With Jayson Tatum back in the Celtics’ starting lineup and playing 30+ minutes a game, it suddenly feels like this overachieving roster is loaded with talent and options. With how well Jaylen Brown has played this season, and trying to get JT back up to speed, it almost feels like every offensive possession should run through one of the Jays.
But that’s not what has made this offense elite all season, and they shouldn’t change their formula now to fit Tatum; they should fit Tatum into the formula to enhance it. That formula has been running the offense through Derrick White and Payton Pritchard, the conventional point guards on the team, and allowing them to set the table.
It has worked wonders for JB, who is having a career season, and has emerged as an alpha, go-to-guy on offense. But that’s not because he has become a point guard; it’s because he has let the scheme put him in a position to succeed.
With Tatum added in, that should be the case even more. The Cs can’t stifle the role players who have gotten them this far. Guys like Baylor Scheierman, Hugo Gonzalez, Pritchard, and others have been elevated and trusted to make plays and take shots, and that needs to continue.
Bill Simmons makes the case for Celtics to lean into guards
This is exactly the fear that Bill Simmons expressed on his Sunday night podcast with Zach Lowe after the team fell to the shorthanded Timberwolves. The Celtics were a little too iso-heavy in that game, and it felt like a lot of your-turn-my-turn stuff with Tatum and Brown.
They are both elite one-on-one players, so it’s not a terrible thing, but it makes the Celtics easier to guard. When White and Pritchard are running the show and starting the actions, it makes the offense much more unpredictable and puts their best weapons, Tatum and Brown, in excellent positions to attack a compromised defense.
Opponents will face impossible decisions when everyone is involved, and defenses will be forced into rotation, creating the easy looks Boston has been generating all season. It’s easy to fall into the trap of just giving the ball to your best players and letting them do all the work, but that would be foolish.
For now, it’s fine to load Tatum up with opportunities to help him find his rhythm, but Joe Mazzulla and the Celtics can’t forget what got them into this spot in the first place. Letting the point guards cook will let the Jays be their best selves and give this all-time offense a chance to raise its ceiling even higher in the playoffs.