Brad Stevens Discusses Jayson Tatum's Injury Timeline

The Boston Celtics are in a very interesting position. After losing their best player, Jayson Tatum, to an Achilles tear in last year’s playoffs, everyone expected them to take a year off to reset and prepare for Tatum to return. Instead of tanking in Tatum’s absence, the Celtics have remained super competitive. 

As of Thursday, the Celtics are 15–11, good for the fourth seed in the Eastern Conference. Their play, combined with Tatum’s extremely fast recovery, has some wondering if Tatum will rejoin the team this year instead of waiting until next season. 

Celtics GM Brad Stevens spoke about Tatum’s injury and the possibility of him returning to the court this season. 

"We're not putting a timeline on it, as we haven't the whole time. One of the things that everybody can see is we didn't apply for a DPE (Disabled Player Exception) this year, which was a conscious decision for a lot of reasons. But the reality is, he's not gonna be back until he's 110 percent healthy and he feels good about it. Obviously, he's itching to play, and he hates watching, but he's also very cognizant of the need to meet every threshold… There's strength thresholds he has to meet, and then after that, several weeks of progressions—scripted against small groups, scripted against bigger groups, scripted in 5-on-5, and unscripted random. It's a long progression; once you hit the strength, then you do your thresholds of play, and then you're reconditioning to play real minutes. He's obviously made great strides, but right now, we're still focused on the full strength gain."

It seems like Stevens and the Celtics aren't going to rush Tatum back, no matter what. This is the smart move. If Tatum comes back and gets reinjured, the Celtics could be jeopardizing this season and the next. For now, the Celtics should just keep doing what they are doing and hope Tatum can be 100% for next season, regardless of whether he plays this year.