There are a number of equally valid, sufficiently scrupulous takes to ring in the New Jayson Tatum Year. “Adding good players is good for your team,” “If the Celtics think Tatum is ready to go, then he is ready,” “I support Jayson Tatum’s decision, it’s his injury and his comeback,” “See? I told you he would play this year!” (That final one, while irrefutable, is the type of repulsive victory-lapping rock on which sports media has built its most detestable church. In any case, none of the above will
be present here.)
Jayson Tatum’s return to play is the redemption of human life on Earth, provided we substitute “redemption” for watching your favorite basketball players and “human life on Earth” for the sports-obsessed body politic of specifically Boston, Massachusetts. Both are worthy substitutions, and Jayson Tatum is an essential member of Boston’s happiness quotient, along with Dunkin’ medium iced coffee, that one 71-degrees-and-sunny day in May, Bakemas with Anne Michael Maye and perhaps the immortal superiority complex over New York City and Los Angeles. I’d throw Philadelphia and Chicago in there too, but we all know that isn’t necessary.
Happiness is important in Boston, since we live in the worst climate imaginable and can have a bitter disposition (see above). “Jayson Tatum – QUESTIONABLE” hitting the Celtics X account was that moment in Tangled when at last she saw the light and it’s like the fog had lifted. Suddenly the piles of snow that have been here since late December and make it impossible to walk side by side with another person — you have to walk single file, like Sand People, to hide their numbers — have melted away. The cold can’t hurt you anymore, because in exactly a couple-to-a-few hours (I have no idea when this is going to be published) we will hear the Celtics PA announcer, the vocally-resplendent Eddie Palladino, say “FROM DUKE… JAYSooooooooooooooon TAAAAAAAAAAATUM.” Or he’s going to say “for the Celtics replacing Baylor Scheierman, number zero… JAYSooooooooooooooon TAAAAAAAAAAATUM” if he comes off the bench. If you’ve been in the building at any point in the last seven years, you know exactly how that sounds. It’s one of the great sounds.
There has been incessant discussion among national media about how this will affect Jaylen Brown, the Celtics’ 41-win mojo and the tentative hold on the two seed in the East. However, “Incessant,” for those wondering, means never-ending but with a very negative connotation. I find those discussions incessant because I find them never-ending and I find them intensely annoying. Jayson Tatum is central to Boston happiness. That a bunch of New Yorkers or Los Angeleans or Philadelphians or Chicagoans want to wonder if he will muck up the work of art that is the 2026 Celtics is in fact the ultimate compliment. They’re calling us a work of art, and we conversely don’t care about what they think. I call that a win-win.
From a Boston happiness perspective, Tatum’s absence was like losing your right pinky while still having to finish your manuscript. You can type without your right pinky, but it’s super annoying. You can’t add apostrophes as easily; the return key is totally unnatural for the ring finger, it’s just not the same. From a basketball perspective, it was like losing your right arm and having to finish your manuscript by having Jaylen Brown dictate it to Hugo Gonzalez and Luka Garza. And that’s definitely harder than just typing, but it’s honestly a pretty good book.
Right pinky or right arm, a part of us is coming back tonight. Sappy and overdone, to be sure. But I hope you relate to at least a piece of the happiness communicated above, because it’s important to find joy in the little things. Especially something as legally and professionally meaningless as being a sports fan.
