Lue sees the kid in Tatum
An adolescent Jayson Tatum, after having his photo taken with LeBron James,
posted the image on Twitter, asking the then Miami Heat star to follow him on the social media network.
The old tweet (and photo) resurfaced this week now that the Celtics rookie is about to face James’ Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference finals.
And the connections run even deeper.
Cavaliers coach Ty Lue,
a cousin to Tatum’s father Justin, was shown the photo yesterday and cracked a cynical look when told that the Celtics rookie was 14 when the photo was taken.
“That’s not six years ago,” he said, inferring that the beaming kid in the photo was much younger.
As Lue knows better than anyone, Tatum still essentially is a kid. He used to go along when Justin Tatum and his good friend, former NBA star Larry Hughes,
went to Lue’s July 4 barbecue in Mexico each summer.
“He’s like my little cousin,” said Lue. “Justin is part of my extended family. Where Jayson was at 6 or 7 to where he is now is crazy, with the player he’s become. I knew that he’d be good, but this is at a whole new level. Just seeing him come to Mexico to my barbecues and stuff, and now to see him as an NBA player playing at a high level is something to see. We had some old pictures of him that we were looking at the other day. Seeing him now is just kind of weird to me.
“This is going to be tough, because you want to see him do well, but not against you.”
Based on what Lue considers Tatum’s best trait, he understands that the rookie is going to have his moments in the series.
“It’s his toughness. He’s not afraid. He wants these types of moments,” said Lue. “With Kyrie (Irving)
now and Gordon (Hayward)
going down at the start of the year for them, he’s not afraid of the moment. And now look, as a little kid he was fast, but when he got tall it slowed him down a lot. He reminds me of Paul Pierce when Paul started out. He’s able to get to the free throw line, he has great footwork, he doesn’t let the game speed him up.”
Achy breaky
Irving won’t be in uniform, but that won’t stop Lue from feeling a little ache at the sight of his former star on the C’s bench.
“It was tough to see him over there when we played them this year, because he was a big part of what we did,” said Lue, then referring back to his old Lakers teammates. “I would see guys like Rick Fox and BShaw (Brian Shaw) 15 years later, and there would still be love.”
Love the Garden
James enjoys his trips to the Garden, and he’s not alone in drawing motivation from the hostile crowd.
“Boston is a great place to play,” said forward Kevin Love. “Win or lose, we have a great time playing there. The crowd’s great and we play really well there.”
Said Lue, a former Celtics assistant under Doc Rivers: “It’s just the history of the Celtics, and who they are. When you look at the history of the Celtics and the Lakers, those are the franchises you want to model yourself after. Seventeen championships is extraordinary. A model as far as winning.”
Put me in coach
Cavs forward Rodney Hood apologized to his teammates for refusing to go in late in Game 4 against Toronto on Monday after spending most of the game on the bench.
“They did call my name, and I should have been more serious about it,” Hood said. “It was the end of the game, there were seven minutes left to play, and Jose (Calderone) wanted to go in, so I just told (Lue) to let Jose play. But it’s not like people tried to make it out to look like. The next time I’ll definitely go in.”