Losing in the NBA Finals this past postseason would have been tough to deal with for the Boston Celtics, but the team had managed to position itself to bounce back from that disappointment. They were bringing back the core that had done ever so well to get them to the Finals, and they also managed to bring in Malcolm Brogdon and Danilo Gallinari.
The ship seemed to be sailing smoothly, but then the bombshell news dropped that they had offered a trade package centered around Jaylen Brown for Kevin Durant. That unsurprisingly has led to some uneasiness within the building, with Brown being displeased and Jayson Tatum has had to answer questions about it as well. Tatum previously remarked that he loved the team as it is right now and he was recently on the “Celtics Lab” podcast, where he was asked how he deals with all the speculation.
(starts at 15:27 mark):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oj0rDf495e8
“It’s just the world we live in, right? It always comes from an anonymous source. But it always makes ESPN or Twitter or whatever, and everybody sees it. So you never know what is true and what’s not true, but it gets people to talk about it, and I guess that’s the idea. They got what they wanted out of the deal, for people to talk about it and make speculations.”
“If you pay attention to everything you see on Twitter or TV, you drive yourself crazy. I think that’s just something that you have to learn, just to keep your own sanity and your own peace. They will literally say anything, and some of it might be true, and there are other things that just couldn’t be further from the truth…. we don’t know who said it, so just control what you can control. That’s what I always live by.”
As Tatum says right there, just control what you can control and don’t bother with what’s being said. There is always going to be speculation and you should block out that outside noise, or else it can easily get into your head.
That’s what the rest of the team needs to do as well, as the talent is there to go all the way this upcoming season. An NBA beat writer stated no one would be shocked if the team gets off to a hot start and the experience of having played in the Finals should help them if they get back there in 2023.
