It’s been the summer that completely changed the landscape of the NBA.
The super team has been replaced by the super duo, with pairs of super stars teaming up across the league to completely stack the list of championship contenders.
Kawhi Leonard and Paul George rocked the league when it was announced that Leonard was heading to the Los Angeles Clippers, with the Clippers also completing a trade for George. The double move gives the Clippers one of the best wing duos in the NBA.
But one Boston Celtics executive believes the next great wing duo is forming right in Boston with Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.
“Everyone loves Kawhi (Leonard) and PG (Paul George) as a wing duo,” the executive told Keith P. Smith of SB Nation’s Celtics Blog. “We think we have our own version growing right here in Boston. It’s gonna take a couple more years, but those guys are stars. And neither has an ego. They just want to play and win.”
There were some rumblings that Tatum and Brown could have been trade bait for Anthony Davis or in another move to acquire an established superstar, but it appears now the price for Tatum was insane, while others were equally excited about Brown.
“That’s the guy we wanted to steal,” an opposing executive told Smith of Brown. “Our thought was ‘They have (Jayson) Tatum and (Gordon) Hayward and drafted another wing, maybe they are out on Brown’ and boy were we wrong. The conversation got about as far as the ‘Jay’ sound out of my mouth and they said ‘Neither Jayson or Jaylen are on the table for you’. So, yeah. They love that kid.”
The pair certainly has an exciting future ahead of them. But Leonard and George are two of the premier two-way players in the game. And with Tatum just 21 years old and Brown 22, it might be a little early to throw those kind of expectations their way.
