(Photo by Jim Rogash/Getty Images)
The Boston Celtics will have another chance to wrap up their 18th NBA championship on Monday evening in Game 5 of the NBA Finals, this time in front of their fans at TD Garden.
If the Celtics win, there will be the minor issue of who on their roster will win series MVP honors.
While Jayson Tatum is considered by most to be their best player, he has struggled in this series, and as a result, Nick Wright said on Fox Sports 1’s “First Things First” that Tatum is “almost disqualified” from winning the Finals MVP award.
“Jayson Tatum is not a Finals guy until he proves otherwise. … At this point, he’s almost disqualified from Finals MVP.”
— @getnickwright explains: pic.twitter.com/BJFK0qsfjz
— First Things First (@FTFonFS1) June 17, 2024
Tatum has made the All-Star team five seasons in a row, and in the regular season this year, he averaged 26.9 points, 8.1 rebounds and 4.9 assists a game.
However, in this series, he’s at just 20.0 points a game while shooting 36.5 percent from the field and 29.0 percent from 3-point range.
Tatum has a growing history of performing poorly on the big stage — he shot an icy 36.7 percent in the 2022 NBA Finals, and in Game 7 of last year’s Eastern Conference Finals, he mustered just 14 points on 5-of-13 shooting.
Wright pointed out that in 10 career Finals games, Tatum has never shot over 50 percent in a single game.
Tatum’s Boston co-star Jaylen Brown hasn’t played up to his standards either, as he’s averaging just 20.8 points per contest, but he is shooting 49.2 percent from the field.
It may take Tatum playing up to his standards for once for the Celtics to claim the Larry O’Brien Trophy on Monday, or for that matter, in Game 6 or Game 7.
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