When RJ was matched up again Tatum in the 3rd and the 4th quarter, he was able to hold him to 1 for 5 shooting to help get the Knicks back into the game. RJ always seems to play great defense against Tatum and was a lot more effective than Grimes last night as Tatum shot 5/5 (100%) when defended by Grimes. Should we have RJ be the main Tatum defender for future matchups?

Nice to see RJ start the season off strong on both sides of the ball. Hope he can keep it up for the rest of the season.

  • joorralB
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    11 months ago

    Rj is the only one with size at that position and he’s strong. Until we get a better replacement we can’t just trade him just because without have a strong sf at that position. I love grimes and iq defense but they are too little compared to to all the great wings in the league

  • TreSevenB
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    11 months ago

    I’ve hated the Grimes-on-Tatum, RJ-on-Brown matchup since the beginning of last year. Tatum is just too big for Grimes and Brown is a good offensive player, it’s not a situation where you’re wasting your best perimeter defender by sticking him on somebody that’s not a scoring threat. RJ has the strength to guard Tatum down low and the size to contest his shots. If anything, I feel like I’d even rather have Randle on Tatum if the Celtics aren’t in a double big lineup

  • awrkB
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    11 months ago

    RJ has lowkey done a great job guarding Tatum all throughout his career

  • solo118B
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    11 months ago

    Sometimes I think we need to share things like this with Thibs

  • pagenotdisplayedB
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    11 months ago

    I wouldn’t overanalyze the shooting numbers from one game. Trust Thibs to play the matchups that give us the best chance to win. Grimes is an elite point-of-attack defender, and RJ has shown to be a bit slow footed.