Boston Celtics: 2 stars we could see C’s pairing Jayson Tatum with one day

Bradley Beal, SG

Within the past couple of weeks, we discussed the possibility of the Boston Celtics pursuing one of Jayson Tatum’s long-time friends, Bradley Beal:

"Having their relationship go back to their childhood roots in St. Louis, Beal — five year’s Tatum’s elder — has been a mentor for the 22 year old All-Star since youth. Referred to as a “brother” to Tatum, Beal has given the talented wing advice and guidance every step of the way throughout his NBA tenure."

A few weeks ago they teamed up to donate $500,000 to Boston and St. Louis-area food banks.

Tatum and Beal also collaborated with St. Louis based pizzeria Imo’s to deliver 1,000 pizzas to local hospitals and healthcare facilities.

Most recently, Tatum appeared on Showtime’s “All the Smoke” podcast where he proclaimed that his long-time buddy is the most underrated player in the league and even suggested that, if he were in a bigger city perhaps his perception would be different.

"“He averaged 31 a season and he didn’t make the All-Star Game,” Tatum said. “I feel like probably if he was in a bigger market, he would be on ESPN more. … I think he need more attention because he is a killer.”"

Might a bigger market for the 26-year-old shooting guard be Boston?

To his credit, Tatum does have a point about the lack of coverage for Beal despite his unbelievable play throughout 2019-20. On the season, the eight-year pro is putting up a league-leading 30.5 points per game to go along with 6.1 assists (career-high) and 4.2 boards while shooting 46 percent shooting from the field and 35 percent from deep.

Despite his excellence, Beal was not selected to this season’s All-Star game and, if the season were to continue, would likely find himself watching the playoffs from the comfort of his couch — by the time of the suspension the Wizards Wizards were in the ninth seed with a measly record of 29-40.

Like we discussed in our previous piece on Beal, we acknowledged that he’s admitted to being loyal to a fault, but everyone has their breaking point. Signing an extension with the Wizards this offseason the talented wing is under contract with the franchise for the next two years — with a player option for 2022-23 — which means, if they wished to acquire the shooting guard sooner than this, they’d need to look to the trading route.

The C’s would have ample talents to dangle in a potential package, including the likes of Gordon Hayward, Jaylen Brown, Romeo Langford and many other assets.

However, they could also just simply wait for his contract to expire and pursue him via 2023’s free agency period if they actually wanted to attain his services.