We Are Too Low on Jayson Tatum

[Roy H.]

Many talk about Tatum as a future perennial all-star / superstar.  I don’t necessarily see that, particularly in terms of his passing and defensive instincts.  There’s a lot of criticism for Kyrie, but Tatum seems like an extreme example of Kyrie’s bad habits, with less offensive explosiveness.

Does he need to improve that much as a defender or passer in order to be a perennial All-Star?


Seems to me if he played more minutes and had higher usage, he would just need to maintain similar efficiency while getting to the line a bit more and then he'd be pretty close to that level.


Paul George attempted 21 field goals per game this year.

If Tatum attempted 21 field goals per game and his efficiency and 2P/3P/FT ratio remained the same, Tatum would average 25.18 points per game.

Now, I'm not suggesting he would necessarily maintain his full efficiency if he attempted 8 more shots a game.  I don't think it's crazy to think he might.  But even if he wasn't quite at that level, as long as he was still fairly efficient, 25+ ppg with solid defense, 5-6+ rebounds a game, on a winning team --- that's going to get you an All-Star berth in an ordinary season.

I think Tatum is a long way away from 25+ ppg with solid defense on a winning team.  He’s going to have to actually work to improve his game, rather than trying to emulate Kobe.

I'm not sure why you think he's so far off.  He was used as a 2nd or 3rd option, if not lower, most of his first two years in the league.  I think it's fair to wonder if he would struggle to get good shots if the defense was focusing on him more. 

I tend to think that he's already capable of handling a greater load offensively.  He already has a pretty good variety of moves, and if he had more touches I think his shot selection would be more varied.  Maybe I'm being too optimistic as far as that goes, but I don't think so.

Looking only at his draft class, Tatum ranks 11th in scoring per 36 minutes. That includes only guys who qualified for the scoring title, to exclude wonky results.

Link

He may become an elite scorer, but he has yet to separate himself.

[Chief]

For me the key here is getting Davis to committ long term, if he does it is a no brainer to trade Tatum and Smart and #14 and filler for him.

I dont trust Klutch Sports.

[JBcat]

Many talk about Tatum as a future perennial all-star / superstar.  I don’t necessarily see that, particularly in terms of his passing and defensive instincts.  There’s a lot of criticism for Kyrie, but Tatum seems like an extreme example of Kyrie’s bad habits, with less offensive explosiveness.

I agree.  Some of these other names being floated around as a comparison like Paul Pierce drew a lot of fouls even at a young age, much stronger than Tatum, and an underrated passer and defender.  Paul George is a great defender.  Tatum doesn’t really have characteristics to his game yet.  Rudy Gay would be the low end if Tatum never improves.

There are plenty of players that started off very well that leveled off.  To be a several time all star he’ll need to add a lot to his game.  If all falls right and that happens he still won’t have the impact of Davis on the game.

[byennie]

Looking only at his draft class, Tatum ranks 11th in scoring per 36 minutes. That includes only guys who qualified for the scoring title, to exclude wonky results.

Link

He may become an elite scorer, but he has yet to separate himself.

I'd agree he has big steps to becoming elite, but this seems a little misleading. He's 11th in points but also 13th in FGA. Every player from that class who scored more points also had a lower TS%. I think if you polled "top scorer" from his draft, 90% of people are still going with Mitchell and Tatum top two, and not always in that order.

[nickagneta]

Many talk about Tatum as a future perennial all-star / superstar.  I don’t necessarily see that, particularly in terms of his passing and defensive instincts.  There’s a lot of criticism for Kyrie, but Tatum seems like an extreme example of Kyrie’s bad habits, with less offensive explosiveness.

Does he need to improve that much as a defender or passer in order to be a perennial All-Star?


Seems to me if he played more minutes and had higher usage, he would just need to maintain similar efficiency while getting to the line a bit more and then he'd be pretty close to that level.


Paul George attempted 21 field goals per game this year.

If Tatum attempted 21 field goals per game and his efficiency and 2P/3P/FT ratio remained the same, Tatum would average 25.18 points per game.

Now, I'm not suggesting he would necessarily maintain his full efficiency if he attempted 8 more shots a game.  I don't think it's crazy to think he might.  But even if he wasn't quite at that level, as long as he was still fairly efficient, 25+ ppg with solid defense, 5-6+ rebounds a game, on a winning team --- that's going to get you an All-Star berth in an ordinary season.

I think Tatum is a long way away from 25+ ppg with solid defense on a winning team.  He’s going to have to actually work to improve his game, rather than trying to emulate Kobe.

I'm not sure why you think he's so far off.  He was used as a 2nd or 3rd option, if not lower, most of his first two years in the league.  I think it's fair to wonder if he would struggle to get good shots if the defense was focusing on him more. 

I tend to think that he's already capable of handling a greater load offensively.  He already has a pretty good variety of moves, and if he had more touches I think his shot selection would be more varied.  Maybe I'm being too optimistic as far as that goes, but I don't think so.

25 PPG is a lot. That's a huge jump, even if New Orleans turned him into their very clear #1 option, which they probably won't if Holiday and Zion are still there.

Kyrie was Boston's clear #1 option this year. He took 18.5 shots a game with shooting splits of 49/40/87 and he couldn't even average 24 PPG.

I think expecting Tatum to quickly jump to 25 PPG is expecting way too much and will lead to disappointment. Tatum would really need to develop his game to get it to the point of warranting giving him 20 shots a game.

Don't get me wrong. I think if he reaches his ceiling of development that it is possible. But that is years away and will require him to work on his game and develop it a lot more than it developed between his first two years. He has to put in the work.

[Roy H.]

Looking only at his draft class, Tatum ranks 11th in scoring per 36 minutes. That includes only guys who qualified for the scoring title, to exclude wonky results.

Link

He may become an elite scorer, but he has yet to separate himself.

I'd agree he has big steps to becoming elite, but this seems a little misleading. He's 11th in points but also 13th in FGA. Every player from that class who scored more points also had a lower TS%. I think if you polled "top scorer" from his draft, 90% of people are still going with Mitchell and Tatum top two, and not always in that order.

Kuzma, Collins and Bryant all score more points per minute and have a higher eFG% over their first two years.

Tatum is a nice prospect, at least as a scorer.  However, if he's going to be a one-dimensional player, he's going to have to separate himself much moreso than he has done.  "11th best scoring rate among 2017 draftees" isn't a lot to hang his hat on right now.  There's some noise in those numbers, sure, but we're also only comparing him to his fellow draftees, rather than to the truly elite players in the NBA.

[Erik]

I mean you can't exactly compare scoring output from players on garbage teams vs elite contenders. It's apples and oranges. Tatum is by far the best prospect in his class. When all of the experts, execs and not so experts agree, it's usually a good sign.

[PhoSita]

Many talk about Tatum as a future perennial all-star / superstar.  I don’t necessarily see that, particularly in terms of his passing and defensive instincts.  There’s a lot of criticism for Kyrie, but Tatum seems like an extreme example of Kyrie’s bad habits, with less offensive explosiveness.

Does he need to improve that much as a defender or passer in order to be a perennial All-Star?


Seems to me if he played more minutes and had higher usage, he would just need to maintain similar efficiency while getting to the line a bit more and then he'd be pretty close to that level.


Paul George attempted 21 field goals per game this year.

If Tatum attempted 21 field goals per game and his efficiency and 2P/3P/FT ratio remained the same, Tatum would average 25.18 points per game.

Now, I'm not suggesting he would necessarily maintain his full efficiency if he attempted 8 more shots a game.  I don't think it's crazy to think he might.  But even if he wasn't quite at that level, as long as he was still fairly efficient, 25+ ppg with solid defense, 5-6+ rebounds a game, on a winning team --- that's going to get you an All-Star berth in an ordinary season.

I think Tatum is a long way away from 25+ ppg with solid defense on a winning team.  He’s going to have to actually work to improve his game, rather than trying to emulate Kobe.

I'm not sure why you think he's so far off.  He was used as a 2nd or 3rd option, if not lower, most of his first two years in the league.  I think it's fair to wonder if he would struggle to get good shots if the defense was focusing on him more. 

I tend to think that he's already capable of handling a greater load offensively.  He already has a pretty good variety of moves, and if he had more touches I think his shot selection would be more varied.  Maybe I'm being too optimistic as far as that goes, but I don't think so.

25 PPG is a lot. That's a huge jump, even if New Orleans turned him into their very clear #1 option, which they probably won't if Holiday and Zion are still there.

Kyrie was Boston's clear #1 option this year. He took 18.5 shots a game with shooting splits of 49/40/87 and he couldn't even average 24 PPG.

I think expecting Tatum to quickly jump to 25 PPG is expecting way too much and will lead to disappointment. Tatum would really need to develop his game to get it to the point of warranting giving him 20 shots a game.

Don't get me wrong. I think if he reaches his ceiling of development that it is possible. But that is years away and will require him to work on his game and develop it a lot more than it developed between his first two years. He has to put in the work.

The thing is, it sounds like a big jump.

And in some ways, it would be.

At the same time, per 36 Jayson was already taking about 15 shots a game this season.


If he played closer to 36 minutes a game, he'd just have to take about one extra shot per quarter, give or take, to get to 20-21 attempts.  He was already playing about 31 minutes a game, so that's not a huge leap.


I know it's not really that simple.  But it's not such a drastic change that it's outside the realm of what's conceivable if the team moves forward without Kyrie or any other lead star next season and Jayson is elevated to the lead scoring role.  As I said in my previous post, he would not need to change his current three point attempt rate or his free throw rate.  He wouldn't need to become more efficient than he has been.  He would just need to take an extra shot or two in each quarter while playing more minutes.


Perhaps he would not have the strength or stamina to hold up over a full season playing 34-36 minutes per game and also carrying that increased offensive load.  I'm not sure I believe that though.  He doesn't strike me as a guy whose conditioning is an issue, and his offensive game doesn't really rely on bullying other players or taking a lot of contact.



Anyway, I'm not trying to make this into an argument about whether Tatum is going to average 25 points per game.  The point is rather that Tatum's game wouldn't even need to radically change in order for his point per game numbers to go up a lot.  We're not even discussing right now whether it's possible he might add some things to other parts of his game, e.g. bulking up and grabbing some more boards, increasing his playmaking a bit, getting a bit more active in passing lanes, etc.


In light of the fact that he's only 21, I think it would be sort of weird to assume he's a finished product and that he won't add to the other parts of his game.  And given that he's been a secondary or tertiary option for his first two seasons in the league and he's been super efficient and rarely had to force the issue with that volume, it's not unreasonable to think he could make a jump in terms of scoring.


By the way, as a reference point -- somebody mentioned Danny Granger.

He went from attempting 10.6 shots per game in his second season (age 23), to 15.1 shots the following season (age 24), and then 19.1 field goal attempts in his fourth season (age 25).  That was the season he made the All-Star team averaging 25.8 points per game.

[Who]

By the way, as a reference point -- somebody mentioned Danny Granger.

He went from attempting 10.6 shots per game in his second season (age 23), to 15.1 shots the following season (age 24), and then 19.1 field goal attempts in his fourth season (age 25).  That was the season he made the All-Star team averaging 25.8 points per game.

Danny Granger. That is a good comparison for Tatum. Tatum reminds me a lot of Granger.

[Who]

On Tatum improving his scoring = I care less about him scoring more and instead want to see him improve his ball-handling and passing.

I do not want to see him become more one dimensional. He needs to become more well-rounded. I would be ecstatic to see him average 4apg and 18ppg rather than 25ppg and 2apg.

[Surferdad]

JT is the best C's prospect since Al Jefferson and there are parallels between the two.  He is a bit like Jefferson in that he has elite scoring ability but not much else.  Tatum is a mediocre defender, unremarkable passer and also needs to add 15 lbs. of solid muscle to play the 4.  Also like Al Jefferson, I predict he gets traded for a superstar.  We've seen this movie before.

[Bobshot]

You look at the comparisons of Tatum and Brown here, and it's obvious these guys are complementary players. Tatum is more offense and shooting, Brown is more defense. Seems like a perfect match for team chemistry.

The guy who has inadvertently screwed up the mix this year has been Hayward. Ainge just didn't see this coming when he signed Hayward. He managed to draft a couple of young studs who make Hayward look obsolete, especially after his injury.
Both of those kids suffered some this year in their development because of Hayward's presence.

So what does Danny do now? He's pretty much stuck with  Hayward's salary. My guess is he gambles that Hayward will improve further this year, close to all star form, and trades Brown and Tatum for Davis. Irving maybe leaving makes his cap life easier. Plus he'll probably still have a couple of no.1s.  He builds around Davis, Horford, Hayward, Rozier, Smart...

The Raptors are very strong up front right now. Too strong for the Warriors without Durant, and way too strong for the Celtics. Ainge has to trade for Davis if only to compete with the Raptors.

[gpap]

JT is the best C's prospect since Al Jefferson and there are parallels between the two.  He is a bit like Jefferson in that he has elite scoring ability but not much else.  Tatum is a mediocre defender, unremarkable passer and also needs to add 15 lbs. of solid muscle to play the 4.  Also like Al Jefferson, I predict he gets traded for a superstar.  We've seen this movie before.

Tatum is a very talented player and wouldn't be surprised if he reaches all-star status. However, I don't think he's a franchise player like Anthony Davis. He lacks that killer mentality and his game still needs some serious polishing.

In other words, he's still at least a year away from gaining more basketball intelligence and becoming a better player. The "build around Tatum and Brown" mantra is not very wise because you'll be waiting a long time.

Time to push the chips to the middle of the table and get Davis.

[Rosco917]

I didn't like what I saw out of Tatum last season. Poor shots, lack of motor, he didn't even address the weakness of the prior season. That stupid vacation he took with Kobe, etc.

That said he's still a very young player, with much more upside. I'll be patient.

[Kuberski33]

On Tatum improving his scoring = I care less about him scoring more and instead want to see him improve his ball-handling and passing.

I do not want to see him become more one dimensional. He needs to become more well-rounded. I would be ecstatic to see him average 4apg and 18ppg rather than 25ppg and 2apg.

I want to see him be able to abuse smaller guys when they switch onto him in the paint instead of shooting fallaways or passing out.  With his long arms every time he gets iso'd there - without a Giannis/Embid around to help - he should be scoring or getting fouled.  Instead he often seems to shy away from contact.  I also think he struggles to get by good defenders - maybe that improves as his ball handling improves but I wonder whether a lack of athleticism contributes as well.  That's something that cannot be improved upon.