Can Celtics Depend on Jayson Tatum to Take on Larger Leadership Role?

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On the latest episode of Celtics Beat, Adam and Evan are joined by Celtics writer and salary cap expert Keith Smith of Spotrac to talk the season ahead and the need for leadership after the departure of Marcus Smart.  In a recent interview, Jayson Tatum sat down with Jeff Goodman of The Messenger to discuss the offseason, and spoke on taking on a larger leadership role with the team. Is Jayson Tatum going to be the new age leader that the Celtics need? Do the Celtics need to have others step up to be leaders outside of their stars? The trio discusses in this segment!  FULL SHOW: https://youtu.be/zRN9vkQ2lmw  This segment of the Celtics Beat Podcast is brought to you by Fanduel Sportsbook, the exclusive wagering partner of the CLNS Media Network. NEW customers can bet $5  and get $200 in BONUS BETS – GUARANTEED. Plus, all customers who bet $5 will get $100 OFF NFL SUNDAY TICKET from YouTube and YouTube TV. Now is the best time to join FanDuel! The app is easy to use and you can be on everything from spreads to player props and more! So, visit  https://FanDuel.com/BOSTON and kick off the NFL season with an offer you won’t wanna miss.  21+ and present in MA. First online real money wager only. $10 first deposit required. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable bonus bets that expire 7 days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See terms at  https://fanduel.com/sportsbook. Hope is here. GamblingHelpLineMa.org or call (800)-327-5050 for 24/7 support. Play it smart from the start! GameSenseMA.com or call 1-800-GAM-1234. NFL Sunday Ticket Offer ends 9/18/23. No refunds. Terms and embargoes apply. $100 off NFL Sunday Ticket, not YouTube TV. YouTube TV base plan required to watch YouTube TV. Redemption requires a Google account and current form of payment. Commercial Use Excluded. Subscription renews; cancel anytime.

Transcript

00:00 So I want to pick up on that. That's exactly where I wanted to go next. I want to read the quote from

00:04 Tatum in this Goodman article. Again, it says, "I'm never going to be Kevin Garnett. As much as

00:08 people want me to be, that's not who I am. The way I lead, the public may not ever see what I do.

00:13 When I need to, I make sure my voice is heard and I do it in my own way. I'm not going to be out

00:18 there jumping up and down screaming. That's just not my personality. As much as people want to talk

00:23 about it and want me to be that, I'm not changing who I am. I lead in my own way and when I talk,

00:28 everybody in that organization is going to listen. And whatever I say is always for the betterment of

00:33 the team and my teammates know that." Again, he's been asked to talk about this, Keith, for years,

00:41 time and time again by various media, different articles, different podcasts. This is a theme.

00:47 It continually comes up. But the big difference between all of those times before and now is,

00:53 I would argue, you know, like we have fun with the whole heart and soul thing, but Marcus Smartt

00:58 I think really was the de facto captain, obviously, who was the longest tenured member of the team.

01:05 He was this team's leader. He was this team's, you know, the guy that was going to yell and

01:13 shout and be that vocal guy. Now, does that always make you the true leader just because

01:20 you're the loudest guy in the room? Not necessarily, but I do think Marcus Smartt,

01:24 more often than not, was considered both internally and externally the leader of that team.

01:28 He's gone now. So this is more than ever, Evan and I have talked about it, Tatum and Brown's team.

01:34 Is Tatum prepared to lead in, you know, he doesn't, forget us, he doesn't need to do anything

01:40 for us, you know, fans, media, outsiders. Within that room, does he have a leadership style you

01:47 think that does resonate with everybody else that need to listen to him? "New fan group customers

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02:06 I think so. I think what we're going to find out with this team is, do you need that in-your-face

02:18 leader or not? Because you mentioned Marcus, I would say the second guy in the roster who would

02:24 do that is Grant Williams, and he's no longer there either. It's, you know, I always like and

02:28 did too, you know, those are the two guys along with when he was there, Emeigh or Doka, they'd

02:33 scream and yell at you and make you feel bad. And then Al Horford would put his arms around

02:37 your shoulder and be like, "All right, you know, let's move on. Let's go and just kind of get it

02:42 moving." And I think Tatum probably falls more towards the Horford side of things. We know Derek

02:47 White's kind of a quiet leader. Jalen Brown can be loud, but I tend to think that's more towards

02:53 itself than it has ever been towards anybody else. So we're going to see, is there somebody on the

02:57 roster who will, you know, if the need arises, kind of get in somebody's face? And do you even

03:03 need that, right? Those are the other things we're going to find out is, can you get through? Like,

03:08 I don't know, maybe somebody is that guy on the Denver Nuggets, but I don't know who the guy on

03:13 the Nuggets is that was screaming and yelling in teammates' faces either. It seems like they were

03:17 all a little bit more of, "Hey, let's do what we're supposed to do." But that's a long way of

03:22 saying, I think with Tatum, you're right, we're never going to see it. Like, it's never going to

03:26 be on the court where he, you know, is grabbing somebody's jersey and screaming and yelling at

03:32 them. We're never going to see, you know, that even the moments when the media is allowed in

03:36 at the end of a practice and those kind of things. Maybe stories will trickle out, but I think he's

03:42 going to be more of the kind of guy who's going to be like, "All right, here's what we got to do."

03:45 And kind of sit everybody down and let's talk through this and kind of go through it in a way

03:50 where it is, you know, "Hey, but I think it's more than a just, let's build everybody up. I think

03:57 it's going to be in a, I'm holding people accountable kind of way." And it's almost

04:01 kind of like, I look at it as when we were kids, right? You almost wanted, if you knew you screwed

04:06 up, you wanted your parents to scream and yell at you. And it was way worse when they were like,

04:11 you know, "I'm just disappointed in you." Yeah, I'm not mad that we were disappointed.

04:15 Yeah, like that just, that hurts so much worse, you know, than if they yelled at you. So I think

04:20 that's, but I think that's the kind of guy Tatum is. I think he's probably more the kind of,

04:24 you know, leader who is like, "All right, I'm a little disappointed. I'm not happy. Here's what

04:29 we got to do." I guess my concern, Keith, would be, and I don't know how this plays out, and I

04:35 may never know because it would have to be written about by, you know, it's that behind closed doors

04:41 kind of thing. And I'm not even saying it needs to be Tatum. It just needs to be somebody who,

04:47 every once in a while, who isn't the coach, is going to raise his voice in that room. I just

04:54 think you can only have so many, and it doesn't need to be on a daily basis like it felt like

04:59 maybe it was from Marcus or even from Grant. You just can only have, I think, within a team,

05:06 in all this expertise that I have, I just think you can only have so many lead by example guys.

05:12 You know, you need to have someone that when the going gets tough, and I don't mean a five-game

05:17 skid. It could be, you know, at halftime of a game, a particular game, where somebody is going

05:22 to raise their voice and get everyone's attention and provide that sort of, you know, for lack of

05:29 better way of putting it, that fire up moment, that spark. It doesn't need to be a rah-rah speech,

05:36 but it's got to be something that just, like, gets everybody's blood boiling a little bit.

05:40 And I don't know who that guy is on this roster, and it does sort of feel like

05:45 if it is going to be Tatum, it's going to be very, very infrequent. And that's fine.

05:50 If he only raises his voice three times a year, people are sure as hell going to listen when it

05:54 happens. But it's got to be somebody, right? I think so. I'm with you on that. I generally think,

06:03 you know, someone needs to be that guy, and we'll see. You know, maybe that develops into somebody,

06:09 and maybe that's where it goes. But yeah, I think it's, you know, team chemistry is always a very,

06:15 you know, it's like a balancing act, right? It's like, you know, you put too much chlorine in your

06:20 pool, and you know, you're in trouble with that, and everybody's eyes hurt. You don't put enough in,

06:24 and your pool's gross. And you know, I think it's you're constantly kind of tweaking and adjusting,

06:29 and trying to figure out, you know, the right mix. And I think with, and the dog just popped

06:34 her head in here. I think you've got to, you know, go into those things where you've got to figure

06:40 that stuff out, because to your point, yeah, if everybody's just the kind of quiet leader,

06:45 then it's like, who's going to fire these guys up? Who's going to get them going? Especially

06:48 on that night where Tatum's shot isn't falling, and he's not able to kind of get himself going.

06:54 Who's going to get everybody fired up? And on the flip side, if you have too many guys who want to

06:57 scream and yell all the time, we know that never goes well, right? That's when it's like, God,

07:02 would you shut up and just play kind of stuff. And that's going to be interesting. I'll also say,

07:07 too, a very underrated loss, I think, in that locker room is going to be Blake Griffin. If he

07:13 does not return, which all indications are, he's probably not going to. So I think that's another

07:18 loss that they're going to have, because he's another guy who he'd been around for a long time.

07:22 He wasn't afraid to get loud, much like Grant wasn't afraid to, you know, all right, hey, let's,

07:27 you know, I'm going to crack jokes. Let's be funny. And, you know, I'll kind of be the butt

07:32 of the jokes for the team for that. And I think they're going to miss out with Grant, too. Grant's

07:36 the guy they could all kind of pick on if they wanted to. And they did plenty, and he took it

07:41 good naturedly and those kind of things. So, yeah, their chemistry is going to be interesting to

07:46 watch develop throughout the course of this year. Yeah, I just think sometimes when it comes to

07:51 being a leader, your play on the court can mean more than your actual voice in the locker room.

07:57 Whereas like Tatum, you know, is he going to yell and scream at people? No, maybe that's going to

08:01 be more Jalen Brown, or maybe that's going to be Sam Cassell or, you know, somebody on the bench.

08:05 But I think, you know, when they need a spark, it's going to be Tatum demanding the ball and

08:11 going to the basket, going to the free throw line or whatever he's trying to do. And I think Tatum

08:15 is more than capable of doing something like that. So I think when we talk about leadership,

08:20 we often think about the guy in the locker room who's trying to fire everybody up. We don't have

08:25 access to that stuff, so we have no clue what Tatum's like in the locker room. Every once in a

08:29 while, you get a great clip from the Celtics media relations people of, you know, Joe coming in,

08:35 you know, giving a postgame speech, you know, something really quick or, you know, you'll see

08:39 guys interacting. And sometimes you get a little bit of a sense of like the locker room hierarchy.

08:43 But I do think the one thing that we are missing is the on-court stuff that Tatum can do to lead a

08:51 team. You know, that's going to be really important. And I would argue that's more important

08:55 than the stuff that he says in the locker room, because sometimes when you need a guy to go on

08:59 a run in a game, Tatum's as good as anybody at creating a run by himself. And yeah, he's not

09:04 going to have his shots, not going to fall all the time, but more often than not, it's going to.

09:08 And again, he's going to be a guy that can pick the team up just by hitting baskets,

09:12 playing good defense, getting rebounds, pushing the basketball, getting guys involved. Like that's

09:18 just as impactful to me that being a leader than the stuff that you say. And I think Tatum is,

09:24 again, more than capable of doing that kind of stuff on both ends of the floor to get a team

09:29 motivated. New FanDuel customers can bet $5 and get 200 in bonus bets, guaranteed. Plus, all

09:38 customers who bet $5 will get $100 off NFL Sunday ticket from YouTube at YouTube TV.

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