Fans of the Boston Celtics who have been keeping a close eye on the US National Team in the 2024 Paris Olympics (and more specifically, on star forward Jayson Tatum’s minutes on the court in them) will not be too pleased by a recent prediction by Bleacher Report NBA analyst Andy Bailey.
The B/R analyst predicts that the St. Louis native will see increasingly fewer opportunities for Team USA given his style of play, which, in a nutshell, is because he’s too slow. “It’s not that his play is necessarily right or wrong, but Tatum just sort of processes the game at a different rate than most of the rest of the rotation,” writes Bailey. “When he catches the ball, he often starts jab-stepping, pump-faking or surveying the floor. He seems to enjoy time in the triple-threat position a bit more than others.”
“His … Celtics teammates, Derrick White and Jrue Holiday, aren’t that way,” adds the B/R analyst. “Of course, they also aren’t as good on an individual level as Tatum, but their defensive versatility and quick decisions make them better fits in most Team USA
And while it may be true that Tatum is one of the slowest players in the league according to the NBA’s advanced stats, he is far from the only member on the team to be so rated.
LeBron James, Joel Embiid, and Anthony Davis are all slower on average than Tatum, and Kevin Durant, Bam Adebayo, and even Anthony Edwards are similarly slow in how they play.
We’re skeptical this is the primary reason Tatum hasn’t fit Steve Kerr’s schema for Team USA, but it’s a better theory than we have seen in some corners — and by a lot.
