Tatum was an astonishing +24 in the game tonight- beyond incredible
It truly is remarkable. I've been saying all season that I honestly think Tatum is close to as talented as Durant was as a rookie. I live in Seattle and watched Durant a ton his rookie year (Brown actually reminds me a ton of young Jeff Green back then, but that's a different story). Durant shot terribly that rookie year. Like 42% from the field and 29% from three, but he had a green light to shoot as much as he wanted. I imagine the reps helped his development.
That was the concern with Tatum... that being part of such a loaded roster might stunt his development. I worried that he wouldn't get the reps and wouldn't get the necessary confidence. The silver lining of the injuries is that Tatum is now getting an opportunity to be one of the main guys on this team on the big stage. A huge amount of responsibility has fallen on him. And the kid is meeting and exceeding expectations.
He's now averaging 18.1 points, 4.7 rebounds, 3 assists, 1.3 steals with 45%/30.7%/82.6% shooting in 10 playoff games.
Compare that to Durant's rookie season where he averaged 20.3 points, 4.4 rebounds, 2.4 asssits, 1 steal with 43%/29%/87% shooting for a 20 win Sonic team.
Tatum genuinely has a shot to end up a true superstar. We haven't had a true superstar prospect since Bird. Loved Pierce, but his ceiling wasn't as high as Tatum. It's exciting. And most importantly it means Boston could reasonably have their 4th star to pair with Kyrie, Hayward and Horford. Our only hope of competing with the 4-star Warriors is to have one of our young guys develop into a star as well. When you also consider the contributions of Brown and Rozier (or moving those guys for Kawhi), it makes our future pretty darn interesting.