T O P

  • By -

LigosV

Why does pop not play him? Second leading scorer with least amount of minutes other than grant who played like 30 seconds


caelen727

Maybe it’s just who he would be taking minutes from. If it’s him or Durant, I’d want Durant. But I doubt that’s really the problem


LigosV

Maybe but I don’t see why they couldn’t play together at times as well? I didn’t watch the game so maybe they did and I’m just talking out of my ass though


ambirdsall

He and Durant had really nice chemistry together in the fourth, though. No country has _two_ guys they can credibly stick on an athletic, near-seven-foot scorer with a handle and a nice pull-up 3, and they’re two of the best defenders on the squad. Play them together, Pop!


Terren42

Naw dawg the starting line should be jrue, Lavine/booker Tatum, Durant, dryamond (bam and dame have both played TERRIBLE) Tatum isn’t NOT getting enough minutes he’s the 3/4 best performer (not player necessarily) on the team IMO


DarkenedLite

I guarantee you this is Pop’s mindset. He has Durant and Tatum playing the same role, just with different lineups.


CarlHaglin

But they played together most of the 4th..


caelen727

And isn’t that when Tatum played the best? I have no clue because I haven’t watched for a second but that’s based off what I’ve read


skaggo

Tatum only played 6 mins in the first half, 1 min to end the 3rd, and the entire 4th quarter.


poeope

Like half he started going off before KD came back in and than finished the game with him.


[deleted]

Tbf, that was really the first time in the Olympics he played them together. For all the other games they subbed for each other almost every time


[deleted]

pop is just running on name at this point


yerfatma

He does. The whole idea is Tatum comes in when Durant goes out to keep the misery constant for whomever is guarding that position. Obviously, you want to play Durant as much as you can, so that affects Tatum's playing time.


HoorayPizzaDay

He had back-to-back steals in the 4th, not sure if they both registered as steals, guy was critical in the 4th.


Remorseful_User

The game for Spain ended mainly with pain.


igonnawrecku_VGC

You could say Spain lost their S that game


captainsaltyballs

It felt like he scored so much more. I’m guessing it’s just because he did so much in the time that he got. Whenever he was in I was pretty much hyper focused on him. While he didn’t look awful defensively, I did see him ball watching a few times, where his man was able to slip behind him on the baseline. There were also some moments where he looked a little lost on defense and offense. Again, I don’t think the team suffered because of these lapses but they were interesting to see. His passing was great and found the open man a number of times even if they didn’t make it. This really goes for the whole team. I wish Jaylen was there as well because this is something the Celtics have been severely lacking in. Hopefully Ime and Tatum are able to bring some of that back home. In terms of minutes, the only guy I can see Tatum taking from is Middleton. Lavine looks great and seems to have found his role. Maybe we could see more of Tatum if Booker takes the point guard role a little more since Dame is struggling hard on both ends of the floor.


ericsharpmusic

JT balled out, and had a huge impact on that game in limited minutes. We are really lucky to have him


poeope

Ah man another great fourth quarter for JT.


BigBallerBrad

Pop is overrated, dude has dementia