One of the biggest stories to come out of Team USA’s victory over Serbia on Sunday was the fact that Jayson Tatum didn’t play a single second. You might think this is due to an injury or some other important reason, but apparently coach Steve Kerr simply preferred not to play him in the Olympics opener.
The Boston star is not only the reigning NBA champion, but was always presumed to be one of the candidates to star in the squad’s starting lineup the summer. However, he wasn’t even played when the United States was winning by 21 early in the fourth quarter.
“It’s really hard in a 40-minute game to play more than 10 guys,” head coach Steve Kerr explained postgame. “With Kevin [Durant] coming back, I just went to the combinations that I felt made the most sense. It seems crazy. I thought I was crazy when I looked at everything and determined these are the lineups I wanted to get to.”
Stephen A. Smith:
“The defending NBA champion Jayson Tatum… you can’t find one minute? Steve Kerr, that’s some straight bullsh*t”
— CelticsUnite (@CelticsUnite18) July 30, 2024
Afterwards, the Warriors tactician told ESPN’s Brian Windhorst in a separate interview that he “felt like an idiot” for not playing the Celtics forward, but then explained that “every game’s going to be different based on matchups” while noting that JT “is going to play” during the rest of the competition.
For this, Kerr has received many criticism. Charles Barkley, for example, who was an Olympic gold medalist with the 1992 Dream Team, expressed why he sees this as a mistake. “First of all, he’s got to play. Everybody on the team has to play,” he said on SiriusXM NBA Radio. “Do you have to play 25-30 minutes? No, but it’s the Olympics. It’s not like there is such a downgrade.”
“That’s not a huge downgrade putting Jayson Tatum in the game. Come on, man. Everybody deserves to play for at least 10 minutes. Chuck Daily did a fabulous job. He had two starting units,” the commentator praised the coach of the 1992 Dream Team.
“You can’t expect anybody to go over there and practice and then not play in the damn Olympics,” Chuck kept at it during an interview at the star of the week. “Come on, man. You got to give them 10-15 minutes along the way.”
Another NBA insider gave solid reasons towards why not playing Tatum can affect Team USA’s performances in Paris
During the same SiriusXM’s NBA Radio show on Monday, ESPN’s Frank Isola mentioned a very important fact surrounding JT’s absence from Team USA’s matchup against Serbia this weekend. “Of the guys on the current (Team USA) roster, no one received more MVP votes for the (2023-24) season than Jayson Tatum. Keep that in mind,” the insider said.
“He’s coming off a year, or he’s just a couple of months removed from winning an NBA championship where he was really close to probably being the MVP … it ended up being Jaylen Brown, who’s not even on the team, but that’s another story entirely we won’t get into,” he continued.
Isola also recognized that it is not easy to handle a roster full of superstars, and knows for a fact that they all can’t play every game. Nevertheless, he simply can’t get his head around why Jayson would be the chosen one to stay in the bench all throughout the contest.
“I get it. I understand it’s gonna be 10 guys,” the expert shared. “… Steve Kerr has got to make these tough calls, but it’s gotta be Jayson Tatum? … I understand what Steve Kerr is doing, but how do you reach the conclusion that it should be Tatum just based on what everyone on the team has done over the last couple of months. He’s going to be the odd man out? I’m not saying Lebron (James) should be the odd man out or Kevin Durant, but how is Jayson Tatum the odd man out?”
