The J’s looked like they belonged in Atlanta
The All-Star game sucks. It’s terrible basketball. Now with guys like Steph and Dame it has become a game of half court knock out. There weren’t even really any show stopping dunks last night. Zion had a lob or two. What else is that guy gunna do?
Really, the game blows. But something struck me watching. It doesn’t matter what we think as viewers. That game meant everything to guys like Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum. For better or for worse it is a career brandishing, yes I have arrived. The notion of such a shitty game meaning that much to these guys kind of bums me out. You would much rather have that energy focused towards championships, but they are young and who knows maybe they are just as hungry for a Championship as both Jayson and Jaylen clearly were to be a part of the All-Star experience.
Which give me a bit of hope. Last year after Tatum made is 1st All-Star game he went on the stretch of performances that woke the rest of The League up. Lebron called him “a problem”. This is slang like “it’s bad” in the 80’s. Good is bad, problem is good. Try to keep up you olds. So, could this years All-Star appearance do the same for Jaylen? And get Tatum back to form?
Watching Jaylen you could tell that the announcers and I’m sure most viewers were sleeping on him, but he made some of the best plays in the entire game. 22pts 5 reb 2 stl, the AND 1 3 pointer, off the glass to himself, a nice put back slam, the move on Tatum, couple steals, and of course the fade away 3 from the corner. It was over shadowed by dumb Chris Webber is his pals going nuts over Giannis and his shit ass 23 foot bank shots. Oh, 16 for 16 with two terrible shots and 14 wide open dunks? Cool.
Tatum’s night was less flashy, but just as effective. 21 pts, 7 rebs, 4 stl. Hit some 3’s of course, but I thought he looked good as a distributor playing next to the best of the best. Now if real NBA games played low post defense like they do in the All-Star game we would never have to see Jayson’s aggravated wing span again.
The point is the two young Celtics looked closer to the Steph Curry’s last night than the Sabonis’ and that is a good thing when talking about the NBA landscape in the minds of young “budding” Super Stars.