Giannis Antetokounmpo won Eastern Conference Player of the Month honors over Jayson Tatum today. A Celtics beat writer fails to see how.
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It goes without saying that Giannis Antetokounmpo is perhaps the most complete player in basketball. If we talk about physical dominance on the court, he’s certainly #1.
After all, this is a man who puts up 29/12/5 in his sleep on any slow regular season night. And there are nights when there’s just no stopping the man – he’s a wrecking ball of sorts during those times.
But having said that, it is also eminently true that Giannis has been overshadowed by other players this year. Nikola Jokic is set to win his second straight MVP trophy by the looks of it. Joel Embiid is markedly better than him right now. And one Jayson Tatum too is shooting up the ranks.
Jayson Tatum and Giannis Antetokounmpo are not being treated equitably, according to a Celtics writer
Jayson Tatum and his Boston Celtics have had the story of NBA basketball in the calendar year of 2022 thus far. This Celtics team was reeling at a 16-17 record after a loss to Milwaukee on Christmas Day.
However, they’ve turned things around in a spectacular fashion since then. In the 49 games thus, Boston has won 35 and lost only 14. They went on an unbeaten streak of sorts whenever their preferred starting lineup was available to play.
Despite this team success and the excellent play of Jayson Tatum, he got overlooked by the NBA journalism community. Instead, Giannis Antetokounmpo got voted as the Eastern Conference Player of the Month for March/April.
Marc D’Amico, who’s one of the most reputed Boston Celtics beat guys, isn’t quite on board with it. According to D’Amico, the distribution is hardly fair.
How in the hell did Tatum get three Player of the Week honors for March/April, Giannis got none, and Giannis won Player of the Month. Very strange.
— Marc D’Amico (@Marc_DAmico) April 12, 2022
While D’Amico makes a ton of sense, it is also very difficult to pick a particular side in this debate. One must remember that these are 2 different type of athletes with different skillsets in different situations on different teams. There’s no true 1-to-1 comparison possible for them. Unless they’re on the same team!