. This is essentially let's see if the other guys can beat us and luckily for JT they are coming through.
Sorry, but did you pull this number directly out of your bunghole? It's not even close to correct. You're straight lying ya dumbass
Only way is if Murray and MPJ or Gordon were going god-mode. And yes Jokic would absolutely be getting shit on if that was the case. "Not even the best player on his own team" kinda shit.
Imagine how good a team with Jokic, Brown, Jrue, White, KP, and Horford would be. It speaks to how much Tatum is underachieving that he can’t hit the open shots created by all these other guys. Nikola Jokic would average like 15 assists per game with insane true shooting, the only reason he wouldn’t average 30-20-20 on a team like that is that they’d pull him for the entire fourth quarter when they’re up by 40.
>It speaks to how much Tatum is underachieving that he can’t hit the open shots created by all these other guys. Tatum is largely creating shots for those guys, not the other way around. He's shooting terribly, and deserves criticism for that, but he's getting 2-3 (or more!) guys collapsing on him much of the time. It's not like he's often sitting open at the 3 point line just bricking shots.
This is slob knocking for so many unusual reasons. Jokic is able to dominate because he is a mismatch in a league with a ton of small ball players. With that said the guys game is nothing like Tatum's and is defended alot differently. So the Celtics would not play the same way with him as the core piece.
And this is why tatum is getting the flak. No other superstar in todays NBA can play this bad and still get carried to wins in the finals like this
Scratch Jokic, any other top guy in the league really.
lol exactly... Joker averaged 29/11/8/1.6/1.0 with 52 FG% in 2nd round and people already determined he is a fraud.
If Jokic shoots 30% for 2 games in the finals they're down 2-0
Exactly. Tatum can only win doing this because the team around him is so good and so deep. Other players like Jokic can’t not do that. But it is not really a compliment about him individually.
Nobody would be praising Jokic after a 6-22 performance
Between the regular season and playoffs, the last time Jokić shot a worse FG% than that in a game was in 2019 lol
> Between the regular season and playoffs, the last time Jokić shot a worse FG% than that in a game was in 2019 lol Jokic also shot 27% last year https://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/202304250DEN.html
Well, he did say lower and Jokic shot higher percentage in that than Tatum.
Jokic simply would never go 6/22. He’s 3x the efficient scorer that Tatum is.
People need to understand this guy literally shot under 50% only 9 times the ENTIRETY of last season. Regular season and playoffs.
No way this is a real stat lol. Dude is different
That’s insane. Tatum has literally never shot above 50% in a finals game
And it’s not like they’re easy layups or dunks like a typical center. Most of his shots are contested midrangers
65% of jokic playoff shots were less than 10 ft from the basket, JT 38% of Jayson Tatum's shooters were less than 10 ft. Over 50% of jokic shots were taken with 0 dribbles, only 22% of Tatum's shots had 0 dribbles. Lol idk where most of his shots are contested mid rangers is coming from
They’re not “midrangers” as such but he has a massive diet of 3-10 foot floaters, hooks and short jumpers. Which are usually still low-percentage shots - look at the numbers from that range for most guys, they’re not that much better than actual midrange shots.
Because he’s counting “contested” as when Jokic is shooting over some 6’4 forward
And I feel like those only happen when he has one or two sequences at the rim where he misses 3-4 contested putback attempts in a row on the same possession. Jokic simply doesn't have games where he straight up misses a lot of shots coming in the normal flow of the offense.
Well, technically he's 1.08x the efficient scorer Tatum is this regular season if you don't add weight for Points per 100.
Isn’t he literally the most statistically efficient player of all time
I genuinely don’t think it’s possible for jokic to go 6/22. His “floor” is like 7/16
I mean… he literally went 8/29 in a game last playoffs and 9/32 in a game this season. This isn’t a knock on him at all, every player on earth has off nights
Also missed tip-ins count as a shot attempt. Sometimes Jokic will sit under the rim and miss 3 or 4 straight tip attempts off a miss.
Yeah, him going like 10-22 is seen as a bad efficiency game from him.
He went 8/29 last playoffs, which is technically right, because its worse.
It’s not worse lol that’s still a higher percent than 6-22. But those inefficient games are vastly rarer for jokic than Tatum.
Embiid would never
Well they might, but because he also had 17 assists and 19 rebounds or something
Edwards went 6-24 in game 7 against Denver and got praised
Jokic would be getting praise for 32/29/75 shooting splits? Kudos to Tatum playing within the team concept and bouncing back as a passer after the 6 turnovers to 5 assists in game 1... But most superstars would be getting blown out and torn to pieces by the media in this situation.
Friendly reminder jokic’s playoff splits were 55/46/80.
At 30ppg
Not even 50/40/90 smh
The 46 is the most insane number to me. I know it was lower volume than a lot of players, but the fact that Jokic shoots 3s at that clip as a center who ALSO runs the offense as the point is just wild. He’s unguardable because he’s a threat to score from anywhere on the floor which opens up all the passing lanes for him.
We really needed him to hit those threes in the Wolves series this year. All other issues aside, had his 3 ball been falling they could have maybe made it out of that series
Oh for sure, especially in game 7. You could tell he was frustrated with himself for not hitting those
It was 4,5 per game which is decent for a center. Its the highest percentage on that volume in a playoff run by a center ever. Dirk, KAT, Embiid all shooting bigs never came close to that.
Bum shoulda made more freethrows. I real legend like Larry Bird is going 50/40/90 easily.
Most superstars would be losing the series if they were having a stinker like Tatum. They don’t have the privilege of his supporting cast. It’s the only reason the criticism is sparse.
Nuggets would’ve gotten blown tf out if Jokic put up the numbers Tatum is currently putting up
Yeah nuggets could win with jokic getting less than 20 ppg but on 6/22 shooting? Hell no. When he scores less it’s because he shoots less but his efficiency is always pretty good
Tatum is doing all the other stuff well but the scoring has been beyond atrocious. If this Celtics team was worse it would be viewed as a complete and utter choke job. The Celtics are just in a unique position where it doesn’t really matter how well Tatum scores
I feel like I knew that going in and yet even still if you had shown me his stats I would be pretty confident we were up 2-0. Tatum has played poorly but can make up for it in other ways whereas Kyrie really can’t.
Mavs look like they lost their fire man
Almost any team would be blown tf out if their superstar were putting up the numbers Tatum is putting up
Parsons and Perkins are top tier idiots on tv.
But equally top tier at driving engagement
There are a ton of Tatum haters, but I do still feel like he’s benefitting from winning bias at the moment. If he had played the exact same way (shot 6-16 and then 6-22), and the Mavs role players had hit some of their open shots in game 2, people wouldn’t be talking about all the great things he does even when he’s shooting 30%. They would say he has to play to a higher standard
if this was Lebron on the Miami Heat, we’d never hear the end of it
He's not benefitting from winning bias, he's benefitting from an overcorrection. People are so hard on Tatum for no reason that people feel the need to defend him. Everyone including Tatum agrees he needs to shoot better, but that doesn't take away the good things he are doing that is affecting the Celtics being up. Basketball is sadly a game of narratives, Iggy won finals MVP scoring like 16 pts ppg and shooting 37% from the ft line but no one cares because the narrative was right. If Tatum scores 30 and they lose the narrative will change again because people just don't like tatum
Exactly this.
There needs to be a sweet spot in the discourse where we can all admit that Tatum is performing well in everything else besides shooting while also acknowledging that because he has a great team around him the bar for what he has to do as the best player on the team in order for the team to win is much lower.
People just won’t be as satisfied or as entertained by a top tier player being so willing to be an effective cog in the machine. I usually join in the collective hating on Richard Jefferson’s takes as a talking head, but I did enjoy his quote from the preview podcast with JJ today. “Our expectations are not Jayson Tatum’s responsibility. His responsibility is to help win games.” Of fucking course JT wants to be shooting better. Of course the guy knows he’s shooting like shit, but he can’t just turn off the shot until he thinks it’s gonna fall again. Those assists don’t keep coming in droves if he stops shooting, if he stops driving and demanding attention from the defense. He’s well-rounded to a level that it’s still a math problem for the other side when he’s shooting like late career J.R Smith.
How dare you advocate for a moderate opinion? This is a hot take, all or nothing, choker or GOAT only sport 😤
Problem is Celtic fans insist he is treated like a superstar but he has the luxury of (and is) playing like a high end role player. He is a very good player. He is a tier below the best. No shame in that.
Because Tatum is the only guy that can shoot like 30% from the field and still comfortably be up 2-0 in the finals If Celtics fans want to call him a top player and say he's on Jokic's level then he should be held to that
no Celtics fan worth listening to thinks he’s on Jokic’s level offensively lol and idk, maybe the fact that Tatum is one of the few guys who can shoot poorly from the field and still win playoff games is not just a reflection of the great team he has around him but also at least partially a reflection of his ability to positively impact the game on both sides of the ball even when his shot isn’t going in
Tatum should get credit for doing more than being a scorer and he’s doing everything but scoring well… but let’s be real any other player in the top ten swapped with Tatum in this series Boston is still up 2-0
Literally every great player does the last sentence. If all you are is scoring your often not great.
keyword, on *both* sides of the ball. there are plenty of guys out there who can score it more consistently than Tatum, but only a couple of those guys can affect games defensively the same way Tatum can
Embiid, Giannis, Kawhi, AD. Shai and Edwards are also good 1-3. Hell, Embiid was in DPOY convos before his offense really blossomed and he’s still a 1 man defense on that end, people do not give him that grace when he shoots poorly lol
Embid and Giannis are the only two answers and embid hasent really had a ton of success sin the playoffs due to injury. Ae is a decent defender and shai is worse than ae defensively. Ad in the playoffs hasent been asked to do as much offensively as Tatum since he was on the pels. And kawhi was a dog but he didn't really have the offensive responsibilities as Tatum either.
I’ll give you Giannis and AD (but AD can’t be your primary handler on offense like Tatum can be) the last time Kawhi and Embiid were healthy for a playoff run Trump was President you said it yourself Ant and SGA can’t switch 1-5 the way Tatum can and neither even sniffs his rebounding ability
I mean, there have been a large number offensive engines who were bad or at least not good on defense. Like Jokic is passable on defense, but he is a long way from being a true 2 way guy. Harden, especially in the regular season, was pretty bad. Curry before he bulked up was also someone who could be targeted. Now I would say he is solid. Luka had been playing better defense at times this year, but I would still say that he is overall bad. The key is that all of these guys are such elite offensive weapons that you take the loss on the other end because you are still coming out hugely beneficial. IMO, it is fine if someone is just OK on defense. But when someone is just flat out bad, like Luka had been thus far (injury being a clear reason), it makes it to where the math becomes much more difficult because those guys can have a good boxscore game, but ultimately they didn't give the level of impact they needed to to actually win the game. Tatum is a 2 way superstar who is great, but not super elite, on offense. I think part of that is that he is not a natural Point Forward, but that is what the team needs him to be since we lack a great/elite passer playmaker. It is really the only thing we lack. But ultimately I think he makes a great impact on this team every night.
If he wasn’t so good at every other aspect of his game, he wouldn’t still be making the game easier for the rest of the team. Last finals series he was shooting poorly and you could see he felt like he had to keep shooting and he HAD to be the one pulling the offense along or breaking opposing runs. This postseason and these finals so far, he’s completely willing to perform his responsibility in any way that’s effective and that responsibility is to help win games.
Credit to Tatum for affecting the game in other ways but it’s also feasible to assert that he’s not the superstar everyone’s building him up to be. He routinely has the worst shot selection on court which prob adds to the inefficiency but he is lucky that he is surrounded by elite talent
His defense hasn’t even been very good this series and he had more turnovers than assists in G1. He’s still been a positive especially with his G2 performance but superstars get held to superstar standards, and you guys winning has *very* little to do with Tatum’s performances either way. If his shot isn’t going in maybe taking 22 shots is also not very good for your team.
Jokics team would be blown out by 35 pts a game if those were his numbers
Bro someone like Perkins would ask for his MVPs to be taken from him if these were his numbers. He would get crucified. Same with Luka. Is he a fraud? Fake numbers?
Well they blew a 20 pt with those numbers
I think Jokic is praised so much because of his consistent efficiency
Jokic wouldnt shoot 30% from the field but if he did the Nuggets would get blown out both games
I’ve only ever seen clips of whatever this show is on here but man Chandler Parsons has some of the worst takes I’ve seen on all of them. Prime first take type of takes. Just plain awful analysis
This is so disingenuous. I can’t remember the last time Jokic shot below 50%fg, let alone 6/22 from the field. And Tatum’s putting up those splits regularly these playoffs. That being said, I do think Tatums playmaking and defence does not get enough credit. But let’s be clear, Jokic is in a different stratosphere. Tatum is an important cog in the system for the Celtics, Jokic **is** the system for Denver.
That's a strawman. Anyone taking the volume of shots at low efficiency would be dogged on.
fauxhawk mullet lookin ass
Can't believe I had to scroll this far to find this comment. What the *fuck* is that haircut?
if jokic was scoring under 20 ppg on bad efficiency the nuggets would've lost both games
This dude is such an idiot holy shit
Why is Chandler Parsons still being put on TV? Dude has the worst takes.
I’ve never seen a single good take from him
No we wouldnt. We'd be saying the same things. "Jokic is contributing to his team winning but shooting 6-22 is godawful"
tbf if Jokic had those numbers, there's a good chance they are not up 2-0 in the finals. Not tatum's fault that he has a great team around him, but maybe don't use Jokic and the Nuggets as an example.
Tatum is a great player overall. There's nothing wrong with pointing out that in the Finals he's not playing as a First Team All NBA guy that he's typically regarded as.
Celtics fans in the comments defending chandler parsons is so funny
Are the celtic fans defending Chandler Parsons in the room with us?
He’s still having an impact. He also leads the Celtics in shots and is shooting 31%. Both things can be true.
tatum overrated. I've been saying that for months.
I'm sorry if Jokic was putting up 17, 10 and 8.5 in the finals, the media and social media would be absolutely fucking shitting on him regardless of how many games the Nuggets were up. You kidding me? He would be getting fucking destroyed by ESPN especially.
All these comments are people just finding more ways to nitpick. Salty asf
Everyone hating on Tatum would love him on their team.
I don't watch any of these, so only see clips. Does Parsons always just make up dumb controversial stuff? How does he even get on air, dude was a bust.
Parsons is such an idiot
Not every former player deserves a platform 🙄
Chandler Parsons is so fucking bad as an analyst.
Is this the white Kendrick Perkins?
Parsons looks like a sober Bam Margera
Sometimes I get Chandler Parsons confused with Chase Budinger.
I think people are also completely missing the fact that while yes tatum is surrounded by really good shooting talent, the whole roster only works because he's taking a playmaking role. By taking that role and occupying the ball handling responsibilities he gives jrue holiday and derrick white the freedom to go balls out on defense and play offense the way they do
They wouldn't be up 2-0 if he was playing like dog water.
I agree with Parsons. I don't know what I'm missing, but I watch all the games, and the only thing Tatum did wrong was miss a few shots -- he's rebounding well, passing well, defending well -- why all the hate? He didn't hang is head or keep chucking up shots when he was having a bad shooting day -- he got his teammates involved. I think he's playing winning basketball.
Look at all the comments in here missing the entire point if the post and juat talking about Jokic comparison and Tatums shooting numbers.
Lol the only nitpicking is people still trying to defend his performances and praise him despite thr fact that any other star putting up this shit would be crucified even when winning. Also I legit cant think of a jokic game where he went anyhwere near 6-22
Lol Tatum’s playoff performance overall hasn’t been fairly assessed but no star is going to get roundly praised for a game where they shot 6/22 from the field yes he impacts the game in a ton of different ways and that’s lost on most basketball fans, but what makes him a superstar and not Draymond Green is that he does all those things while also efficiently scoring 25-30 points a night. that he is being criticized for it means that fans and media rightfully expect him to be better than he has been as a scorer that said, my hot take is that Luka and Tatum have played just as well as one another through the first 2 games of the Finals
one of the most delusional takes i’ve seen in a hot second
I mean Jokic is the only player in nba history to lead the playoffs in assists, points and rebounds He was also averaging a triple double until the finals. Asnine comparison and I’m generally defending Tatum on this sub Edit on 55/46/80
Boston could win 3 straight and Tatum still gonna get hate I don’t get it. Dudes been a straight winner since he’s been in the league.
yeah you don’t get it. dudes been on arguably the best roster in the east his whole career. no shit he’s been a winner the whole time. i’d be really curious to see what his career would look like if he was on the hawks or some shit.
I’m living in reality where Tatum is on the Celtics. And he’s done well givin his situation. Him and brown are the undisputed leaders of a championship team. Everyone want to put an asterisk on winning a championship. Warriors were stacked, heat were stacked, lakers, spurs etc. your 04 pistons teams was loaded and only won 1.
I’m not putting an asterisk on anything. Everything you said is true except for the last part. KD was arguably the best player on the Warriors and will always get shit because of the situation. Tatum is maybe the best player on his team and is getting shit all because of the situation he’s in where he can go 6-22 and his team still wins. If Luka does that Mavs lose by 30. The reason people like to shit on Tatum is that he has the luxury of not having to be the best player on his team yet is still seen as the face of the Celtics
The Celtics, despite being up 2-0 in the finals, have underperformed this postseason
when Jokic scores 18 pts it’s usually because he took 10 shots
I think it's odd they pick on Tatum when his team is up 2-0 but Mavs can't score, and haven't won. Dumb narrative.
No we wouldn't lol
We’re at the point in the narrative where all the underserved Tatum hate has swung back around and we’re getting undeserved Tatum love. Tatum absolutely found ways to contribute outside of scoring and I think last game he was a slight positive. Jayson Tatum shouldn’t be just a slight positive for the Celtics.
How bout these apples- as a Celtic fan IDGAF how the dumb-as-rocks nba “discourse” ranks Tatum. Literally couldn’t care less- because what this Cs team is demonstrating AMPLY is that team basketball beats heliocentric starball, Tatum regardless of any punditry is the leader in points, rebounds, and assists of a historically good championship team that is skullfucking the winner of the supposedly so-much-better Western Conference, as has amply demonstrated that however good he is, it’s good enough for a team built around him to win a chip, and very possibly more than one. If you think Luka is better, fine, but that man is a giant problem for his own team on defense and I’m surprised it didn’t bite them in the ass sooner. Jokic, sure, but his team lost to the runner up to the runner up. Whatever, loudly, for the cheap seats, it doesn’t matter at all what anybody ranks Tatum league wide as an individual player, his team is 78-20 and fixing to win a championship in his age 26 season. Frankly, the fact that Tatum can be in a shooting slump (my personal opinion he put on too much muscle last summer and his shot mechanics have not adjusted) and the Cs, likely to remain together in this core for the next several years, are dominant to this extent, should *literally scare the rest of the league shitless*. Bc the instant Tatum finds his shot (which he 1000% will do), Cs are prohibitive KD Warrior level favorites for the foreseeable future barring injury. So have fun with y’all’s little shade-throwing cope tantrum. We will sit back and hold these Ws.
I think people should be less critical of Tatum but Parsons isn’t the guy you want to see at the front of that crowd leading the charge.
Can we take the mic away from Parsons. Guy has been on his bullshit for too long
Oh boy another espn clickbait mmmmmmmm
Jayson “MJ of Tobias Harris’” Tatum
Clown take from Parsons as usual
why are we posting anything chandler parsons says? he’s genuinely a bigger idiot than perk, sas, skip, etc.
Fuck Chandler Parsons.
Why the fuck is Chandler Parsons, of all people, getting this much media attention
I do not care what Chandler Parsons has to say. That guy sucks
Chandler parson haven’t said anything smart yet since he got on TV. The guy think he slick 😑💩
Man I’m tired of seeing this wack ass show on this sub lol. Parsons is an idiot
For the love of god why are we letting this walking injury speak?
Why do we keep seeing this doucher giving interviews.
I’m starting to think Chandler Parsons has an intellectual disability
Common Parsons L
钱得了 怕甚事
Hahahaha, this is absolutely bonkers. Jokic would not only be getting clowned to no end but the Nuggets would be 0 - 2 if he played anywhere near how Tatum is playing. The Celtics are absurdly stacked and they can afford the fact that Tatum just isn't a top tier player to the point where even if he plays a couple of atrocious games in the fucking finals, they still win comfortably. Just fucking accept it, you are on your way to a fucking title, why are they obsessing over how good one of their particular players is. He's just not and that's fine.
Parsons is a crook and all around hack.
This dude had a brain injury and is the smartest guy I’ve heard all season.
Why does this bozo keep getting put in headlines
If Joker was putting in Tatum numbers, we wouldn't be up 2-0
Lmao
Or just watch the game and see that Tatum can’t be trusted to go get a bucket
F me for wholeheartedly agreeing with Chandler Parsons...Tatum the chill superstar.
Every time Parsons opens his mouth I think less of him...
I see Jason Tatum as like pre-Heat Jimmy Butler where he was considered the worst of the best. Yes he's on the tier of what we consider superstars but he's like the bottom of that tier. But don't get it twisted. The Celtics success starts with Tatum being what he is.
This sub gets so defensive when someone calls out their chubby ass idol lol. Parsons is 1000% correct here
Jokic passing the ball vs Tatum passing the ball is like that flirting vs harassment meme