Jayson Tatum’s big night against the Bulls summarized in four wild stats – NBC Sports Boston
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Jayson Tatum’s big night against the Bulls summarized in four wild stats – NBC Sports Boston

Posted on by Amelia Pressman

Celtics star Jayson Tatum became the first Boston player since Larry Bird to record a 40-point triple-double in a win over the Bulls in Chicago on Saturday. Tatum scored 43 points, 15 rebounds and 10 assists in Boston’s 123-98 triumph.

After a big night like this, we had to dig a little deeper into the data. Here are four more numbers that underscore just how dominant Tatum was on Saturday night:

PWe’re coming to the Windy City

Tatum scored an absurd 26 points on pull-ups. He hit on 9 of 16 pull-up attempts, including going 8 of 14 from beyond the 3-point arc.

How ridiculous is this number? This season, Luka Doncic leads the NBA with an average of 12.3 pull-up points per game. Tatum ranks sixth in the NBA averaging 10 pull-up points per game while shooting 36 percent on those attempts (both from the floor and beyond the 3-point arc).

Tatum’s effective field goal percentage of 81.3 in Saturday’s game was 31.7 percent higher than his season average (49.6) on pull-up attempts.

When Tatum saw a few shots hit, it felt like it could come from almost anywhere. And he did that regularly.

Dot generation machine

In addition to his 43 points scored, Tatum generated 21 assist points from his 10 helpers and finished with 64 points generated. He was also credited with two secondary assists.

That’s a significant jump from Tatum’s season averages: 15.4 assist points per game with 5.7 assists.

Perhaps most impressively, Tatum and All-Star teammate Jaylen Brown combined for 24 potential assists and 18 total actual assists. Her passing produced 41 assist points.

The Celtics are usually at their best when their superstars not only score, but also get everyone else involved.

PPE to the league

Tatum made a public announcement with another PSA – points per shot attempt.

His average of 173.9 points per 100 shot attempts was his second-best performance of the season (only behind his 194.7 PSA in the season opener against the Knicks) and ranks in the 91st percentile of all games in the NBA this season, according to Cleaning Glass data.

All over the glass

Tatum’s 15 rebounds were a season high, but his efficiency in chasing down caroms was particularly impressive. According to NBA tracking, Tatum secured those 15 boards with 21 rebound opportunities. That means he used 71.4 percent of all his rebound chances.

This season, Tatum is averaging 9.3 rebounds on 14.7 chances per game, for a rebound chance percentage of 63.1 percent. This is Boston’s best starting roster, and that number increased 8.3 percent in Saturday’s game.

Among the 83 players in the NBA who average at least 10 rebound chances per game, Tatum ranks 10th in rebound chance percentage, and his mark Saturday night would lead the NBA.

I’m still waiting for the poster dunk score

You’ve probably heard Dunk Score mentioned on our show this season. The NBA developed a metric this season that uses all player tracking data to assign a score to each slam. Key factors include launch distance, maximum vertical height, ball speed through the rim and proximity to the defender.

Jaylen Brown recorded the third-highest dunk score of the season for his poster on Jalen Smith on November 29th. This dunk was registered at 109.6. But somehow the NBA failed to get a dunk score for Tatum’s similar poster slam against Smith on Saturday night.

Of the 29 dunks on Tatum’s NBA dunk registry after Saturday’s game, only three of his four slams appeared in the dunk score, and none were higher than 44.4. It seems like a good bet that Tatum’s dunk over Smith would surpass his season-high of 68.6 (Oct. 26 vs. Detroit).

Or maybe Tatum’s slam broke the dunk scale.

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