For the first time in years, there was no Jayson Tatum playing in the NBA All-Star Game, but still, Tatum managed to steal the spotlight, at least for a few minutes. In between two of the mini games on Sunday night, NBC aired a promo for a mini docuseries chronicling Tatum’s road to recovery from his achilles injury, titled The Quiet Work.
The five-part series will air on NBC/Peacock over the next few weeks, which has many people speculating about what this means, if anything, for Tatum’s eventual season debut.
Longtime Celtics homer and media mogul, Bill Simmons, has never been shy to wade into these waters, and on his Sunday night podcast with Zach Lowe, Bill delved into his ‘Conspiracy Bill’ persona, suggesting that there are some tea leaves to be read here.
Bill explained how he has been hearing things about an early March comeback for a while. He talked about how it was recently announced that the Celtics’ March 1st game against the 76ers was just moved to 8 PM and changed to a national broadcast on NBC. He also mentioned how ticket prices have skyrocketed for the team’s March 6th game against the Mavericks, and he doesn’t think it’s just because of Cooper Flagg.
Simmons predicts March 1st season debut for Tatum
Bill didn’t offer any other inside information, but it’s fair to say he has his sources and he’s relatively plugged into the team and the league, in general. He posited at the end of his Tatum discussion, “So, it’s really starting to look like March 1st or March 6th, but my money would be on March 1st now for him.”
Perhaps just as interesting as the predicted date was the way that Simmons and Lowe were talking about a return date as a foregone conclusion, not if, but when. Simmons isn’t the first to say this, and possibly not even the most connected or plugged in.
But he may be the celebrity most commonly associated with the Celtics and with the largest platform. His prediction is certainly relevant and topical, and given how closely he follows the story, his connections and sources, and his dot connecting, his prediction seems pretty reasonable.
It’s interesting that the Celtics also have games at the Bucks on March 2nd and at home against the Hornets on March 4th that Simmons didn’t even mention, but neither game is nationally televised, whereas the March 1st game is on NBC/Peacock, and the game on the 6th is on ESPN.
I can’t imagine Tatum and the Celtics are planning a return around a TV schedule, but at the same time, it feels like this debut is going to be a massive spectacle and a moment in time. For it not to be broadcast live for the world to see would feel almost wrong. Maybe Conspiracy Bill is on the right track, after all.