The usage of Boston Celtics star forward Jayson Tatum was among the major headlines concerning Team USA at the 2024 Paris Olympics. The Paris experience was both euphoric and humbling for Tatum, whose limited role and benching caused countless discussions within the basketball realm.
Tatum himself admitted that it was a “tough personal experience.”
This brings us to a recent social media activity by Tatum that has been turning lots of heads.
Amid the celebration of Team USA’s 98-87 win over Le Bleus on Saturday’s Olympic gold medal match at Bercy Arena in Paris, rapper Vince Staples hopped on social media and appeared to show support for Jayson Tatum.
“WE WILL AVENGE JAYSON TATUM,” read Staples’ post on X (the social media platform formerly known as Twitter) that Tatum shared via Instagram Stories.
Perhaps Tatum just tried to appreciate the love shown by Staples by sharing the latter’s X post which has gotten over 7,600 likes and more than 1,400 reposts at the time of this writing.
Tatum ended up winning a gold medal in Paris despite his minimal impact on the floor. He was benched in two of Team USA’s six games and averaged just 17.7 minutes. His Celtics teammates, Derrick White And Jrue Holiday played in more games and averaged more minutes than the former Duke Blue Devils star.
Considering that Tatum played a bigger role during the Celtics’ championship run in the 2023-24 NBA season than White and Holiday, many thought that his scant playing time at the Olympics was disrespectful and plainly did not make sense. Team USA head coach Steve Kerr had already explained his decision to keep Tatum stuck on the bench most of the time, but that apparently is not enough to quell the emotions of Tatum’s supporters, as evidenced by Staples’ post.
The two games where Tatum was not used were both against Nikola Jokic and Serbia. With LeBron James and Kevin Durant on the squad, Kerr had a difficult time prioritizing Tatum’s minutes over the two elder Team USA statesmen. Tatum put up just 5.3 points and shot 38.1 percent from the field in the City of Light.
But at the end of the day, what mattered the most was that Team USA avoided an embarrassing outcome in Paris. Had the Americans failed to win the gold, a torrent of second-guessing about Tatum’s playing time would have flooded every social media platform.
Social media reacts to Vince Staples’ sentiment about Jayson Tatum
Fans have varied reactions to Staples’ support for Jayson Tatum.
“Nah I gotta know the connection between Vince and Tatum 😂 ain’t JT from St. Louis? Vince just a fan of his game fr,” said X user @justinbrosemer.
“RARE Vince L and when I say rare I mean rare,” chimed in @shloogs.
“Avenge what?” a seemingly confused @CareyOndre said. “I’m tired of this bruh. BOOKER WAS BETTER THAN HIM IN PARIS. Simple. Ant was better than him in Paris. KD IS BETTER THAN HIM. Jayson Tatum got the minutes he was supposed to get. Shit simple. We won GOLD.”
“a man who’s always known what he’s talkin bout.” – @itsjjwrld
“Vince on the right side of history.” – @yashflee
“You from Cali you suppose to hate him the most.” – @C_Perrymon
From @JoMa1217: “(Tatum posting that Vince Staples tweet is *probably* him laughing at himself, but everyone is taking it the exact opposite lol)”
Follow Us
Subscribe