Getty Boston Celtics forward Jayson Tatum reacts while playing against the Philadelphia 76ers.
Life is pretty good for Boston Celtics superstar Jayson Tatum.
The 25-year-old is the driving force behind one of the NBA’s marquee franchises. He’s making $32.6 million during the 2023-24 season, and his pay structure only escalates for each of the next two years (assuming he picks up a $37.1 million player option for the 2025-26 campaign). He’s a household name in basketball circles, and his Celtics are an Eastern Conference-leading 16-5 coming out of the mini-break for the conclusion of the inaugural In-Season Tournament.
But hard as it may be to imagine, three-time NBA champion Sam Cassell thinks Tatum’s life can get that much better.
Sam Cassell Explains how Jayson Tatum’s Life can ‘Get Better’
The explanation is simple: Go win a title.
Of course, that’s easier said than done.
“It would be life-changing,” Cassell said about the prospect of Tatum winning a championship with the Celtics during an interview with Boston.com’s Khari Thompson. “His life is great now. These guys’ lives are great. But, if you win a championship in Boston, it can get better. It can get a little bit better, trust it. There’s nothing wrong with winning a championship in Boston.”
Cassell knows a thing or three about winning titles.
After starring at Florida State, he entered the NBA as the No. 24 overall pick of the 1993 NBA draft, immediately landing with a competitive Houston Rockets squad led by Hakeem Olajuwon. Though he came off the bench in both seasons and averaged single-digit points as a role player, he won titles during each of his first two professional campaigns.
Cassell went on to make one All-Star roster, earning the nod when he averaged 19.8 points and 7.3 assists for the Minnesota Timberwolves in 2003-04, but he went over a decade in the Association before he again reached the mountaintop. This time, it came with the Doc Rivers-helmed, Ubuntu-preaching Boston Celtics in 2007-08.
The C’s acquired the then-38-year-old by signing him three days after the Los Angeles Clippers waived him at the end of February ’08. He played just 17.6 minutes per game for the rest of the regular season and came off the bench to fill a small role during the playoffs, but that didn’t lessen the sweetness of his third ring.
“Winning a championship in Boston was real, real special. They came out in Houston, but they really came out in Boston. To win a championship in Boston, with that tradition, that alone is huge,” Cassell told Thompson.
“Winning in Houston was great because it was the first one that the city ever had. I will never forget it,” he continued. “But, the Boston one was like ‘wow’. Maybe because I was so young that I didn’t really realize what a championship was all about the first two years. Then I went 12 years without winning another one. Winning another one with the tradition here was wild.”
Boston Celtics Positioned Nicely for Title Pursuit
“I got them as my FAVORITE … There is no team in the #NBA that should be able to definitively look at the Boston #Celtics and say we’re better.” — @stephenasmith
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Jayson Tatum’s résumé is already superlative.
Since he joined the Celtics as the No. 3 overall pick of the 2017 NBA draft, he’s made four All-Star teams and earned three All-NBA nods while establishing himself as one of the league’s premier individual players. He’s also made the playoffs in all six seasons of his career, though a championship has eluded him to this point.
Boston has made the Eastern Conference Finals four times during Tatum’s Beantown tenure, but it’s posted a 1-3 record in the penultimate round. The only victory came in a seven-game series at the expense of the Miami Heat in 2022, though Boston went on to lose to the Golden State Warriors in six games on the sport’s biggest stage.
So far in 2023-24, Tatum and the Celtics are tracking toward another deep run.
Not only do they pace the Eastern Conference with a 16-5 record, but the underlying metrics validate their status as a potential juggernaut. Basketball Reference’s simple rating system (SRS) looks at strength of schedule and margin of victory, and it has Boston (10.22) outpacing the Philadelphia 76ers (8.33), Oklahoma City Thunder (7.18) and Minnesota Timberwolves (6.48) by a substantial margin. No other squad rises higher than the fifth-place Brooklyn Nets’ 4.28 SRS.
“Sixty wins almost feels like a formality for the Boston Celtics,” NBA columnist Dan Favale wrote for Bleacher Report in his post-In Season Tournament record projections. “Injury bugs can bite them. Kristaps Porziņģis has already missed time with a strained left calf, and Al Horford is 37. But key absences are the caveat for every team. Boston is built to withstand them better than most. Its top-end talent is beyond compare in the Eastern Conference.”
Life would be pretty good for Tatum, potentially even featuring some legitimate MVP buzz, if the Celtics can work their way past the 60-win threshold. It would be that much better if a title awaits at the end of the tunnel.