Celtics figuring out ways to get by without Jayson Tatum is extremely encouraging

For years, the Celtics have basically been a wagon whenever Jayson Tatum is on the floor. He has become a net rating cheat code of sorts, quietly akin to players like Nikola Jokic. But it has definitely become an issue for the Celtics in keeping things afloat when Tatum is on the bench. They’ve long tried to stagger rotations to make sure that Jaylen Brown was leading the second unit and at least one of the Jays was always on the floor, but it wasn’t working.

In fact, I have to imagine that those numbers played a role in the team’s decision to trade Brown, deeming that it wasn’t sensible to pay supermax money to a player who couldn’t carry bench units without Tatum.

But early on in this…