Jayson Tatum is seven years faraway from being drafted by the Boston Celtics and after Magic Johnson addressed why the Los Angeles Lakers handed up on the Duke product, the 26-year-old despatched the NBA legend and rival franchise a message.
Tatum holds no exhausting emotions for Johnson or the Lakers and has moved on.
“I feel I used to be simply upset on the time that there wasn’t, I suppose, real curiosity,” Tatum informed reporters earlier than Saturday evening’s sport in opposition to the Bulls, per CLNS Media. “Simply from my perspective, I grew up the largest Kobe (Bryant) fan, wished to play for the Lakers. Magic defined it. They’d too many forwards and that was their thought course of on the time. It wasn’t like I acquired any animosity towards Magic or the Lakers. It was simply as a child. I used to be near conducting a life-long dream, the best way I believed it might be.”
Throughout an look on former Celtics teammate Jeff Teague’s “Membership 520” podcast, Tatum retold the pre-2017 draft story and revealed {that a} exercise with the Lakers by no means came about. Johnson, catching wind of Tatum’s feedback, claimed that Tatum’s agent, Jeff Wechsler, prevented Los Angeles from getting a have a look at the then-19-year-old.
This triggered a domino impact during which everybody concerned recalled their facet of the story, together with Wechsler and Tatum’s coach, Drew Hanlen.
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Wechsler and Hanlen supplied their retellings in separate interviews shortly after Johnson’s and supplied an identical tales. They each revealed that Tatum was in Los Angeles coaching, however the Lakers didn’t categorical any curiosity. By the point Tatum was within the strategy of present process his ultimate exercises, and not on the West Coast, Wechsler and Hanlen claimed that’s when the Lakers reached out for a exercise.
Nevertheless, Wechsler, searching for Tatum’s finest pursuits, didn’t need him to journey and endure the exercise when it was clear Los Angeles was fascinated with Lonzo Ball — who went second general forward of Tatum — greater than another prospect.
Now almost a decade later, Tatum’s a five-time All-Star, a champion, and signed the league’s largest contract ($315 million) ever with the Celtics.
“Like I mentioned, it labored out for one of the best and at the moment they did what they thought was finest for them,” Tatum mentioned, per CLNS Media. “Like I mentioned, I don’t have any exhausting emotions in the direction of them or Magic or that group. I nonetheless made it to the NBA and I’m dwelling out my dream so I’m extraordinarily pleased with the way it turned out.”
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Tatum’s on tempo to cement his legacy as one of many biggest Celtics gamers in franchise historical past, and is off to a convincing begin to an early Corridor of Fame case. Much more vital, Boston is favorably positioned to comply with up its Banner 18 seize with one other — and even a number of — championship runs with teammates Jaylen Brown, Kristaps Porzingis, Jrue Vacation and Derrick White all signed to extensions too.
Onerous to argue that Boston wasn’t Tatum’s true future in any case.
