Jayson Tatum is eager to prove his All-Star breakout was no fluke

Jayson Tatum was playing the best basketball of his career when the NBA season came to a halt on March 11. His breakout had carried the Celtics to numerous wins through the month of February as key parts of the roster dealt with shooting slumps and injuries (Kemba Walker, Enes Kanter). The one question that was left unanswered by the season suspension was whether Tatum would have been able to sustain what was close to MVP-level production in the month of February.

Consistency is the final piece of the puzzle for most young All-Stars and Tatum’s season was no different. While any 22-year-old might be content to reach an elite level in the first place just three years into his career, Tatum finds himself with a different mentality in the Orlando bubble: Showing the NBA world that extraordinary month was far from a fluke.

“Just challenging myself, always setting new goals, setting the standard extremely high,” Tatum said of his mentality. “Not caring what other people think of me – whether it’s really good or whether they think it was a fluke or it was just a short time span. That doesn’t really bother me. I know what I’m capable of, what I think I’m capable of and what I’m striving for. So I think that’s the edge that I have for myself is just I step on the floor and I think I’m the best player every night.

“And I think with that confidence – I know a lot of guys probably feel that way, but I think that’s the mindset I take. And just knowing I can do it, just keep pushing. I know I have a long way to go, but I just want to continue to get better every night, every week, every game, every year. And just never getting complacent.”

While questions have popped up about Tatum’s drive and mental makeup after he voiced understandable reservations about playing in Orlando initially, he’s clearly fully locked into the experience now. In fact, with a life now that centers around basketball after such a long layoff, he’s relishing life on the court even more.

“I’m really just excited,” he said of the experience in Orlando thus far. “I’m enjoying being at practice, seeing the guys, playing with them. This is the most I’ve enjoyed practice since I’ve been in the NBA, just happy to be back playing basketball.”

That mentality has helped set the tone early in camp for the Celtics in Orlando, as Brad Stevens has been pleased with the results he’s seen on the floor. With Kemba Walker largely watching largely from the sidelines to this point, other players have had to fill the leadership void and set the tone. It’s evident that the Duke product has helped on that front.

“I think we're really fortunate, because we've got guys that practice hard, and they get after it,” Stevens said. “And I think that's led by some of our guys that get a lot of the limelight and the attention. They practice hard and I think that that that really helps our team as a whole.”

While everyone’s head is in the right place in camp, the bigger challenge now for the coaching staff is finding a way to get the team to re-establish the habits that made the C’s a top-5 team on both ends of the floor. Stevens’ focus now is ensuring guys work hard at maintaining those habits in live situations so they can carry over to games.

“I think the thing that always go first are the details offensively, the angles of screens, where you catch the ball, all the things that give you a better chance to get a step on the defense,” Stevens said. “On the other end of the court it’s all the small techniques that help you execute defensively well. Then you add on top of that, there’s a conditioning aspect to both of those, that you have a tendency to take short cuts if you’re not in great shape. We feel good about the way our guys kept in shape throughout the hiatus.”

Tatum and some of the veteran players will have so input into those gamelans as well with the coaching staff, trying to recreate the formula that led the C’s to a surprise 43 wins over 64 games in spite of a plethora of injuries.

“We have a lot of conversations, and watch a lot of film,” Tatum said. “Sometimes we’ll just go at it (with the coaches). We’ll be out there during practice, especially a lot of the older guys will voice their opinions and talk things out to the coaches, what they see. Obviously the coaches come up with a game plan but we’re the ones on the floor, so we kind of have that trust in each other to be able to talk.”

How all of this translates to the court remains to be seen in Orlando, but there is a degree of comfort that Celtics fans should be feeling in seeing how Tatum is approaching this situation. His head is in the right place and that’s a promising sign for this franchise, not just for the present but the future as well.

“I’m ready to play. Obviously I know it probably won’t look perfect when we first start playing. And that’s not the goal. The goal is, whenever the playoffs start, that’s when you really want to hit your stride. Obviously we don’t have as much time as we do in a regular season, but I’m sure it’s not going to look perfect when we first go out there and scrimmage, or the first I guess seeding games. But once it get to playoff time that’s when you really want to start clicking individually and as a group.”