{"id":515793,"date":"2026-03-10T21:55:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-10T21:55:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/515793\/"},"modified":"2026-03-10T21:55:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-10T21:55:07","slug":"nba-analyst-calls-celtics-clear-and-present-danger-with-jayson-tatum-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/515793\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA Analyst Calls Celtics ‘Clear And Present Danger’ With Jayson Tatum Back"},"content":{"rendered":"

NBA Analyst Calls Celtics ‘Clear And Present Danger’ With Jayson Tatum Back<\/a> originally appeared on NESN<\/a>. Add NESN as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now that Jayson Tatum’s back, the Boston Celtics<\/a> once again have two of the best players in the NBA.<\/p>\n

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Jaylen Brown was already having an MVP-caliber season<\/a> before Tatum returned, averaging career highs in numerous categories. With Tatum back, now he has someone to take some of the pressure off him and prevent opponents from double-teaming him, giving him more freedom and space to operate on offense.<\/p>\n

NBA analyst Kenny Smith praised Brown<\/a> on Monday’s episode of ESPN’s “First Take.”<\/p>\n

“I would say that Jaylen Brown is having, if not the MVP season, he’s number two. And with that, he had been the best one-on-one basketball player, hardest guy to stop in basketball,” Smith said. “Now, when you add Jayson Tatum to that team, you can’t double-team him.”<\/p>\n

As for the Celtics, Smith thinks they’re once again title contenders, especially once Tatum shakes off his shooting rust.<\/p>\n

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“They’re the clear and present danger…Once\u00a0(Tatum) starts making shots with the same mentality, man, they’re right where they were,” Smith added.<\/p>\n

The sportsbooks agree, as Boston is favored to win the Eastern Conference and has the second-best championship odds<\/a> at DraftKings, behind only the Oklahoma City Thunder.<\/p>\n

Tatum may not be fully himself yet, but Brown is playing the best basketball of his career and can keep picking up the slack. If Tatum does round into form by the playoffs, watch out.<\/p>\n

More NBA:\u00a0Celtics ‘At Top Of The List’ In Eastern Conference After Jayson Tatum’s Return<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NBA Analyst Calls Celtics ‘Clear And Present Danger’ With Jayson Tatum Back originally appeared on NESN. Add NESN…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":515794,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[2242,29175,5488,134065,355,6402,99],"class_list":["post-515793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-boston-celtics","tag-jaylen-brown","tag-jayson-tatum","tag-kenny-smith","tag-nba","tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=515793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515793\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/515794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=515793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=515793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=515793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}