Jayson Tatum's 2021 season isn't going super smoothly as we thought it would. The Boston Celtics star has had some amazing games, but there have also been some… duds from him. He hasn't been perfect, but Tatum has been undeniably one of the reasons that the team has been competitive in most of their games.
The Celtics avenged their ugly loss to the Knicks two days earlier, and most of the heavy lifting was done by Tatum's partner in crime, Jaylen Brown. After the game, former Cs center Kendrick Perkins praised his old team for winning… but also subtly threw some shade at Jayson Tatum.
Jaylen Brown completely took over this game with his first triple double of his career! Played a perfect game while Jayson Tatum went 6/14 from the field. They got the win tho! Carry on…
— Kendrick Perkins (@KendrickPerkins) January 9, 2022
Naturally, the current Celtics star took offense at Perkins' tweet, and he fired back in response.
Normalizing uplifting one man without bringing another one down… JB played great it’s alright to leave it at that https://t.co/hC2mGhNljQ
— Jayson Tatum (@jaytatum0) January 9, 2022




Tatum didn't exactly play well, but he wasn't bad: 19 points on just barely below 50% shooting along with 3 rebounds and an assist is a solid performance. Perkins' tweet could've been simply pointing out the fact that the Celtics winning with a pedestrian game from Tatum is a good thing. However, JT clearly didn't take it that way.
For his part, Perkins apologized, saying he didn't mean to throw shade at the Celtics star's way.
It’s not bringing you down homeboy! My point is that I’m ready to see both of you have great games at the same time! Just like the rest of the world we want to see if y’all can co exist and I’m standing on that! Carry on youngster… https://t.co/WM0bE6o3nI
— Kendrick Perkins (@KendrickPerkins) January 9, 2022
Hopefully, Tatum can take a page out of Michael Jordan's playbook and take this perceived disrespect personally. The Celtics sit two games below .500, as they've clearly struggled adjusting to a new coach and a new system. Everyone knows the potential of the Tatum-Brown duo: we saw these two take LeBron James' Cavaliers teams to Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals. Maybe a little push like this will jumpstart the team's motivation anew.