{"id":323460,"date":"2025-12-02T20:24:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T20:24:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/323460\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T20:24:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T20:24:08","slug":"nba-insider-jayson-tatum-returning-for-playoff-race-not-realistic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/323460\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA insider: Jayson Tatum returning for playoff race ‘not realistic’"},"content":{"rendered":"

A big storyline facing the Celtics<\/a> this season is whether Jayson Tatum<\/a> will return.<\/p>\n

The superstar forward ruptured his Achilles in May<\/a> during Game 4 of the Eastern Conference semifinals against the New York Knicks. <\/p>\n

Tatum has a return date in mind, and the Celtics have never put a concrete timeline on a potential return to game action<\/a>.<\/p>\n

During a recent episode of \u201cThe Zach Lowe Show<\/a>,\u201d the NBA insider noted the noise surrounding a return for Tatum \u201cwon\u2019t die.\u201d But made it clear that even if he plays at some point this season, fans can\u2019t expect him to just return to All-Star form.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat does he look if he came back this season?,\u201d Lowe said<\/a>. \u201cWe cannot just project like, \u2018Oh, yeah, First-Team, All-NBA. Jayson Tatum is coming right in for the playoff race.\u2019 That\u2019s not realistic at all.”<\/p>\n

The Celtics are 11-9 to begin the 2025-26 campaign and have surprised Lowe how well they\u2019ve played \u2014 especially offensively. <\/p>\n

After making sweeping changes in the offseason including trading Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis<\/a>, many counted the Celtics out, especially with Tatum sidelined<\/a>. But they\u2019re seventh in the Eastern Conference. <\/p>\n

There\u2019s still plenty of basketball left to be played<\/a> this season. But Boston won\u2019t rush Tatum back for any reason, regardless if the team is in the playoff race or not. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A big storyline facing the Celtics this season is whether Jayson Tatum will return. The superstar forward ruptured…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":323461,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-323460","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=323460"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323460\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/323461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=323460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=323460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=323460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}