Fanduel– +1800
Vegasinsider– +1700
Draftkings– +1700
Fox Sports– +2000
The Boston Celtics currently hold the no. 3 seed in the East behind the Toronto Raptors and Milwaukee Bucks. With an eight-game regular season set by the league, teams are looking to fight and crawl their way into comfortable seeding positions. This is how the Celtics can set themselves up to win the 2020 NBA Finals.
With only eight games being played to end the 2019-2020 regular season, it will be tough for the Celtics to catch the Raptors who hold the no. 2 seed and are three games ahead of Boston. The no. 2 seed is important because whoever claims it will most likely face off against a defective Nets team. The Brooklyn Nets are without Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant and in recent news, have lost Deandre Jordan, Spencer Dinwiddie and potentially Michael Beasley, going home due to testing positive for COVID-19.
Toronto and Boston play each other once during this eight-game stretch which will most likely be a key game for both franchises. The Celtics do however hold the tiebreaker against Toronto which could be the deciding factor. The Celtics would have an easy road to the semi-finals as a no. 2 seed and hopefully avoid Milwaukee.
The 2019-20 regular season so far has been undoubtedly kind to Boston Celtics’ third-year wing Jayson Tatum. After a rough second year many deemed a “sophomore slump”, the 22-year-old became an All-Star and his team’s undisputed number one option. Look for Tatum to shoot the lights out in these upcoming playoffs.
Tatum in his first-ever postseason as a rookie averaged 18.5 points with a .471 field goal percentage. He struggled in his sophomore year in the postseason averaging 15.2 points with a .438 field goal percentage which is due to Irving being in the starting in the lineup. With Irving gone, Tatum will take on a larger leadership role and have more confidence in his game which Irving took from the whole Celtics group in the 2018-2019 playoffs.
Tatum needs to show the league he is a future MVP caliber player. With stars around him, it should be easy for him to catch fire and make a long postseason run.
Gordon Hayward has to step it up in order for the Celtics to have a successful postseason run. Photo courtesy of Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/profile/gordon-hayward/#7ca425121fff.
Back in 2017, the Boston organization was absolutely thrilled to be uniting Gordon back with his former college coach Brad Stevens. Signing a four-year contract with over $128 million guaranteed, the Celtics knew they were getting an All-Star caliber player. But it has not been playing out the way Boston fans have envisioned.
Gordon has not been playing consistently throughout his time in Boston and some people may blame that on his injury suffered back in 2017. Statistically, Gordon is perfectly okay this season, averaging 17.1 points, 6.6 rebounds and 4.1 assists. Good for a ranking of 56th, 39th and 49th in the league respectively. He’s settled in as the team’s fourth offensive option behind Kemba Walker, Jaylen Brown, and of course Tatum.
However, Hayward in the 2018-2019 playoffs only averaged 9.6 points per game in 30 minutes! It seems his production is consistently inconsistent, and it worries Celtics fans that he will not step up this time around. The time for him to prove himself and his contract worth is right now in these upcoming playoffs. Gordon is the x-Factor.
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